It was a clear and warm afternoon. The few clouds in the blue sky were as fluffy and white as new fallen snow during winter. The wild flowers grew in full bloom, spreading color across the small meadow, and making you want nothing more, other than just to sleep in its sweet aroma. I smile at this pleasant day, as I sit in the center waiting for a certain beau. I can vaguely here the distant bird songs in the trees, or the distant burble of the brook on the edge of the meadow. For my mind keeps on going to the pleasant memories, we’ve had together, before he went off to the disastrous World War. I sigh as the sun is finally warming up my very cold body. “Life is finally good,” I mutter to myself, as I settle in the ground to watch the clouds.
After a while of doing this though, I start noticing something wrong, very wrong. I put my head up, resting on my shoulders. I look left, then right, and then left again. Everything appears normal. The flowers still as vibrant, and fragrant as they can be, the brook is still burbling. And the clouds seemed as fluffy and white as a baby sheep. Though, I still have a nagging feeling that something is definitely wrong. I try to shake it off, but the feeling persisted, saying it’s nothing really important. I try to go back and continue doing what I was doing before, this silly thing happened. Then suddenly I knew what was wrong, the birds. The birds weren’t chirping their springtime tunes. They were dead silent as a mouse, and when they do that…
“Oh no,” I say getting up to see what was wrong. I run towards the woods as if my life depended on it. My hair was flying wildly, my eyes almost watery as I ran at the fastest speed I’ve ever ran in my life. I start stumbling over my own two feet, and then fell. I start to land forward, putting my arms out in front of me, before the ground hit my face. I breathe hard, almost hyperventilating, and then tell myself to stop it, get up, and just take a couple of deep breaths, before continuing on to the forest. Once that was done, I start running towards the forest again, ignoring the throbbing in my side.
Once I reach the threshold to the forest, I stop and start taking more deep breaths. My heartbeat slowing back down to normal. I look around, all looked completely normal, except for the fact that there’s an eerie silence in place of the chirping birds. My mind starts coming up with possibilities of why the birds disappeared. Gunshot? Bomb? Plane? “No,” I say to myself, “I would have heard anything if it actually happened.” I look around again, deciding my options to go explore what happened, or not to explore. For an almost always-curious girl like me the choice was obvious, so I take a step forward. “But wait,” I say to myself. What if my beau is waiting for me back in the meadow, wondering where I am, probably out looking for me at this instant. I look over my shoulder, to make sure he isn’t there, so I can go on. Though, for some reason I have the feeling that he would do the same thing if he were I.
I take another step forward, then another and another, till I was going onto a well familiar trail that Jonathan and I always go on, to get away from other people for the while. I could hear the soft crunch of pine needles, and leaves, and other stuff as I step on them. I have a feeling that the heart of the forest was where everything started. My breath starts quickening, as I get closer to Jonathan’s and mine hide out. It was where we’ve had our first kiss, and our last before he went away. It was also the place where we’ve met on accident, feeling lost so long ago. A smile start s playing on my lips as nostalgia takes over. Memory, after memory, the good, and the bad, and the ones in between start playing in my mind. And before I knew it, I’ve stopped, in a clearing, in the middle of the forest.
There was nothing there, except for a fallen log covered in moss. I smile, it was the same exactly as I’ve left it. Except the quiet was eerie, without the birds singing. It started pounding on my head, making it won’t to explode. I close my eyes, and start shaking my head, forcing myself to stop it. After that, I take a couple of deep breaths, and take a step, then another, and another. Then I stop again, and look everywhere at the forest. My eyes scan for a bird or two, but couldn’t find any. My eyes rest on the log. For on the log lay a watch, with a bouquet of white calla lilies, and a cream-colored envelope. I run to it, tears pricking my eyes, as I pick of the envelope. I instantly recognize Jonathan’s handwriting, fearing the worst I pick it up.
My dearest Rosie, it read.
If you are currently reading this, than you must know that I am dead. Minutes after I wrote your last letter that you have probably received in the mail, there was a surprise attack directed at my camp, leaving many injured or dead. I am one of the injured ones, and I just had enough energy to write this letter to you. Well while you are reading this, I just want you to know just one thing.
“What is that?” I say to myself.
It is that I love you very much.
Tears start dripping down coming freely now. But I don’t care my poor beau is dead! Dead! I dry them up, to continue reading the rest of the letter, which was saying how when he came back home, he was to propose to me. And I smile a bit, wishing, desperately wishing for that to come true. And he began describing his love for me, by giving me his most prized watch. Saying to watch out for it as if it was his flesh and soul. I silent promised him that, then pick up the watch and start smoothing my hand over it. I re read the letter, over and over again, always remembering the last lines.
I love you Rosie, and as time will tell. We’ll be together again, just count on it. Because without you by my side, it will just be complete hell.
“I love you too Jonathan,” I say loudly for the whole world and heaven to hear.
