Marie suddenly leaped up, pointing toward the side of the farmhouse. “Marc!” she called. She lifted her skirts and darted toward the man, wrapping her arms around him when she reached him.
“That’s her husband,” Julie explained, falling back into English. “I read about him in the family mementos. The letters my grandmother wrote.” She turned her head toward the young girl, Marion, who’d spun around to spot her father. “He’s said to be a stern, if loving man. He died fighting in the battle at Oradour-sur-Glane, protecting my grandmother.” Julie shuddered for a moment, peering at Peter. “You feel okay?” she asked.
“Of course. Just … The battle yesterday has me worried.”
Julie shook her head. “Anything that happened in the past isn’t guaranteed to happen again. We have to proceed with the mission today.”
“And then? We go back together?” Peter said. He noted a hint of passion in his voice. He tried to hide the fear he had—that Julie would choose to live here, without him.
“Of course,” Julie said, taking his hand. She gave him a reassuring look. “Let’s head inside, yeah? Petit-dejeuner? I know you know that one.” She winked at him.
They walked inside. Emmett stood in the dining room, strapping his suspenders over his shoulders. He reached out to shake the hand of the man in front of him: Marc. Julie’s great-grandfather. “Enchanté,” Emmett said.
“Please. I speak English,” Marc said, bringing his hands out wide in explanation. “I think I saw you at the battle yesterday.”
Emmett blushed, placing his hand the back of his neck. “Anything I can do to help out,” he said.
“We appreciate it. We try to keep Oradour-sur-Glane strong, even in the wake of the Nazi terror.” Marc wrapped his arm around his pretty wife, Marie. “We will not fall to such treachery.”
“I understand,” Emmett said firmly.
Marc began to sit at the table. He drew a napkin over his lap. “We’ve just learned this morning at the town meeting that the Vichy are joining ranks with us, with the resistance. After the Nazi attempt to destroy us yesterday—after all the events in the south and in Paris—the Vichy have decided to right their wrongs, so you say.” Marc tapped his forehead with his finger.
A feeling of heightened emotion passed through the room. Peter swallowed. He knew that the Vichy weren’t meant to join ranks with the resistance until at least a year after this time. What would happen to the timeline now?
“Well. We must get you some food before you go out on your mission secrete,” Marie spoke up, inserting her way into the tension like a knife. “Or. Le petit-dejeuner, like you said,” she said with a smile, tapping Peter on the shoulder.
Julie whispered into Peter’s ear, noting his small moment of shock at Marie’s intimate touch. “Don’t worry. The French like to flirt. With everyone,” she said, laughing.
They sat at the table and enjoyed a multi-faceted conversation, with many different dialects, many different flavors of speech coming together. Peter watched as Julie laughed with her family members, giving them such a brilliant smile. He realized that this was the first family reunion she’d ever had, really. So much had happened between 1943 and 2013 in her family’s timeline. She’d been given a chance to reboot, to see the castle before the ruin.
Marc and Marie said they were meaning to walk to town that day, that they could show Julie, Peter, and Emmett around on their way to find the memo maker. Julie tapped Peter’s knee, her eyebrows waggling. She wanted this more than anything, Peter knew.
“We’d love to,” Peter said finally. Emmett looked at him with wide, loaded eyes. He was, perhaps, angry. He wanted to get on with the mission, to complete their time here. But Peter was split. He wanted to make Julie happy, beyond anything.
“Just a quick trip,” Peter whispered to Emmett on their way from the farmhouse.
Emmett nodded. “I’m getting anxious, Peter. One wrong turn after another. And we’re finally here.” He rushed up to grab some of their equipment.
Peter felt like his stomach was gnawing at him, that he was forgetting something. He grabbed Julie’s hand as they left the farmhouse. He looked back at the house for only a moment as Marion reached toward Julie’s other hand, asking her a timid question that only Julie could hear.
The farmhouse seemed to gleam, like it was wafting, lost in the clouds just a field away. The window shutters flapped briefly in the breeze. The cow still stood in the yard, churning her cud and watching them go. Peter took a deep breath, trying to focus. Today was the day they’d been working toward since he’d signed up on that fateful day—since he’d understood, finally, that he was meant for something bigger than himself, bigger than his problems. Since he’d said that goodbye to his children.
