~ Present Day ~

“Andy! Wait!”

“There is no time to wait. The museum closes in an hour. Let’s go Olympian.”

“I really don’t want to go to the museum,” Maya protests, not moving another inch from the sidewalk she had come to a stop in. It’s a quiet street, no tourists but themselves.

“You promised.”

“I change my mind. There’s going to be too many people there. I just want to relax and stroll around and not claw my way around people wanting to see some sculpture.”

Andy walks back with her best show of puppy dog eyes, “Please? We can do whatever you want when we’re done.”

“Why don’t we just meet somewhere afterwards?” Maya suggests since they both want to do very different things.

“Ugh, you’re no fun.”

Maya chuckles, “How about, let’s say, that cafe in an hour?” She points to a tucked away coffee shop.

“Fine. But if you get lost, that's on you. I’m not coming to find you if you’re not there.”

“Understood.”

Andy backs away slowly, “You’re sure?”

“I’m sure,” Maya is more than okay with that.

“Okay, Olympian, see you later.”

“I’m not an Olympian, yet,” She yells but Andy ignores her, sprinting down the street and disappears around the corner. 

Maya takes a deep relieving breath and turns around, looking down the quiet street. Slowly she starts to walk by each shop, peering into a bakery, every item in the window looking simply delectable. She passes quickly before she succumbs to temptation. The next shop is a clothing boutique, one that looked expensive and completely tailor made for a very specific clientele. The next shop is an antique shop, books and trinkets almost blocking the entryway but this is something that intrigues her. She shimmies her way in, the smell of nostalgia hits her with each step further into the little shop. Maya has a feast looking at everything even through a layer of dust sprinkled over each item. It oddly added to the charm.

“Buon pomeriggio, Signora. Posso aiutarla?” [Good afternoon miss. Can I help you?]

“Buonasera? I’m sorry I don’t speak Italian.”

“American?”

“Yes?” Maya didn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing.

“Can I help you look for something?” The woman says with a thick Italian accent.

“No, thank you. Is it okay if I just look around for a bit?”

“Sí. Just call when you need help.”

“Grazie,” Maya uses the second of three words of Italian she had in her arsenal. The stout older lady scoffs and walks off, leaving Maya to peruse at her own time.

Maya walks around, tentatively, hoping she doesn’t knock anything down. She traces her finger over old worn books, leaving a dust trail in its wake. There is a box of old vinyls on the floor and Maya leafs through them but she didn’t recognise any of the musicians, most of them are Italian artists. Next she came to a stop in front of a shelf stockpiled with gold and silver relics. They had all been clean and shiny at one stage but with just a little bit of polish they would look good as new again.

On her way out however, after not really seeing something that she could take home as a souvenir, she spots a box on the counter. Vecchie fotografie - 50cents/e, it was labeled. Maya lifts the lid and slowly takes out the photographs, some dating back to the early 1900s but mostly black and white pictures of families and veterans and lovers and children from various periods of time. They depicted a time of old, a simpler time but also a harsher time to some degree. Maya smiles nostalgically at each one and is about to put them back when one last photograph catches her eye. 

She wipes her thumb over the small square, a clear streak of dust revealing an image that she didn’t expect, an image that defies the laws of physics and time. She gasps, her hand flying to her mouth in shock and the photographs fall from her fingers, tumbling to the ground but before they even land she blinks once and upon opening her eyes she finds herself there, in that photograph.

~ 1944 ~

“Bishop, we need you over here!”

Maya comes to in the middle of the chaos, but then again that has been her life for the last couple of weeks or was it months? She couldn’t even tell anymore, time these days ticked by differently than what she is used to. Here you can only tell what time it was by when the sounds of bombs stopped and continued back up again. The sounds of war being a clock shouldn’t be normal but it is everyone’s reality right now.

Maya jumps into action, taking over for the other nurse. She starts chest compressions, feeling the soldier’s rib cage give way with each harsh press but she doesn’t stop, she can’t give up. The bone underneath her palm cracks but still she continues until the soldier breathes life back into his body. Once he is stable and the other nurse can take over again is when she moves on to the next stretcher.

