Whiskey with William

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Whiskey with William

I’ll always remember that night, that wonderful night, so peaceful, so quiet.  That was the last night I ever sat round the charred oak table drinking a few with William.  It started of with a simple acutance; our shifts would crossover every Tuesday and Thursday, every night at 11 pm exactly.  One night I started my shift a little early, got to know each other a bit. Turned out to be that our dugouts where right next to each other, and the next thing you know we where having whiskey every night, even on duty.

I remember one night, specifically actually, because of what he said to me.

“… Yea I know, talk about stench, we thought Mickey took his boots off or something and what did it turn out to be, a Charlie Fogger, stunk the whole trench out.”

“Yea I’ll say, it blew into our dugout, couldn’t get the chlorine smell out for days.”

“Anyway Pete, I gota go”

“Why?”

“Well you see, I’m going away for a while”

“What, what do you mean?”

“They’re moving me to Dawson’s bay, they’re holding a colonel meeting, and might be sending forces into no-man’s-land.”

“When are you coming back?”

“ Well, depending on what the outcome of the meeting is, I might not”

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I don’t know what happened after that, I couldn’t remember, or maybe I didn’t want to remember. Just the following morning, I remember waking up finding a bottle on the oak table. After I examined the half empty bottle of whiskey that we where drinking last night I noticed a poorly written note beneath It.

“Dear peter, I hope this is the last note I will ever have to write you, I hope that we can talk in person one day, I hope that we could finish this bottle, but don’t count on it, enjoy it while you have the ...

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