AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I don’t know. Sometimes there’s no reason. It just is what it is. You’re alive, and they aren’t. It isn’t because of some great plan or because a God deemed it so, and it also isn’t because you were better. You got lucky. So many fought and died to live. Are you truly going to give that up?” I murmur.
He swallows and grabs the gun, but he hesitates.
“We can’t force you to live. You have to make that choice, but you called to us. Deep down, you wanted someone to offer you a helping hand. It might seem bleak and helpless now, but take a breath, and then another. Let the moment pass. Today will end. Dawn will come once more with new opportunities. It’s never too late to start over. Don’t die here and end that. Death is final. It’s easy. Living is harder. Your friends . . . Would they want this, or would they want you to live?”
“They are gone,” he snaps.
“And you are their legacy. Their memories live on with you. I can’t take away what you have endured, and the cirque knows we can’t fight these demons for you, but I think someone strong enough to fight for their country and their friends is strong enough to fight for his life . . . for his future. Don’t let their sacrifices be in vain.” I hold out my hand. “It’s your choice—live or die here. I won’t make it for you.”
He glances between me and the gun, ghosts passing through his eyes. “I don’t deserve to live,” he says. “It should have been me, not them, but I’m here. You’re right. They’d hate me for doing this.” He picks up the gun, and I tense as he lifts it, but he simply hands it over and stands instead of pointing it at himself.
Nodding at me, he turns and walks through the flower field, but a weight seems to have lifted from his shoulders. At the edge of the field, he looks back at us watching him, a new light in his eyes. “Well? Are we going?”
I’m not saying it’ll be easy. He’ll still be haunted by his past, but he made a choice today.
He chose life, and now he has to fight for it.
Chapter
Forty-Three
On the ride back to the cirque, we learn the soldier’s name is Greg Stonewall. He’s in his late thirties and obviously wrestling with his demons, but he’s taking a chance with us. He chose to live, and I respect the hell out of him for it. Here, the only information we know about war is what the newspapers tell us, but that all pales in comparison to the reality of it. Roger, as a doctor, should have been drafted and sent to help, but he paid someone off to go in his place. I hated him for that, not because he got out of going, but because I wanted him to go and possibly never come back. It would have been a reprieve. If that makes me a terrible person, then so be it.
This man, however, doesn’t deserve the demons plaguing him. I can see it in his eyes. He’s a good person, or at least he tries to be.
When the soldiers returned from war, they were celebrated as heroes. It wasn’t their fault that they were sent overseas, but it was their fault that they won. I can’t remember how many lives were lost, but it was a lot. Roger never let me read the paper for too long, so I couldn’t get a thorough image of it in my mind, but I know it was bad. We all know it was bad. Those of us who didn’t have to go were left with the information that someone else was fighting for us, and for what? The terrible people that many of us are? I never understood it, but I hadn’t experienced freedom the same way others had.
Now, here is this man, a survivor of that war, but can one really call it surviving? The government brought these men home with their phantoms and demons and expected them to go back to normal life. They didn’t help them in any way, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Greg wasn’t the first to stare down the barrel of a gun.
What I wonder, though, is how he got a joker card.
I’m sitting in the back with Greg and Club, while Spade, Diamond, and Heart sit in the front. I’m no stranger to the process of the joker card, as Hilda gave me my own so long ago, but this man doesn’t look like the kind to come to a circus, especially since he’d been to war.
We already introduced ourselves and went through the motions, but we fell into silence after. When I glance over at him, Greg looks back at me with bright eyes, something in them speaking of hope.
“So have you ever been to Cirque Obscurum before?” I ask, having already lifted my mask. There’s no longer any need to hide my identity with him.
He shakes his head. “No. Never.”
I hum under my breath, curious. “Where did you get the card?”
“The card?” he asks.
“Yes, the joker card.” I pull out the pristine card and hold it up. “This one. It’s how you called us.”
He glances at the card and away. “Can I keep it?”
I hesitate and look up at Diamond in the mirror.
“It’s usually meant for us to take it,” Diamond says, “but it’s not mandatory.”
Greg nods gratefully and takes it from me with a shaking hand. “You want to know where I got it?” When I nod, he sighs. “I didn’t actually know it would call . . . people. I thought . . . Well, I thought I’d see my buddy again. We fought together overseas. His name was Edmond Ford. We just called him Ed.”
“Edmond Ford?” Diamond repeats, something in his tone catching our attention.
“You knew him?” I ask.
Diamond nods. “He was a teenager at the cirque when I was a kid, but I didn’t have much interaction with him. He left a few years after he came of age.” His eyes meet mine in the mirror. “I guess we know where he went.”