“What do you need?” She asks looking down at the ash coloured skin of the soldier.

“We need blood.” The nurse said.

“We don’t have blood.”

“No shit Nancy Drew.”

Maya forgives the sarcasm because they were running on nothing but 15 minutes of sleep intervals and stale bread and cold coffee these days.

“I can give blood.”

They both snap their heads to the soldier behind Maya. He had a broken leg slung up into the air with a makeshift crane but otherwise looks fine and more importably, healthy.

“What’s your blood type, soldier?” Maya questions, getting the transfer tubes ready. There wasn’t time to really question when an offer like this comes along.

“Type O, ma’am.”

She also didn’t have time to correct him on the ma’am part before she’s already cleaning the inside of his arm and puncturing his flesh with a sharp needle. In the corner of her eyes she sees a group of new nurses enter the tent, new volunteers, but she focuses her attention back on the blood transfer, watching the dark red liquid run down the tube and into the bag. There is no place to hook the IV bag and Maya also didn’t have time to hold it while it filled.

“I need any available hands!” She shouts but no one responds. She looks up, pinpointing the new transfers standing around not knowing what to do yet.

“You!” Maya catches the attention of one of the women looking around like fish out of water but her breath catches as soon as they lock eyes. She is the most gorgeous being Maya has ever seen.

“Cosa?”

“Yes, you. I need you to hold this.” She is pulled back from her momentary loss of reality.

The woman has long legs, her strides taking her across the tent towards Maya in no time.

“Do you speak English?”

“Sí. I mean, yes.”

“Good. Hold this.” Maya shoves the warm blood bag into this woman’s hands and goes back to the soldier who needs it. She grabs the underside of the stretcher and pulls him over the grass and dirt as close to the donor's arm as she can and quickly sets up the rest of the transfer cannula. The woman looks at Maya with a questionable glance, one that is clearly asking if this is sanitary and or allowed.

“Here, anything goes to save a life.” Is all she says.

Once she’s sure the transfusion is secured, she sprints off to the next victim and by the end of her rotation and once things have settled for the time being, it is the first time she can take a second to catch her own breath and in that second she also remembers the new arrivals, who have somehow seamlessly integrated themselves into the inner working of the tent. But also, she was thinking of one new arrival in particular. 

Maya looks around the open space and is quick to find the taller woman now working on a different patient. Like an invisible string, she is pulled into that direction.

“Do you need help?” She asks the woman who clearly had a handle on things.

“No, I’m good.” She says but doesn’t look up. The deep frown between her eyes tells Maya she is laser focusing on what she is doing. Maya observes over her shoulder as she works, deft fingers stitching up a large wound on the unconscious soldier’s forehead.

“Nice work.”

“Thank you.” She finishes the last stitch and turns around to look up at Maya and time comes to a screeching halt. 

Under different circumstances, Maya would have been totally enamored with this woman, she would have lusted after her like a teenage girl in love for the very first time and Maya would have pestered her until she agreed to go on a date with her but this isn’t the time. Such frivolities lost its essence the moment bombs took out entire cities, when the loss of life count became a guessing game at one point. Who can even think about first loves and crushes when people will never see their sons, fathers, brothers, ever again.

But in another life…

“Carina.” She breaks Maya out of her reverie.

“Sorry?”

“My name. Carina DeLuca.”

“Oh, uh, Bishop. Maya. Kathleen. Maya Kathleen Bishop.” Maya stutters her full name like it’s normal to introduce oneself by the full name bestowed onto her at birth. Never in her 28 years on this earth has that happened to her before and she cringes at herself as soon as the words fall from her lips.

Carina finds the fumbling blonde funny and somehow her laugh, a sound so out of place in their current setting, makes Maya blush even harder. In all of the chaos and tragedy they have witnessed in just the last 10 minutes alone, this woman manages to make Maya blush and forget where she is for just a split second, making everything feel somewhat normal again.

