Chapter Text
After Joy explained that the wedding was canceled, they had a long argument, and Joy decided to spend the night in her old treehouse, the one that she would hang out in with Jasmine and Grace when they were kids.
She had to head back to America soon, and didn’t want to deal with her mother’s drama for the night. However, she did have to go to her room the next morning to pack up her stuff. She did so, and soon enough her mother came to bother her as she often did.
“Darling…” She sat on the corner of the bed.
“No. I’ve told you.” Joy turned away from her, laying down on her side. “The wedding isn’t happening.”
“Won’t you even consider it?” Her mother placed a hand on Joy’s upper arm softly.
“Nope.” Joy told her. Her mother stood up, rather pissed off now.
“I can’t believe you’d be so selfish!” The woman yelled. “I sewed that dress by hand, there was love in every stitch, and you refuse to wear it! I spent hours organising caterers, musicians, designers to make this a perfect day for us, and you don’t even care!”
Joy couldn’t believe this. She sat up and rolled her eyes, “Mother, you’re the one who offered to do all that.”
“Poor Adrian was calling me, telling me he was awfully sorry. He wanted me to tell you he still loves you!” She was taking his side.
“Poor Adrian? Did he tell you what he did to me?!” Joy could hardly believe her ears.
“He told me he misread things between you, he didn’t mean to make you feel like that-”
“Well, he clearly wasn’t listening to me when I told him to stop!” Joy exclaimed, absolutely furious.
“Joy, you’ve always been dramatic, it’s hard for me to believe you!”
“What do you mean, dramatic?” Joy scoffed.
“You’d cry to me every time you got your period, get so moody at the mention of your father, and have an absolute fit when I told you that you couldn’t do something you weren’t meant to!”
“Because all of those things hurt me, Mother! And Adrian hurt me too, and you’re trying to sweep it under the rug. You always make me feel like I’m in the wrong, just for the way I feel about things!” Joy sobbed.
“You’re still so childish, you’re just thinking about yourself all the time! You’ve got no idea what pain is, how could you? You’ve never pushed a baby out of you, a baby that I’ve raised and loved-”
“How can you say you love me, when you won’t even believe I was assaulted?!” Joy argued.
“I’m not saying that, I’m saying that you shouldn’t behave like this! It hurts me to see you become like this, especially since I was so happy to have a little girl, all of my own-”
“I am not your little girl! I’m a young woman, and I don’t give a fuck whether you think I’m ‘proper’ or not! I don’t owe you this marriage, nor grandkids, nor some fake exterior just so I can maintain your reputation, now get out of my room!”
Her mother, shocked, couldn’t find any words to say back and stormed off. Joy was left wiping tears from her eyes that looked at the door, remembering being 9 years old, feeling her mother’s hand slap her cheek.
The pain of it seemed to fade now.
It was the year of 1939.
David was living and working in London again, this time as a bartender at a fairly expensive pub. He still had to deal with rich pricks on top of belligerent drunkards, but fortunately it was fairly more tolerable than the restaurant job. The manager was thankfully more benevolent and gave him the permission to refuse service to customers.
However, he still had to deal with this one pest who just wouldn’t go away, and that was of course William Cromwell, who just so happened to be a regular. He wondered why this man always seemed to constantly show up to make his life worse. He started to think he’s actually just a goblin following him around, since they are mischievous household spirits according to European folklore. He does look pretty goblin-like after all, with his short, scrawny stature and pointed features.
Sure enough, on one seemingly uneventful September 3rd, William came in, this time with that French girl from a few years back. Colette, he thinks? The obnoxious rich man approached the counter as David was cleaning glasses, smirked, and spoke.
“Two porters. One for me and one for the lady.”
David glared at him, not thrilled about his presence. “I expected you two to have broken up by now.”
“Oh, she just can’t walk away from my irresistible charm.”
David just rolled his eyes and fixed them their beers. Unfortunately, William was good for the pub’s business, as he would order the most expensive drinks on the menu, so David wasn’t really allowed to refuse service to him. He could only do so if he got pissed to the point of barely functioning, which was nearly every time he visits. David handed them their drinks.
“The fact that you still have a girlfriend amazes me,” David snarked as he tossed the beers to them. “Enjoy your beers.”
