{Fanworkathon day five} fanfiction

[yumi-oko-chan.livejournal.com]

Title- Two Days (1/3?)
Warnings/ratings- not much, one minor innuendo and possible bias, nyotalia, rather rushed, abrupt ending
Word count- 3483
Pairing- UKxFem!US
Summary- When Amelia grew up, she wanted to be a soldier. And Arthur never did.

No time for AN, too sleepy. Sigh. If there is something wrong, let me know, if not, happy reading!

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When Amelia was four years old, Arthur Kirkland kicked his football into her back garden.

When her doorbell rang and her mother hurried him out onto the porch to see if he could see it anywhere, he identified is as the ball Amelia was busy playing with. When her mother asked her to give it back to him, she scrunched up her face in a pout, declaring, “No!” as her answer to the request.

 
When her mom was about to give out to her for being so bold, Arthur had just smiled and asked if it was okay for her to play with it for a bit.

Amelia ended up keeping the ball, growling every time Arthur tried to prise it from her hands and squealing with glee when he decided to play catch with her, it being the only way he could play with his own football, seemingly, and Arthur ended up having to buy a new one out of his pocket money, but they both made a new friend in all the goings on.

It seemed strange to Amelia that Arthur, just over three years her senior, would bother playing catch with almost every second afternoon from there on out. Sure, she had bugged him, even going so far as to attempt to scale the fence by herself, to play with her, but she had done that to her older brother as well, and, unlike Arthur, he paid no heed to her.

A few months later, after she had stolen the older boy’s ball and said ball was deflated and abandoned in the bushes out her back, Arthur didn’t even need to be bugged to come over every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to play with her. It was just a given that he would arrive, football under arm, with the threat that if she stole this one, he wouldn’t play with her anymore, so Amelia, albeit sourly, kept her hands to herself.

Spring faded and, come summer, Arthur was able to come over in the early afternoon, happy to sit on her porch and drink her lemonade if it was too hot to run around.  Amelia’s mother didn’t mind Amelia having him over, although the child often dragged him over the fence and the woman wouldn’t even know he was there until he was going home.

When it got too hot to play with Arthur’s self purchased ball, they’d just converse, Arthur treating Amelia like a peer to keep her pleased and Amelia being delighted that someone older wasn’t talking down to her.

Amelia would rant about facts that she bet Arthur didn’t know, though the boy had known them for years previous, and Arthur would pretend to be clueless with as much of a dry smile that an eight year old kid could muster.

In turn, Arthur would tell her about his elder brothers and how mean they were and how, at school, they just let the other kids pick on him, sometimes joining in, instead of sticking up for him like family. Amelia didn’t think this was right and vowed that one day, when she grew up, she was going to kick their asses, and then they’d be sorry. Arthur smiled, appreciating the sentiment, but knowing that Amelia would forget she had ever said that by the time she actually did grow to be an adult.

One day, when Arthur told her that he wanted to be professor of something or other when he was grown up, Amelia grinned, chubby fists on hips and said;

“When I grow up, I’m going to be a soldier!”

“Don’t be silly,” Arthur had laughed, “Girls cant be soldiers.”

Amelia had puffed out her cheeks and scowled in annoyance that Arthur was laughing at her. “I’m dead serious! I’m going to be the best soldier there ever was and kick ass wherever I’m needed! I’m gonna have a pistol and everything!”

After a few seconds of grinning proudly, Amelia then added, “And I’ll even dress up as a boy if I have to!”

Arthur smiled at her and Amelia got the sinking feeling that he was laughing at her again. “Amelia, right now, there is no war to fight. Who says there will be one when you’re eighteen? It’s not very likely, is it?”

The child pouted again, disgruntled at Arthur for ruining her fun. But her anger was short lived as, a few minutes of silence later, Arthur sighed and offered to at least play soldiers with her. With a squeal of joy, she ran in to her kitchen and her mother found them four hours later with her colanders and saucepans as armour and spatulas as weapons, chasing each other around the garden.

She just smiled and went back inside.