“Nice to meet you Maya Kathleen Bishop.”

That is going to haunt Maya for the rest of her days she was sure of it.

~ 4 Weeks Later ~

“You need to take a break.”

“I don’t need to do anything but be here, helping.”

“Maya!”

She stops in her tracks at the tone, so does everyone around them but the chaos resumes after a beat.

“There is no time to stop, Carina.”

“Yes there is, if you don’t you will collapse from exhaustion and be out of commission even longer. Take a minute. Everything will go on without you for a few hours.”

They quickly formed a bond over the weeks that followed Carina’s arrival which feels like one neverending long day upon day since then. They’ve established a partnership in the tent that is unmatched and they always worked or helped each other out on tougher cases. They instinctively know each other’s next move, what equipment the other will need and what procedure one or the other will perform before anyone else can even ask. Some of the nurses even gave them a nickname, calling them Abbott and Costello because they worked so well together. They still didn’t know who is who in the scenario but it feels good to have this type of camaraderie in the tent which oftentimes feels dark and morbid.

“Take an hour at least. Shower and rest. I’ll come get you myself if you want me to. We can cope while you’re gone.”

If it wasn’t for her literally being awake going on 48 hours now, she probably would have contested this further but Carina was right, she was barely standing on her own two feet as is, “Okay. Promise you’ll come get me in an hour?”

“I promise, Costello.”

Maya smiles despite feeling bone tired and not even sure if she’ll make the bunker but when Carina is near her, she feels light and happy, as much as she can be given their circumstance, and like she can take on the world.

“And I’m clearly Abbott just so you know,” Maya says just before leaving the tent and all of the chaos behind.

“Never. No.” Carina chuckles as she runs to the next emergency. Maya feels compelled to go with her but Carina can handle herself as well as the other nurses, they are all competent just like she was, if not more. She will come back stronger and take on whatever the day may bring with just a short little break.

~*~

Maya is a light sleeper normally and usually wakes at the slightest sound but she must have been over exhausted because she was out cold, as soon as her head touched the pillow she was gone to the world. She doesn’t even know how long she was asleep for but she finally wakes at a featherlike touch to her face, her eyes are slow to focus but they flutter open and look up at an angel-like figure.

“Hey sleepyhead.” The voice is unrecognisable however.

“Carina. Hey, what time is it?” Maya’s voice is raspy from sleep.

“Early.”

It is dark outside, the frost clinging in the air and an involuntary shiver runs down her spine. Carina pulls up the blanket trying to cover Maya back up but the blonde sits up fully now, ready to get back to work. Clearly Carina let her sleep from longer than she was promised.

“You were supposed to wake me up in an hour. It’s dark outside which means it’s more than an hour. You promised.”

“I’m sorry. You needed the rest, Maya. You were running on that god forsaken stuff you call coffee and adrenaline and virtually no sleep which is not good for you. I was waiting for you to collapse any moment.”

“That is not your decision to make. We’re all making sacrifices here, I’m not the exception. I’m not weak, I can handle myself.”

“Look, be mad all you want but you were no good to us out there, you were making mistakes and forgetting things and dropping medical instruments when I know that is not you. We then had to go back to clean everything which interrupted the time flow of the entire tent, time we don’t have; none of us, all because you were that tired and wanted to do everything and be everywhere all at once. You are not weak, bella. God, if I had a say in it, I would think you’re superwoman.” Her eyes soften and Maya drops her defense, registering what Carina is telling her and completely understanding why she did it.

“Someone had to force you to just take a moment to recuperate and I drew the short end of the stick to be that bad guy but just know I did it because I care…I care about you.” Carina finishes.

Maya still wants to argue but Carina catches her off guard with that last part. They share the small space on Maya’s bunker bed, Carina sitting on the edge and close enough for them to touch with just a single movement which she does. She lifts her hand and cups Maya’s face, her thumb brushing over the area below Maya’s left eye in soft strokes. 