William took a huge sip as David went to turn on the radio to rugby.
“William, if you’ll excuse me for a second, I must powder my nose,” Colette explained.
“Of course,” William replied. “Don’t stay in there too long, or I might just end up drinking your beer.”
Colette fake a laughed and went to the bathroom. As soon as she was inside, she made sure nobody else was there, and got out a radio. She spoke into it, this time in a less heavy French accent.
“I’m away from the English dog. When do I kill him?”
Another French accent of a woman spoke through the radio. “Get him somewhere alone, then kill him. I suggest framing that bartender. They seem like they have some bad blood between each other. There’s no doubt people would think he’s the murderer.”
Colette ended the radio conversation and went back to William. She couldn’t wait to finally kill this buffoon, as her mission was complete.
“William, my dear,” she grabbed his attention.
He only responded with a loud belch, which grossed out Colette. “Oh, pardon me.”
Merde, just let this nightmare end already, Colette thought, before faking a good attitude again. “The pool room is empty. Sounds like the perfect make-out spot, no?”
“Let me listen to the radio first. I have to see what my team does.”
“Sure,” Colette obliged in annoyance, still gagging over the beer smell.
William listened carefully as he drank his beer, excitedly waiting for his team to score the winning goal, but just before that happened, a breaking news from the BBC interrupted. He got angry.
“Seriously?!” He shouted. “On game day?!”
David was annoyed as well over the game being interrupted but still heeded his attention to the breaking news. “It might be important, so let’s listen.” He turned the radio up, allowing the rest of the bar to hear. An announcer spoke over the radio.
“This is London. You will now hear a statement by the prime minister.”
“It’s a statement from Chamberlain,” David informed. “Must be serious. Ugh…” He groaned as he wiped the counter. “Do not like that man one bit. That deal he made with Germany after they invaded Czechoslovakia just ended up enabling Hitler. This war is getting worse and now they’re invading Poland. I hope he resigns, and maybe we’ll get someone with an actual backbone to lead this country.”
Afterwards, Chamberlain was heard speaking on the radio.
“I am speaking to you from the cabinet room at 10 Downing Street. This morning the British ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note stating that unless we heard from them by 11 O’clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received and that consequently, this country is at war with Germany.”
The whole room fell into a state of horror and disbelief upon hearing this, and David could feel the whole mood of the bar sour afterwards. They continued to listen to the remaining ten minutes of Chamberlain’s speech, before it eventually switched back to sports. However, David turned the radio off after that, feeling sick to his stomach and not in the mood for the game anymore. Not when his country was about to be torn by war and that many innocent Britons were now going to be sent to fight to their deaths, which would include him. Even the usually uncaring William seemed uneasy by the news.
“Can I have another drink?” He meekly asked David. “A gin this time.”
David fixed William’s drink, and William quickly downed it.
“I could really use a drink myself…” David muttered. “Because how the hell am I supposed to stay calm when Britain just bloody declared war on Germany?! I was finally getting somewhere with my life, and now I’m probably going to end up with a drafting letter in my mailbox a few weeks from now. Certainly not looking forward to dying in war whilst barely into my 30’s…”
William tried his best to laugh it off, although inside he was equally as scared. “I’m not going to worry. My father would never let me join a war. I’m too important to him, as heir of his company, after all.”
“Yes, as usual the lowly peasants are going off to battle to serve a government that treats them like expendables, whilst the aristocrats still get to live cushy lives from the safety of their homes.”
Thankfully, this aristocrat is about to face the guillotine, Colette thought, discreetly readying her gun. She spoke to her “boyfriend”. “William, perhaps we can take our mind off this war for a while and do the thing I, you know, suggested we could do?”
“Of course,” William responded, excitedly. “Let’s go to the pool room then.”
The two went over to the empty pool room and as soon as the two were alone and away from everyone else, William grinned and got out a mint, putting it into his mouth.
“Alright, I’m ready.”
However, his expression changed into that of pure horror, when “Colette” took out a handgun and aimed it straight at his head.
“Call for help, and I’ll kill the rest of your little family.” She gripped the gun tighter. “After I’m done killing you, of course.”
“Colette?!” He uttered out in shock. “What the hell is going on?!”