-x-

Come September, Amelia spent her first grade days waiting for the bell to ring so she could go back to her house, do whatever assignment she had in ten minutes and wait outside on the grass in her back garden for Arthur to come home.

Arthur had begun to come over almost every afternoon, except for Sundays and the odd day where he’d have a project due the next day that he needed to finish off, and when that happened Amelia just wandered around her back garden and kicked the old deflated ball from the previous spring she had come across again, not that it was much use to her.

But when Arthur did come over, they’d play catch like they always did, which a lot of the time would turn into him teasing her about her war fantasies, saying she was a sadist, whatever that was. Which, in turn, would turn into either a vicious game of dodge ball or another war game, both of which Amelia always won, which she’d later learn to be deliberate.

Autumn turned to winter and Arthur’s visits became every day, without fail, except for Sundays, but he went home earlier, to Amelia’s distaste. She did understand that it was dark earlier now, for some reason or other that she couldn’t quite understand yet. But, she just learned to make do with it and hit him with a spatula while he was there.

Arthur turned nine that spring and Amelia turned six that summer, three months later. Arthur turning up in her back garden, his football securely under his arm didn’t wither at all, and neither did the war games that never seemed repetitive.

One day Arthur would allow Amelia to be general, the next she would insist on being out on the frontline, firing at whoever she felt were the ‘bad men’ this time. Arthur would laugh and ask why they weren’t ‘bad ladies’ and Amelia would pout and reply that he had said that there weren’t any ladies in wars, so she should be the only lady out there.

Arthur still drank her lemonade on her back porch in the sweltering heat, caking sun block on her with almost motherly concern even though she was already wearing the gallon her mother had put on her earlier, and him getting himself burnt pink in the process.

Amelia once asked him why he didn’t play with the boys in his class that he played with at lunch in school, and he just replied that they were never around and that he never really ‘played’ with them in the first place.

At the time, Amelia never dwelled on what that sentence meant, just that Arthur would rather spend time with her then with his peers, which resulted in another cheerful game of something or other that suited Arthur’s tastes a tad more than hers.

-x-

When Amelia was twelve, Arthur decided to teach her how to sew, to her irritation as she couldn’t even hold the needle right. He decided it was time she acted like a woman, to which she retaliated that it was time he stopped.

Obviously, Arthur wasn’t too happy with that comeback, going as far as to not come play with her for a few days until one afternoon she looked outside her bedroom window to find him throwing rocks at it, a sheepish lopsided grin on his face.

He somehow scaled her wall, coughing awkwardly when she innocently made a Romeo and Juliet reference, and stayed in her room until her mother found him, coming in to wish her goodnight, and kicked him out, him swearing that he hadn’t laid a finger on her, his ears red. When Amelia asked him what this meant, he told her, his ears as red as before, that he’d tell her later.

Somehow, Arthur still hadn’t stopped visiting her almost every day; minus the Sundays of course. Amelia now thought this strange; as a child she just assumed that she was so awesome that he couldn’t stand to be away from her. Though now, as an almost teenager, her view was one of the scepticism Arthur taught her.

Asking him why he still came over, football under his arm, even though they never played catch anymore was always met by the awkward silence and the reply of, “Well, you’re my friend, and friends come over right?”

To that, a lot of the time Amelia stayed silent, but sometimes made a retort that she never came over to his house to bug him to which he always sighed and replied that coming over to hers was an escape from his brothers, which made her just feel like a safe house and not really a friend. So, in the end up, she learned not to reply whenever he called her his friend.

Instead of playing war, Amelia just learned about history and politics in her spare time, learning more about the war America wasn’t taking a part in going on over in Europe. Arthur seemed happy enough to escort her to the library once a week and to the shop for the newspaper in the summer and on a Saturday; he saw this more educational then kicking around a football or even sewing.

Whenever he brought up the fact that she was actually educating herself in her spare time, she threatened to tell all his classmates that he knew how to sew, which shut him up, and fast.