“Your eyes, they’re a shade of blue I’ve never seen before and I’ve seen some of the most beautiful oceans of the world but nothing compares. And when you’re not yourself that blue fades into a dark pool of navy depths so deep that it swallows the very light behind these eyes of yours. I hate when that happens, I hate not seeing the blue because that blue is what gets me through each day, through the tragedy and the devastation surrounding us, the blue is what keeps me grounded, it’s my constant reminder that life is beautiful, life is worth living, life is short. Your blue is my forever blue.”

“Carina…” Maya finds herself leaning into Carina’s palm, her own hand finding the other and lacing their fingers together. They stay like that for a moment, drowning in the touch of their intertwined hands. Hands that have become miracle instruments saving lives, hands despite the scrubbing and grime they endure are silk soft pressed together. Never has anything felt so right, never has a person felt like a missing piece of her soul finally finding its way back home.

“INCOMING! 3 CONVOYS HIT WITH UNKNOWN BODYCOUNT HEADING OUR WAY!”

They both jump apart, Maya already grabbing her uniform and pulling it on with a well established sequence.

Another long day lies ahead of them but it’s the dread of those they won’t be able to save that always looms close by because no matter how much they try, some soldiers just never stood a chance, not in this unforgiving war, but it’s their duty to give them their best chance at survival to try and get them home in one piece, to their families and loved ones. 

In that moment however, Maya is grateful for the break she was forced to take because she would surely not have made it otherwise, especially with what they’re about to be hit with and she would have to thank Carina in some way when they ever get a chance again.

~ 24 Hours Later ~

An eerie silence settles around the camp, the tent itself is marred with blood, gauze, medical equipment and the memories of those they’ve lost. It’s the first time however everyone could actually just take a moment to breathe, to drink a sip of water and to quietly make their rounds and check on the patients that were stable and the ones they were able to save without rushing through it this time.

“Are you okay?” Maya walks over to Carina washing her hands in a basin with water that has long since lost its transparency.

She only nods, continuing to scrub at her blood stained hands but the blood doesn’t seem to want to come off. She rubs and lathers soap and rinse and repeat while Maya notices that her hands are actually shaking. In fact, Carina’s whole body was.

“Hey, look at me. What’s wrong?” Maya turns to her now with concern.

“When is it going to end?” She whispers and Maya isn’t sure if she is even asking her this question or if it’s just an outcry of hopelessness.

“I wish I had an answer for you.”

“This fucking war. It has to stop, right? Someone has to do something. The death toll just keeps rising and rising. I…I don’t know…how can we…I can’t believe…we…”

“Hey, okay. Just breathe for a second,” Maya says, trying to calm her down. The emotions are running high after today which is understandable. What they’ve witnessed today was a massacre. It’s one of the worst days they’ve had yet and somehow she just knows it will get worse. Carina apparently realises this too.

Maya pulls her aside, into a dark corner where it’s just them.

“Breathe,” Maya encourages softly, her hands coming to rest at the small of Carina’s back, mostly placed there for comfort but Carina falls into Maya’s arms instead and Maya tightens her hold around Carina’s waist, hugging her to her chest as tight as she can. She soothes her back up and down but doesn’t say anything, just holds her until Carina feels strong enough to stand up again.

“I’m sorry,” She sniffs.

“Don’t be. Today was a lot.”

“It was, is. I just kept thinking about home and how much I miss it but then I would feel guilty because we’re needed here and that some of them will never get to go home and…”

“Where is home?” Maya interrupts just to distract Carina before she gets another panic attack.

“Sicily. Catania specifically. It’s in the south of Italy.”

“Sounds like a beautiful place.”

“It is. Maybe you can come visit me there some day.”

Maya smiles bashfully, “I would love that.”

Carina manages a smile, “You’re very beautiful,” she blurts.

“Now I know you are not okay, if you’re talking like that.”

“Oh, so you really are incapable of taking a compliment. I’ve heard rumours but I didn’t believe it. Not the Maya Bishop.”

“Not when they aren’t true.”

“I’m no liar.”

“Then you’re surely blind.”