He watched Julie engage with the little girl walking alongside her. He tried to draw up an image of his own children in his mind. What did they look like, again? Tori’s blonde hair; that way she smirked at him when he did something so parent-like, so annoying. He didn’t really feel like a parent anymore.
Marie and Marc were far out in front of them, now. Emmett, Peter, Julie, and Marion hurried to catch them. The French couple were holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes as they spoke. Their love was intimate, fully-formed. “We’ve lived in this village since we were born,” Marie said, turning toward Peter and Julie. “We met when we were children.”
The town appeared before them, then. It was so beautiful, sunlit and sparkling in the beautiful day. Peter saw young children playing in the streets, old people eating at cafés. It was like the previous day’s events hadn’t even occurred. Like the war was raging on somewhere else, without affecting this beautiful place.
Emmett elbowed him out of his reverie. “We need to go,” he said. His eyes looked glazed over, serious.
“That’s Marion’s school,” Marie interrupted, nodding toward a small schoolhouse across from a bakery.
Marion started speaking rapid French to Julie: about her classes, about her friends. Julie nodded along; not a bit of interest in the memo of Project Sledgehammer showed on her face. Peter didn’t know what to do.
Peter stood next to Emmett, feeling a little nervous. Everything around him seemed too perfect, too serene. The bakery next to him emitted such tantalizing smells. He peered in and saw an old man bringing freshly baked baguettes into the world. They shone in the light.
Peter noted, as he stood waiting to get away, to proceed with the mission, that several Vichy soldiers were stationed at various points throughout the town. They stood in lines, ready to protect. Ready to maintain the structure of this timid place.
Marc walked toward him and gestured. “If anything is to happen, they’ll protect us. Now,” he said.
Peter nodded.
“You care for a cigarette?” Marc asked. Peter agreed, and he found himself leaning against the wall in casual intimacy with this long-dead man. They smoked quietly, watching the women as they spoke near the schoolhouse. All at once, Marion scurried back toward them and rushed into the bakery. Julie and Marie followed her slowly, speaking to each other in a way that made Peter think they were sisters.
Inside, Peter could see little Marion gazing at the small pastries as they glistened. The red marmalade in the center was puddled high, making Peter’s mouth water. The old baker approached the little girl and leaned toward her, whispering a secret in her ear.
Marie laughed as the five adults watched this. “They have quite a friendship,” she said. “He gives her sweets; she gives him smiles.” She shook her head, and the adults laughed in the sunlight as little Marion ducked into the back room, where Peter assumed more sweets were lurking. Perhaps the baker would let her lick the spoon, like Peter’s mother had all those years before.
Suddenly, they heard it again. That noise. That horn. Peter brought his arm around Julie, trying to protect her. Marc tossed his cigarette to the ground in a way that reminded Peter of a cowboy in an old western.
Marie threw her arms around her husband, crying out
, “Qu-est’ce que c’est?”
“It’s the Nazis. They’ve come back.”
The adults from both this past and this future listened as they heard the horn again. They heard the crunching of boots against the road; they heard great wheels. “Tanks,” Emmett said. “They have tanks.”
Peter ducked around the building with his arm around Julie. He gestured toward Marie, toward Marc. Toward Emmett. From this side, they were protected from the coming army. But they could see them as they approached. This time, there were several hundred of them. They were in Jeeps, in tanks. They had strapped enormous guns to the sides of their vehicles. They came forward like an enormous wall of hate.
“They are angry about yesterday,” Marc whispered. He pushed his wife against the wall, then kissed her passionately, on her mouth, on her cheek. “Mon amore,” he murmured. And then he was gone, rushing down the street with other men who’d heard the alarm, who understood: now was the time they had to protect their town. Yesterday had only been a trial run.
Marie seemed completely tormented with this knowledge. She pulled at her hair. Tears rushed down her cheeks. Peter knew they needed to get to safety. He turned toward Emmett, but Emmett’s eyes were dark. “This is it,” he said.