-x-

Summer faded to fall and the year nineteen forty faded into the year nineteen forty two, and when the winter came along, America entered the war that Amelia had read up on in Europe after an attack on a base in Hawaii; that’s what Amelia could make out from the crackly radio in her room.

But to her it didn’t matter the ins and outs of how who had entered what and what declarations had been made by who. All that surfaced in her mind was that it was a war, a war that she should be part of, it having been all she ever thought of as a child. Saving lives by putting hers on the line was all she had ever dreamed of; being a soldier was being a superhero.

But when she brought the topic up to her mother, she just laughed and patted her on the head and told her to stop being silly. When she told Arthur, he just smirked and went back to knitting her a hat for whatever reason occurred to him at the time. When she sent in letters to the US army, she never got a reply and Arthur told her that the big generals in their offices were probably laughing at the idea of a fifteen year old girl trying to become a soldier.

So it was settled and Amelia’s dreams were ground into dust and no matter how many stones Arthur threw at her window, they didn’t bring her down from her room for days.

And when she did, she was met by the same sheepish grin that had met her the first time they fought, years earlier and one simple sentence.

“I’m going to war.”

-x-

Amelia had stammered, stuttered and finally managed a “How?” and Arthur shrugged in response.

“I’m sick of it,” he said lowly, “I’m sick of walking into a shop and being asked my age and given so many disapproving looks when I tell them I’m almost legal, but have no intentions of leaving. I should be fighting, whether for the US army or the British, I should be out there.”

Amelia narrowed her eyes. “Tell them to shove it,” she replied, looking down at her shoes because they were easier to look at than then look of complete exhaustion on Arthur’s face. Because she knew that her dream was his worst nightmare; this was never what he wanted, and now it seemed that he had to live her dream for her just because of a fifty fifty chance and a couple of years.

Arthur managed a smile, but it was sullen and tired. “I’m sick of that. That is what I always do. But I feel myself that I should be out there. I’m no better than the people out there, so I shouldn’t act it.”

“You aren’t! You just aren’t going out and getting yourself killed!” she yelled, frustration easily slipping unnoticed into her voice.

Arthur sighed. “You’re contradicting yourself. Two minutes ago, you were the one wanting to go to war and get yourself killed. But the one difference, is that I’m actually doing it.”

Tears were beginning to prick at her eyes and her fists were shaking. “You’re...calling me a coward?” she asked, her voice shaking lightly, but still sounding oh so final.

Arthur frowned. “I never said that, Amelia.”

But the door still slammed shut in his face.

A rock was thrown at her window fifteen minutes later and Amelia ignored it.

“Go away,” she muttered to no one but herself.

“No, I wont,” Arthur said softly and Amelia turned, stiffening and wiping her stained cheeks frantically as she realised that Arthur was standing in front of her open window, hands in pockets and that same, stupid, apologetic, sheepish smile on his face as before, as always.

“This is my room,” she said accusingly, “Get out.” She still reached over to lock the door though.

“Look,” Arthur sighed, sitting cross legged on the ground over y the window, making no attempt to make her feel uncomfortable by approaching her, “You’re not a coward, I am. You wanted this at least; you were willing. You know more than anyone that I don’t want this, Amelia, I never did. This isn’t my dream and I’m really sorry for taking yours.”

Amelia watched him, his sincere, solemn expression, and finally relaxed, walking over to kneel in front of him, reaching out to grab onto the sleeve of his shirt like she use to do to his trouser legs when they were children. “I’m sorry too.”

Later, Amelia’s mother would try her door, to find it locked, and presume that she was still irritate about her dreams and never guess that her daughter had fallen asleep, leaning on Arthur, who in turn has fallen asleep leaning up against the window he had snuck in earlier.

-x-

To get her mind off the war, Amelia applied for a job at the café down in the town; they were desperate for workers since all the boys had gone. Sadly, it didn’t do much good as all the soldiers went from the bus stop across the street, in their neatly pressed uniforms that would soon be caked in blood.