“I have perfect vision.”

Maya rolls her eyes but Carina doesn’t let her get off that easily. She lifts her chin with her finger until Maya locks eyes with her. Carina stares down into her favourite ocean blues until only a breath is shared between them, “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, Maya Kathleen Bishop and if we were anywhere else right now I would kiss you until you agreed.”

Maya’s breath hitches and her cheeks bloom into a shade of pink that reminds Carina of summers in Italy. Oh, how she would love to take Maya around her hometown and show her all of her favourite secret spots and swim in the shimmering ocean water down by the beach and lie in the sun until their bodies are glowing and covered in sand and how they would run back home to take a shower to wash away traces of their day.

“I would kiss you even if I don’t.”

The corner of Carina’s mouth lifts, shaking her head slightly, “Where have you been all my life?”

~ 1 Week Later ~

The words blur on the page and the paper shakes in her hand.

“So everything seems stable around the tent, I’m going to go run through the showers to get whatever is stuck in – Hey are you okay?” Carina stops mid sentence once she sees an unmoving Maya.

Maya comes to and quickly nods, “Yeah of course. We’re good here, I’ll hold down the fort.”

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Maya,” Carina has mastered the art of getting Maya to talk with just one word and a slight tonal inclination.

She sighs, “I’ve been transferred.”

There is a brief silence, pregnant with dread. These types of letters always come with bad news attached.

“Where?”

“Bastogne,” Maya deadpans.

Carina’s heart sinks. Everyone knows about Bastogne how bad it is there right now. They’ve heard stories through the grapevine and one of the harshest places to be stationed.

“When?” Carina didn’t want to ask.

“2 days.”

The whimper leaves Carina’s throat before she can stop herself, her heart cracks little by little. She doesn’t know how to process the grief that settles into her bones and perhaps it’s wrong of her to already mourn something – someone – that isn’t gone yet but they both know, once you go there, the only way you come back is in a body bag, if you’re lucky.

She grabs Maya’s hand, the letter falling from her fingers and it floats to the ground. She pulls her out of the tent, towards the area they used as their communal bathroom. It would be empty this time of day and once they are inside, Carina finds them a spot at one of the make-shift showers and backs Maya into the nearest enclosed surface. A quietness they’ve not experienced in months settles around them, their breathing the only sound in the space.

“Don’t go. Let’s run away together,” Carina whispers, pleading really. 

Maya smiles ruefully, cupping Carina’s jaw, “You know we can’t do that.”

Their fates were sealed.

“I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t. I’ll come back,” But even to her own ears it sounded misleading.

“You don’t know that.”

“I know.”

“How do you know?”

“Because of you.”

Carina has to look away for a second. The piercing blue eyes staring deep into her soul was breaking her apart but Maya doesn’t let her have that reprieve, no she wants to see everything Carina is feeling because she was feeling it too.

“Please, don’t go.” Carina tries one more time.

Maya swipes her thumb over the train left behind from the stray tear escaping down Carina’s cheek, “Perhaps this is my purpose. Perhaps this is what I was put on this earth to do.”

“What if you were put on this earth to be mine? What if this is our destiny? To be together. To have found each other in a time where the concept seems almost impossible?”

“Then I don’t have a choice but to come back to you,” Maya says it like it’s already written in the history books, like it’s a fact that no one can dispute.

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

Maybe they were both masochists trying to hold on to this promise but somehow they truly believe they will meet again. Even if it’s in a different life, they are always going to be timeless.

~ 3 Months Later ~

Every wakingly free moment Carina has, she would run to the mailroom and ask.

“Anything?”

It would either always be followed by a shaking head or a simple no and each time the crack in her chest would pry open wider.

She wrote letters but never sent them because she was warned that the chances of them reaching Bastogne was almost zero. But that didn’t stop her from writing them anyway. She would give them to Maya in person when she sees her. Those letters became her lifeline between her and Maya even if they were securely tucked beneath her bed for now.

