Christopher 𝔅𝔞𝔫𝔤 ✱

The war was supposed to smell of gunpowder.
But here she smelled of apples and warm grass.
The sun rose slowly over a foreign land, burning into the eyes of a foreigner lying on a hillside. The dawn here was unusually quiet. The air was sweet—thick with the scent of orchards and damp dew.
The warm morning wind lazily swept his dark hair, escaping from beneath his military cap. Daisies were tangled in it, as if the earth itself were trying to hold him there a little longer.
A little further down stretched a field. Beyond it were orchards, heavy with fruit.
And people.
Christopher watched.
He looked, studied, listened - like a man who found himself in a world where he did not belong.
Girls carried water with yokes. Dogs herded rams into the meadow when the pens opened. Boys ran across the grass, holding a kite aloft. Men plowed the land on horseback, women harvested the crops and sang long, melodious songs. These songs were strangely soothing.
For a moment it seemed as if the war did not exist.
The general's long eyelashes fluttered as another voice reached him - quiet, young.
Christopher raised himself up on his elbows and looked down.
In the garden, among the vines, someone was picking grapes. A young man.
He hummed to himself, his voice carrying easily across the hill.

• One summer day at dawn
  looked into the neighboring garden...
  Christopher rose slowly, his boots darkened by dew, but he hardly noticed.
  He had been watching this young man since his arrival.
  And the young man knew it.
  But he never allowed anyone to come closer.