And, in April, one month after she fell asleep on Arthur’s chest after being told that he was going to go out to risk his life for ‘The worthless war’ she now called it, her view point having changed now since it wasn’t her seemingly endless life on the line and instead Arthur’s, sewing, tea drinking, knitting Arthur, it was time for his leave.

And instead of some faceless youth ordering coffee off her before going out to give his life for his country, it was Arthur, ordering his tea and shuffling in his seat, looking so nervous, so lost in his neatly ironed uniform that seemed far too big for him, although it was just the right size.

Suddenly, when Amelia asked for a break while getting a cup of coffee for herself as well as Arthur’s tea, Arthur didn’t seem eighteen. He looked as lost as the boy in the hand me down slacks that kicked his ball into her garden eleven years ago, man, it had been eleven years.

“You’re leaving,” she said quietly, and he smiled.

“I am,” he said back, quietly. So very quiet.

Amelia smiled back at him, and tapped the little hat on his head. “US army.”

“I couldn’t get the other uniform,” he chuckled, but it was far from one of humour.

Amelia could think of so many other things to say, to beg him not to leave, to make him promise not to get himself killed, but there was nothing he could do and no promise he could make that would mean anything other than him being a liar. So Amelia wouldn’t ask him to lie for her.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” she smiled, but could feel the tears pricking her eyes again.

“I already am,” he said, and it was all done.

Amelia never thought she’d be the girl with the handkerchief, or café napkin, waving off some soldier, because she never stopped to think that she wouldn’t be the soldier. But here she was, waving as Arthur put one shaky foot on the bus.

But he stopped, turned around and pressed one kiss on her cheek, his ears red and his cheeks tinted. Amelia frowned, flushing lightly before, looking at him with wondering eyes. “What was that for?”

Arthur just smiled, wryly, before saying, “I’ll tell you later,” and getting on the bus. And Amelia couldn’t help but feel that he was quite good at irony.

-x-

Months passed and every letter Amelia sent started with ‘Dear Arthur’ and ended with nothing, just her name. Though, time passed and as no letter ever came back in the post from him, Amelia started starting her letters with a more informal ‘To Arthur’ and ending with a ‘love’ before her name.

It didn’t seem to work and on the eighty third day, and her fifteenth letter, she decided it would be her last, because apparently asking whether or not it was ‘later’ yet wasn’t good enough for Arthur, who couldn’t even find the time to write back to her while doing her dream job.

It wasn’t until eight months after Arthur left, that she finally got a letter from the base, but realised after a few shouts of glee and teared envelopes that it wasn’t from Arthur at all.

Dear Miss Amelia Jones

I am writing to you to let you know that, although no body has been found, Arthur Kirkland has been AWOL for the last four weeks. You are not to be officially notified until we no for certain, or until this battle is over, but we feel that you have the right to know what to expect in the future.

I apologize if we have not acted in your best interests.

Yours faithfully

L. Bonnefoy and L. Bragninski

Amelia slowly put the letter under her pillow, and went to bed, lay her head down on the pillow and told herself over and over again that this meant nothing, that there was no body, there was no inkling that he was even dead. Maybe he was just captured, or at some other base.

Neither of those possibilities sounded to good either.

The thought that, if her letters had been answered and she was the one that had gone to war and that Arthur could be in her position right now was a scary though, so she banished it to the back of her mind and never got up when he mother called her for dinner.

-x-

When two more weeks passed and she had no letter from Arthur and none from the army either, Amelia was inconsolable. She would eat two bites at dinner and this seemed to be an improvement. But that was all her mother could force on her, earning and accusatory glare whenever something was brought up, because she could have been in Arthur’s place, and Arthur could be safe instead of her.

But, her room felt lonely too, knowing that no scruffy blonde teenager was going to come throw rocks at her window, and possibly not ever again.

It scared her senseless.

And one day, and envelope came, addressed to her, in through her letter box and the tears came cascading down her cheeks before she opened the envelope, and didn’t cease once she opened it either.

Flinging open the door, the scruffy blonde teenager on her door step was met with one single question.

“Is it later yet?”