~ 6 Months Later ~

Days turned into weeks and weeks into months and Carina stopped passing the clerk who received mail after some time. She couldn’t take the heartbreak anymore. She continued to go about each day on autopilot, kept her mind busy by working and working until her hands couldn’t hold a single thing anymore until her body collapsed onto her bed but sleep never came that easy, not after she left but it is only then that she allowed herself to think of Maya.

She wished for so many things in her brief moments of solitude. She wished she could have spent more time with her, she wished she’d kissed her before she left, she wished she had told her she loved her. She wished she had tried once more to convince her to run away with her, to go anywhere that is as far away from here as possible.

But Maya has too much pride for that. Her sense of duty is admirable and part of what Carina loved about her.

By the end of the year there were rumours buzzing around that the war was ending soon but it’s been so long that hope was something they took with a grain of salt.

“Carina?”

She tears her eyes away from watching the downpour outside the tent, large puddles of water forming in the uneven ground and would turn into sludge and mud that would somehow end up on every part of clothing and pair of shoes even if you weren’t coming from outside.

Nancy stops in front of her, out of breath. Carina chuckles at the woman who looks like she has run a marathon. “Are you okay?”

“It came,” Nancy manages to get out, doubled over now trying to catch her breath.

“What came?”

The shorter woman straightens her posture and presents a white envelope, “She wrote.”

Carina almost drops her cup of coffee but instead of grabbing it out of Nancy’s outstretched hand like she wants to, she just looks at it like it’s a live snake.

“Well, aren’t you going to open it?”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“You’ve been asking me for months and now that there is finally word, you hesitate?”

Nancy watches an unmoving Carina, almost finding her reaction comical but she knows how much something this means in a time like this. She reaches for Carina’s hand and makes her take the crisp white paper. Once she’s sure Carina has a handle on it she then slowly backs away, giving her space.

Carina can only look at the neatly folded square, and can only surmise what could be written in there and how much it had gone through to get to her. She had her doubts, every scenario running through her mind while looking at the letter. What if it’s not even Maya but someone just telling her that she is gone. Carina wouldn’t be able to handle that but her name scribbled on the front oddly felt like it was written in Maya’s handwriting, not that she has ever seen it, but she just had a feeling that it was her. She finally gathers enough courage to open it, carefully breaking the seal at the back and flips it open, pulling out the neatly folded paper.

My Love,

I miss you.

I have to just say that first and foremost. 

I miss you in the very fiber of my bones.

I miss your soft smile that feels reserved just for me and your beautiful eyes that are like a beacon of hope in the middle of a storm. 

I miss your voice and the way you say my name, a simple name that doesn’t deserve the finesse in which you speak it.

I miss that freckle beside your mouth and the way your eyebrows knit together when you concentrate.

I miss watching you across the room when you don’t know anyone’s looking, unaware of the beauty you possess.

I miss the gentle touch of your hands and how they weave through your wild curls after a long day when you untie them to relieve tension.

I miss the way your brain works and how you just know things without sounding smug about it but you are always the smartest person in the room.

I miss you.

I don’t know if this letter will ever reach you but I had to try.

I need you to know I’m fighting for you.

I’ll fight like hell every single day to come and find you.

Even if it’s not in this lifetime or perhaps this century.

It could even be a different universe,

worlds apart or on different continents

but I will find you again and again through time and space,

across treacherous lands and vast bodies of seas,

I’ll always find my home in you.

Forevermore me and you against the world, my love.

With love,

Costello

PS, Fine, I'll admit it.

~ 1 Month Later ~

They were going home. The war is finally over. No one really feels like celebrating because nothing can make up for what they lost but war is finally over. Maya couldn’t process that, not even when they were hauled onto a ship, flags flying jubilantly and victoriously and people finding joy but she couldn’t. She had nothing to celebrate because yes they were finally going home but where was her home, really?

She wasn’t going to go back to her father’s house. She basically ran away after protests from him and she doubted she would be welcomed back with open arms. Her home was somewhere across the ocean but Maya didn’t know if she would be welcomed there too, if she would be remembered even.

