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It's the letters that are the hardest. Chris has grown to hate the simple action of pen on paper, the stilted formal language of lies carefully woven into a shroud of comfortable deceit; and sometimes he can't even remember the man's face or remember if Gonzalez had the stutter or Sutton. Was Voigt the one killed by the shell or was he shot? And how old was Koppel?
"Your son was a valuable member of the company..." A good man but no soldier. "Well-liked and good-humored..." when drunk and reeling. "He died instantly...he did not suffer..." but his guts spilled in his hands and he cried for his mother and there was no morphia, no release from the pain, and he cried, they all cry.
The names change, the faces are a blur, and Chris can't protect them, his men, his company, he can't shield them from shrapnel and shellfire, can't stop the bullets or hold back the gas. He holds their lives in his hands, but they sift through his fingers like grains of sand and he can't hold onto them.
And the other letters, the men's letters, all passing across whatever makeshift table he can find in the quiet moments in support or reserve, as quiet as the front ever gets with the constant shellfire overhead, the machine guns, the gas sirens, the rats and the men and the moans of the dying. Thick black pen in hand, and he hates this too, reading their words, standing as a barrier between their families and what they really want to say.
"Mother, I am doing fine..." "It's not like we thought..." "I'm cold and tired but we keep each other going..." "I miss you..." "Give my love to Mother, to Sister, to Brother..." when what they really mean is death and destruction and horror, words they can never ever say and feelings they can never reconcile. They'll go home changed and their families will look at those letters and they'll never understand what happened between the lines.
Chris doesn't write letters of his own. There's no-one waiting Stateside to receive them, just a burnt-out shell and a desolate ranch, and memories, always memories, and even Flanders isn't far enough to out-run them. But sometimes it's a relief, as thick as bile in his throat, because he couldn't lie to them, he could never lie to them, not even to save them.
He kept a journal as a child and young man, before Sarah and Adam. His mother had patted his cheek softly and handed him the leather-bound book on his tenth birthday, the pages so clean and crisp, the sharp smell mingling with just the faintest hint of her lemon verbena scent. She'd written on the flyleaf, 'a friend who will never abandon, never betray and never lie' - and he'd believed that, had written in it every day until he met Sarah and found he could never lie to her, could never hurt her, could never leave her; and who needed a journal with such a friend?
Sarah had encouraged him to keep writing. She'd stroked her fingers down the spines of the journals, stacked neatly on the shelf, each one identical, and laughed that it was important, that maybe one day he'd need help to remember the good times.
She couldn't have been thinking of a war. No-one could have thought of this war. And she couldn't have known that she would no longer be there to help.
The journal had stayed in his kitbag from New York to St Nazaire, through Gondrecourt and the months of training, and those first hellish days with the French at Bathelémont. Even Paris and their rapturous reception, Lafayette's tomb and the flowers thrown from the balconies, and he couldn't bring himself to write of any of it, not Paris or Bathelémont, Sommerville or Cantigny. He would lift his pen, poised over the paper, and the words wouldn't come, there was nothing he could write that he would ever wish to remember.
And then one day there was Vin, and somehow it became so simple. There was Vin in the barn at Dammartin, lying quiet and exhausted by his side, the broken shards of moonlight turning his pale face into something timeless and beautiful, and Chris had picked up his pen and written 'Dear Vin...'
'Dear Vin', and from then on every entry is a letter and every letter is to Vin; and Vin is the friend who will never abandon him, Vin is the friend who will never betray him, and if it's possible to be thankful for anything in this war, Chris is thankful for Vin.
He came into this war thinking he had lost all there was in life - home, family, wife, child - but there is always more to lose and he had reckoned without Vin. Chris lives each day in fear such as he's never known, and when he saw Vin at Ansauville, blinded and lost and still only concerned for Chris, it almost drove him to his knees. He'll never know where he found the strength to return to the trenches without him, and each day was a lifetime until Vin returned.
He watches as Vin leads his platoon on a trench raid or patrol, and his knuckles are white, his stomach roils, but he can't hold him back. Vin throws a casual salute and his grin is the last thing Chris sees for hours. He paces restlessly in the dugout, three strides and turn, and even Travis knows not to approach him as he tours the trenches and talks with the men, every fiber straining to listen for the raiding party's return.
Every shell-burst heralds Vin's death, every bullet is meant for Vin, every passing minute is a minute too long, too late. And when they return triumphantly, muddied and often bloodied too, with prisoners, guns, information, he can only return Vin's salute briefly and turn away, eyes closing in a silent prayer of thanks to a God he no longer trusts to protect those he loves.
Later Vin will come to the dugout and read quietly over his shoulder as Chris agonizes over the letters for those lost, his broad palm resting on the back of Chris' neck, heavy and warm and unutterably welcome. Later Vin will pull the journal from Chris' pack and lay it in front of him, will gather the letters for the field post and run his fingers through Chris' hair as he leaves.
And one day, Chris knows, he will grasp Vin's wrist and hold him in place. One day he'll take the letters from Vin's hand and press the journal into it instead. One day Vin will understand.
But for now Chris writes.
'Dear Vin...'