Ad Astra Per Aspera [2] - Band of Brothers

36 | panic

" When grief is deepest, words are fewest."

- Ann Voskamp

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As the days rolled on with Easy, especially after Shifty's accident, there was a felt uptick in many of the paratroopers' of the need to get angry with people or fight, or walk around with a weapon in hand completely restless with nothing to do.

Hazel told herself that she wouldn't shoot that gun at a person until she had to jump into Japan - she was done fighting a war with weapons and not words. So Hazel retreated to the bunking area of 2nd platoon most days, where maybe one or two members would be laying around for an afternoon nap when PT training was over, and write letters out to people that were gone from Easy.

Her mother of course, but then out to Bill, Joe, Buck, Smokey, and now Shifty. They were fairly long letters, quite to long she felt, but she missed them more than she could imagine, and wrote her heart out into the letters for them to see. Sure, her handwriting, as mentioned by Frank in the hospital, was anything but neat and styled, but it was truthful, slightly messy handwriting, written with pure love.

And she visited APO sometimes for hours on end giving and receiving little letters and then running into Speirs and the two would end up cracking a joke or two before he was needed by Battalion Staff, ie Winters.

And she spent many nights with Joe by the docks, and he would always let her rest her weary head in his lap and he'd run his fingers through hair, softly massaging away the worries, looking down at her in the moonlight, the epitome of beauty she thought as he would smile. He always knew how to calm her down, and just let her be herself with him.

She loved him, so much, and after that kiss, it was just like they were picking up where they left off, except maybe there were more secret kisses or Joe pulling her from the group to press a kiss to her lips in a tiny alley way, just to see her smile or giggle, or to see her eyes shine.

It was the little things, Hazel always appreciated the little things, especially with Joe.

Lizzie was sitting currently in the aid station, attempting to read the Grey's Anatomy book open in her lap, but she kept reading the same line over and over to the point where she didn't know what she was even reading anymore.

It was just words on a page.

Her mind tortured by the letter from her family about her grandmother, who was only getting sicker. It hurt more than Lizzie could imagine and she always felt it, but her grandmother was the one who had helped her so much and now this was going on and occurring.

But for years almost half a decade, she had been fighting this slow and painful death that was consuming her.

Lizzie felt a sense to throw something, but instead just slammed the book shut and slid it off her knees to the ground angrily, as it made a thump noise, before putting her head in her hands. She couldn't focus. She couldn't focus on anything. She tried having a conversation with Tab at breakfast but it went in one ear and out the other and left the conversation without as much as a good bye, before retreating here where she tried talking to Gene about their knew set of inventory, but instead kept staring at his eye and began wondering if she'd never see her grandmother's eyes again and soon enough had to just sit down alone.