She finds a quiet spot on the otherwise overcrowded vessel and pulls out the letter, her lifeline. She remembers receiving the letter not long after she sent hers. It was on a particularly tough day, so it couldn’t have come at a better time but getting something like that when she was surrounded by so much death and ugliness, was almost a miracle, she swore at some point that she conjured up the very fabric of the envelope to keep her own sanity but it was the swoopy lettering that was so meticulously embedded into the paper that it was impossible to imagine something like that.

She read it with trembling fingers that first time, dirt under her nails that she somehow could never get clean. She felt unworthy of the letter during that time but it ultimately saved her life. Getting that letter got her through the war. She read it every free moment she had, so much so that the paper started to wear, smudged with dried blood and creased from having it shoved in her pocket for safe keeping. She kept the letter on her person every single day for all the time she was stationed there.

Winter is now fast approaching and Maya remembers how harsh it can be which makes her hunker down now, wrapped in a thick blanket in a quiet corner of the boat as she tries to read the letter under the cover of darkness for probably the thousandths time. She of course knows it by heart but reading it made her feel connected to the sender, to Carina because every stroke of her pen was a reminder that they are real, every punctuation mark she used was intentionally written with Maya in mind.

Amore Mio,

I want to say so much but I’m at a loss for words. That has never happened to me.

I hope you get this letter because I need to remind you what you promised. I need you to keep that promise and come back to me no matter what.

The talks of the war ending gives me hope but I won’t know peace until I see you again, until I can feel you in my arms again.

I need you to come find me, promise me that if it turns out that we are unburdened from this horror, that you’ll come back to me.

In turn, I promise you this.

I’ll wait for you, every single day, I’ll show up at Catania Centrale in my hometown at exactly 9am until you’re home.

I’ll wait for you for all my days if I have to.

I love you and I miss you. Be safe.

With love

Abbott

Maya folds the well worn paper carefully back into place and pockets it in its permanent place. It’s been a few weeks since she received this letter and she didn’t know if Carina would still be waiting for her but she is going to keep her promise even if Carina moved on. Even if she just sees her one last time, at least then she knows what to do with her life and would be able to perhaps try and find some semblance of normalcy, not that she has any idea of what that might look like anymore.

It takes her a few days to even get transportation from Belgium to Italy and getting a train traveling down to Sicily deemed almost impossible. Stations were overcrowded and people were desperate to get home but eventually she did manage to secure a spot after a brutal week in Rome. 

The hours tick by slowly as the train makes its journey across Italy. Maya wants to enjoy the surroundings, the beauty but the exhaustion settles in pretty early on and she dozes off for the majority of the ride, the sound of the engine and the train tracks lulling her to sleep but still she will jostle awake to only realise an hour has passed. It is excruciating to be confined in such close quarters with people that don’t speak the same language you do but she would do it all again knowing she’d hopefully get to see Carina one last time. It will all be worth it.

~ 08:45 am ~

Carina was running late, she knows the schedule of each train passing through Catania by heart and she knows the train coming from Rome will arrive just after 9 today if nothing happened along the way.

When she finally got home after the war, her mother wrapped her in her arms and held her for hours and they cried together, from relief, gratitude and love all combined, and it took all but two days for her father to force her back to work. She complied, just to keep her mind and fidgety busy. She helped out at his practice and he at least gave her free rein to take on whatever she was capable of. She was grateful for the distraction because at night, the nightmares only got worse and her heart was missing a piece that left her aching and longing. 

She however did keep her promise and showed up at the train station every morning at 9. She waited until the train unloaded the passengers coming from all over the world but each day there still was no trace of Maya. But she went back the next day and the next because Maya promised she would come back to her. She just hoped her letter got to her in time.

This particular morning, Carina had to run to the train station. She could hear the whistle and the steam of the locomotive approaching in the distance. Her heart hammered in her chest and she elbowed her way through the crowd already forming on the platform. Her usual seat is now occupied so she opted to stand with the other people waiting to welcome home their loved ones and heroes.