Suddenly, Marie leaped up from the wall, howling. “Mon bébé!” She rushed around, into the bakery. She had to find Marion, they understood.
Julie was looking at Peter with frightened eyes. “What should we do, Peter?”
Peter felt the pounding weight of the past few weeks on his shoulders, on his chest. He felt like he was going to pass out. He tried to search through his rushing mind, to find an appropriate thought. He turned toward Emmett, and they both nodded at the same time. In that moment, they knew this was the only timeline they had. They had to fight.
Peter kissed Julie passionately, just as he’d seen Marc do a minute before. “Run inside, Julie,” he said. “We’ll be back soon. We’ll stay alive,” he assured her. She nodded at him, her eyes brimming.
He spun around and followed Emmett toward the road. He paused for just a moment as he saw Julie follow Marie into the bakery to find little Marion. They would to be safe.
Emmett and Peter met up with some men from the resistance at the corner, huddled together, barking orders. They had weapons strapped to their bodies. A few extra weapons had been thrown to the side, and Peter and Emmett grabbed them, slinging rifles over their shoulders. The resistance didn’t have much to them; they were thin, so French. Used to a different way of life. But the passion in their eyes was strong.
The men began to fall into rows. Peter could hear the tanks getting closer. Their wheels were spinning faster, stronger. Their great noses—those penetrating rifles—were pointed right at them. Peter felt naked.
The resistance started to march forward, to meet the Nazi regime at the edge of the city. Peter tried to count them. They were outnumbered in ways he couldn’t comprehend. He swallowed, watching Emmett’s face as they marched. They weren’t trained soldiers; they hadn’t been meant to die on the battlefield of Oradour-sur-Glane—a town that officially had no hope.
The resistance stopped, then. Their marching feet landed solidly in the sand. A single tank—an antiquated one from the previous World War—was wheeled forth on the resistance side. Peter didn’t hear a single sound on the battlefield. The Nazi faces held no emotion.
Suddenly, Peter began to hear something—like an itching in the back of his brain. He felt the tension grow around him and the other soldiers; he felt his anxiety rise. Then they saw it: a plane. It skirted closer and closer, soaring across the incredible blue sky. Peter brought his gun up, his eyes following the plane as it came closer and closer.
It dropped something. It shot toward them, coming fast. Peter’s mind raced. A V-1 flying bomb, he realized. They’d sent a bomb directly toward him, toward all of Oradour-sur-Glane. He felt a scream beginning in his stomach.
But the French had realized it, as well. They’d begun to charge the Germans, to outrun the bomb that was heading their way. Shots were fired on both sides as the bomb flew closer—a consistent shadow, a feeling of rushing anxiety. Emmett lurched forward, toward the Nazi army, fear blazing in his eyes. Peter followed him, his rifle poised. He wove through resistance soldiers, and he cocked the great gun, firing toward the Jeeps that were now so close to him—just the length of a football field away.
The blast deafened Peter, nearly throwing him to the ground. He tucked his chin to his chest and braced himself for the shockwave. The seconds passed eternally slowly, and just as Peter felt like the concussion wouldn’t come, the wave knocked them forward, into the cobblestone road. He dropped his rifle in the fall, but groped after it as he rolled to the side.
Next to him, a man let out a great cackle, a great hiccup. Peter lurched his head to the right and watched the man as he fell on his back, a hole forming in his chest. He brought his hand toward the rushing blood. The Frenchman’s body looked so small. He was losing air, losing blood. The war drained him, closed his eyes.
All around Peter, people were falling, dying. They screamed empty French words into the raucous day. War wasn’t meant for such a beautiful morning.
Peter urged himself forward, toward the Nazi army. Another guided bomb was rushing toward them. He saw it to his right; it was closer, sent from the ground. Emmett suddenly spun. The whites of his eyes were stark when compared to the blood coursing down his cheeks—other people’s blood, Peter knew. He wondered how much of it was on his own body.
