The Company You Keep...

Part One

William folded the picture up and started to put it back in his wallet. He paused thinking that he really should just throw it out. Forget about her. If his Commander saw that he carried a picture of her he might get the wrong idea.

It wasn't the first time he had contemplated this. He put the picture back in his wallet. It wouldn't be the last.

He stared at the ceiling in the little bedroom he was currently not sleeping in. Remembering their last morning together. He had been so excited to get started. To really make a difference.

"It's not going to be what you think."

She had told him this before. He wanted to steer the conversation away from the topic. He was worried about what she might say. He was worried someone might overhear. His regiment was packing up supplies, getting ready to leave. But she was talking and he didn't want her to stop either. He didn't know how long it would be before they would come back here. 

"You haven't been out there either. It might be exactly what I think. You could be wrong."

She gave him the don't be an idiot look again then rubbed her shaved head. "I have a good idea what it's like out there. I have a better idea what it's like here. I'm not blinded by some sort of misplaced patriotism."

"Patriotism is never misplaced." He puffed up a bit at the suggestion. 

"So noble. So honorable. That will change."

"I will always be honorable!" He really was starting to get insulted now. 

"I know you think that. But as you sit here eating breakfast your friends are stealing everything that isn't nailed down. What are you going to leave me with? No food, that's for sure."

"They are packing supplies, they aren't stealing!"

"Supplies? They are my things. They are taking my things."

"You will get reimbursed by the Army for anything that is requisitioned."

She laughed her bitter laugh. "Do you still believe that? Oh, William, you are naive."

She walked to the table and leaned close to him and whispered in his ear, "There are things that can never be repaid. There are things that once stolen can never be returned. You are going to have choices to make once you're out there. Make the right ones."

Then she walked out of the kitchen and in to the yard where his Commander was working with a group to round up the chickens to take with them. If they would lay eggs while they were in transit that would be best but if not they could kill them and have meat for dinner. William watched from the window as she strode out in to the yard. She walked up behind one of the men that had been sharing the house with them. One that William had never liked. He was the type to take things that weren't his to take, and to leave bruises on white skin that couldn't be ignored. As she neared him William saw a flash of silver in her hand. He could have shouted out a warning right then but didn't. He tried later to tell himself that he hadn't known what she was going to do but that wasn't honorable. He couldn't lie even to himself.

But he never told anyone else that he had seen it coming. He wasn't that stupid. 

She plunged the knife into his brain. Targeting the small vulnerable spot at the back of his neck. It was fast. Up and in. He dropped without a sound. Then she had turned and opened her arms to his Commander, "Fuck you." Those were her last words. He shot her at least 8 times. It wasn't quick and clean. She had been better than them all the way to the end. 

That had been two years ago. 

William had done and seen a lot since then. 

It's why he couldn't always sleep. 

The room was starting to fill with sunlight. He didn't want to look at the floor. He wanted to keep looking at the ceiling. He wanted to keep replaying the memories of her cooking him breakfast. He wanted to go back in time and listen to her about leaving. He wanted to talk her into going with him. Smuggling her out from behind the fence. Living a life where she could grow her hair back or get another tattoo or cook like she loved to...

He looked at the floor. At the stain where the blood had pooled. He didn't want to think about that. 

"Gosser! You're smaller than me, go see if you can reach her."

His friends, as she had always called them and now he even thought of them that way, had been laughing and joking outside the door to the room. They had stopped at this house not expecting to find it occupied. Most people moved on if they knew the 2nd was on the march. But sometimes they didn't. Then they would hide. Sometimes that worked. If they were only looking for supplies they would sometimes pretend they didn't see anyone. But if they were looking for other things...

William had gone into the room and looked around. He could hear her breathing. She was trying to be quiet but the panic had set in so each breath was a quiet whimper. She had to be under the bed. It was a small bed, low to the ground. They could have lifted it off of her maybe but it would be easier for him to slide under there and just drag her out. His friends closed the door to make sure she couldn't run once he got her out. 

He grabbed her arm and drug her across the floor to the middle of the room, she blinked up at him, the fear turning to confusion, "Billy?"

He hadn't been called Billy in a long time. It was familiar, but not him, not anymore. 

"Billy? It's you, isn't it? It's me, Suzanne. From Mrs. Springfield's class. Remember? We sat next to each other..." She trailed off and then shook her head. Remembering where they were. Who they were. Just how far away Mrs. Springfield's third grade class really was.

William stared at her. "Suzanne. Yeah. I remember you." And he did. She had always been so nice to everyone. One of those people who even in the third grade didn't give in to bullying the weird kids. She never made fun of the quiet boy who just liked to listen to people talk.

There was a bang on the door, "Did you get her Gosser?? Save some for the rest of us!"

Suzanne closed her eyes as her body shook with fear. "Billy..."

"I'm sorry." He reached up and scratched his own face, then yelled as he shot her.

The door slammed open as he stood over the bleeding out body. "Crazy bitch attacked me."

"Ah shit...well that's no fun."

They drug her out into the yard and burned her on the trash pile. 

He slept in her room that night. Spoils of war. 

He put his hand over his wallet, making sure it, and everything it contained, was secure in his pocket. She had been right.

It wasn't what he thought it would be. He thought he had made the right choice though. The honorable one. What would she have thought?

He heard her voice in his head,

"Fuck you."