The steam engine rolls in slowly and as it is with each incoming train, Carina held her breath, watching the doors creak open and people jumping from the over filled cabins, finding their people with cries and embracing. The reunions still makes Carina tear up but today for some reason she was focused on the train, watching each exit for one familiar face. Slowly the platform clears as each family leaves and Carina’s hopes are dashed once the last person finally gets to exit the train. The doors close and the train takes off again.

She sighs, deflated but never giving up hope. She will come back tomorrow but it is getting harder and harder each day. She doesn’t know how much longer her heart would be able to take the disappointment.

She turns to leave but her foot catches on a cracked piece in the concrete and she stumbles, redirecting her gaze until she sees her. Carina's lungs restrict, cut off from receiving air all while across the platform, standing at a distance, it's her. Her Maya. With a lopsided grin, the effect is the equivalent to a shimmering ocean wave barreling towards her like a tsunami. Her steps are slow but she makes it, stopping in front of Carina.

“Hi.”

With trembling fingers and hesitation, Carina reaches for her, “Are you really here?”

“Why don’t you find out.”

Those words give her the courage to close the gap, finally able to do the thing she has thought about doing ever since they parted. She pulls her in and kisses her right then and there and she swears she is drowning. She is pulled underneath the waves, swirled around the current and just when she can't breathe anymore she is finally brought back up for air. She presses her forehead against Maya’s, their chests heaving in tandem.

“Welcome home.”

~ Present Day ~

“Oh, scusa.”

“Sorry.”

They say at the same time.

Maya had to get away, she had to leave the antique shop because she needed fresh air but on her way out she bumped into someone entering the shop. She is about to just skate by but the hand on her arm makes her look up and somehow the most familiar set of brown eyes are staring right through her.

“Hello.” She says and the impact of that simple word hits Maya like a ton of bricks. How is it possible to feel like she knows this woman when she has never seen her before, in the split second that they are meeting in this very moment she feels like she has known her all her life. 

“You dropped this,” The taller woman bends down to retrieve a bundle of letters bound together by a single red string. They’ve discoloured to a vintage yellow but clearly stood the test of time.

“Oh, no they’re not mine,” Maya looks down at the woman’s outstretched hand and tries to read the inscription which the stranger does too.

“You’re not Maya Kathleen Bishop?”

Maya’s eyes widen, taking the letters from her hand and to her shock it did have her name on the first envelope in the stack and the one below it and the one below it. They were all addressed to her but it wasn’t hers. She’s never seen them before. How is that possible? She looks at the date inscribed in the corner of the first one; 1944.

Clearly someone had the same name as her and she didn’t know how to process that information because what are the chances? In a small little tucked away corner antique shop in Italy while she is only there to compete in the Olympics, she finds something like this and the photograph which are both once in a lifetime phenomenons.

“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know.”

Maya looks up again, the woman sporting an amused grin and the familiarity behind her eyes are unsettling.

“I have to go.” Maya walks past the stranger and wanders down the street, aimlessly, and not really knowing how to compartmentalize everything, the letters still in her hand. She didn’t even pay for them, hell she wasn’t entirely sure if they were from the shop or even for sale but she couldn’t go back now.

Back at the shop however, Carina watches the woman walk down the street, a little concerned about her reaction to a stack of letters but before she can overthink the situation the shop owner interrupts her confusion, asking if she can help but doesn’t even finish her sentence when she notices photographs scattered all over the floor. The owner swears underneath her breath and bends down to pick them up but Carina offers to help, gathering them neatly before handing them over. The last photograph however catches her eye.

Two lovers on a beach in their bathing costumes, the summer sun and crashing waves of the ocean behind them but they clearly only had eyes for each other. The light haired girl was kissing the dark haired girl on the cheek and it would have been sweet until Carina looks closer. The blonde girl looks exactly like the girl she just bumped into and the brunette…

She gasps.

She turns the photograph over.

Summer 1946 - Catania, Italy.

We’re going to be timeless.

With love

Abbott & Costello