But Emmett knew. He knew that the bomb was heading right for them, that Peter was too out of it, too shocked in this strange, other dimension. Emmett flung himself onto Peter as the bomb shook into the earth to Peter’s right, taking arms and legs and hearts and minds from all the soldiers around them.
Peter could feel the shudder, the silence, as Emmett pushed him to the ground, to safety, protecting him with his body. Peter’s arms and legs were covered completely, and his face was tucked beneath Emmett’s chest as Emmett fell upon him.
Peter coughed, bringing the first noise into the now-hushed field. “Emmett,” he whispered. Emmett was a dead weight on his body. Didn’t he know it was over? “Emmett. God, you saved me. I was an idiot—”
But Emmett didn’t answer. Peter felt something warm begin to fall on him, dripping. He began to lurch back, to push Emmett off him. His heart was racing. He pushed Emmett up, and he could see that his eyes were pulled open, that his ear had been stripped clean off by the bomb.
Peter leaned Emmett against the ground, jostling his shoulder lightly. “Hey. Buddy?” Emmett still wasn’t answering. His lips were so loose on his face. Peter looked around him, noting that his was the only movement in the field. A huge cloud of smoke had taken shape around him. He couldn’t see the Nazis anymore, nothing but the outline of a single Nazi tank. They would keep coming; they would keep destroying, until the last resident of Oradour-sur-Glane was dead.
Peter turned back toward Emmett. His head lolled to the right. Blood oozed from his back, from his side. Everywhere Peter looked, the field was pulsing with blood. Emmett was dead, Peter knew. He closed his eyes, feeling his mind fall into a state of panic. What the hell was he going to do?
Peter leaned over Emmett, trying to think of something to say—something meaningful. This man had saved him, had followed him across the earth just to make sure he was okay. And now he had paid the ultimate price.
He spun his head back, toward the town. He noted that the original bomb had landed in the city. His heart lurched. Julie. He leaped from the battlefield and started to run, trying not to look at the dead men in the field. Their arms. Their legs. He tried not to realize that he was the only person who had survived the attack, that he didn’t deserve his life.
Peter found himself in the center of town. The great strip of buildings had been struck by the bomb, and everything was on fire, spewing billows of black smoke. He brought his blood-drenched shirt over his mouth and made his way down t
he street, thoughts only of Julie in his head. He couldn’t be the only one here; he couldn’t do this on his own.
The bakery was on the corner. Peter lurched toward it, trying not to see all the dead in the street. The beautiful schoolhouse they’d seen earlier was caught in its own fit of flames across the street. The bakery’s top windows had burst, and the glass lay in the street below. Peter stomped through it. The entire bottom of the bakery was completely blackened. The back kitchen was spitting flames, and Peter started coughing. “Julie! Julie!” The steps before him led upstairs. He wondered if the women were there.
He rushed forward, but his first step on the stairs told him he needed a different plan, a different route. The steps had already fallen in.
It was getting difficult to breathe. Peter rushed outside to take a few earnest breaths. He realized that the Nazis hadn’t gotten any closer. And why would they? Around him, the city was nearly all destroyed. The bomb had landed mere minutes before, and already the world around him was conquered. People had died in an instant. The anonymity of a bomb was incredible to Peter. Someone had dropped it and floated on through the sky.
Peter heard a crash. He looked toward the steps, where he’d just been. He saw her. Julie. She was rushing from the top floor carrying a small person in her arms. She held a rag over her mouth. Her eyes were bloodshot as she ran. But her feet were so purposeful, so true. She burst into the air beside him and fell into his arms. Peter wrapped his arms around her and brought his mouth to her forehead.
Julie was shaking. She turned her head toward him, her eyes shining. The young girl, Marion, looked up as well. Her face was covered in soot; a small bit of pastry was stuck to her cheek. “Julie?” she murmured.
The smoke hovered around them, and Peter knew they had to get moving.
CHAPTER 15
Peter and Julie walked quickly away from the smoke, out onto the field by the farmhouse. They didn’t speak. Marion had descended into a sort of shock, and Julie cradled her in her arms. Her body strained with the weight of her young grandmother.
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