Colette chortled sinisterly. “Colette isn’t even my real name. It’s actually Sophie. Of course, a spy isn’t supposed to tell someone her real name, but you’ll be dead within a minute, so it shouldn’t really matter.”
“What the-?!” William sputtered out in shock. “You’re a spy?!”
“Indeed, William. I was never actually attracted to you, oh no. I only pretended to date your ass for these past years so I can get up and close with the British government, since your father has ties with a lot of politicians, including Chamberlain.”
“What?! But why?!”
“The French nationalist agency I work for sent me to infiltrate the corners of the world’s superpowers and gather their militaries’ deepest secrets. They sent me to do the bidding because I can easily seduce idiots like you, but you’ve outdated your usefulness, so I must now dispose of you. Au revoir, you bastard.”
“Wait! Cole-er, Sophie,” William tried to negotiate. “There’s no way you’ll get away with killing the son of one of the most influential men in London. They’re going to do an investigation, you know, and they’ll find out you did it.”
Sophie just laughed. “That’s why I’m going to frame David for the murder. You two make your hatred and jealousy of each other so obviously known, that there’s no doubt he’ll be the first to be accused.”
William was horrified by this. As much as he hated David, he wouldn’t wish for him to be accused of murder and sent to prison for life, perhaps even be put on death row, and he also thought about how his family was going to react to his murder. Even if his parents did have him by accident and his father didn’t love him, even if his sister hates him now, surely they’d still be devastated by his death, right?
“But I’m wasting time here,” Sophie said. “I have to start my next mission soon and can’t fool around. Now that my work here is complete, it’s time to do what I’ve been anticipating all these years.” She firmly held the gun, ready to press down on the trigger. “I’m going to enjoy every minute shooting your privileged ass.”
However, she heard David’s voice and freaked out. As she didn’t have enough time to shoot William without David witnessing the murder, so she grabbed a billard ball and threw it at William's head, knocking the wealthy Englishman out. She then made a quick escape out the door with the brightly-lit exit sign. David entered the pool room and saw that William was asleep, so he went over to kick him awake. William snorted and stood up.
“C-Colette…” William stammered. “She’s a spy! And she knows all the government’s secrets now!”
“Alright, clearly that beer is starting to hit you,” David snarked. “My boss just asked me to work an extra shift so guess I’m going to continue serving your dumbarse tonight.” David left the room.
Unfortunately, after the news broke out, the place got busier, full of people stressed out about the escalating war. David also had to continue dealing with William, who was now crying and drinking his sorrows away after his apparent “breakup” with Colette.
“Give me another glass,” he sniffled and slurred out, now drunk at this point.
David begrudgingly made him a drink and handed it to him. “This is the last drink I’m serving you for the night, you know that, right?”
“We were going to get married and have children, and live in a big seaside mansion! She was going to be my housewife and cook and clean for me like wives are supposed to do! But it was all just a ruse!” He continued to sob as David glared at him.
“I hope she wised up and left you for good, she deserves better than a chauvinistic twat like you,” David growled at him, before looking at his watch and seeing that it was now finally midnight, which was closing time. “Thank God, I can finally get out of this place.”
After clocking out and calling a taxi to pick up the shitfaced William, he made his drive back home to his apartment, reading to get some sleep before having to start another dreadfully long shift at work tomorrow noon. When he got back to his apartment, he kicked his shoes off his aching feet and plopped down on the couch with a dismayed groan, turning on the radio to some jazz music. He saw the rotary phone on the table next to the couch, and holding back tears, he grabbed the phone and dialed his sister. Eventually, he heard her voice.
“Hello, Mary. Sorry to wake you…I just got off of work and wanted to call you. Did you hear Chamberlain’s speech from earlier?”
After a beat, he spoke again.
“Yes, I’m most likely going to end up getting drafted, unfortunately. I just wanted to let you know how much I love you, and how fortunate I am to have you as a sister.” He started to tear up and his voice broke. “If anything happens, please take care of Mum and Dad for me. Yes, I’ll call them tomorrow before work. I love you, Mary. Good night.”
He hung up the phone and tried his best to sleep, thinking about his loved ones. He thought about Joy, and remembered how much she wanted to join the military. He got worried about her going off to war and dying so young. If there’s anything that would inspire him to join the military, it would be simply just to protect her.
That was going to be his first goal once he was drafted.