The latch clicked.

For a heartbeat, neither of them moved.

Then the front door eased open, and there he was.

Henry O'Brien.

Whole.

His army cap sat crooked on his mess of brown curls, curls that almost looked blond where the afternoon light caught them. His skin had lost what little colour it once had, pale beneath the dust of travel, freckles scattered across his forearms where his sleeves had been rolled, disappearing beneath the collar of his uniform and down beneath the fabric she knew so well. His blue eyes searched the little cottage as though he wasn't entirely convinced it was real.

He had expected silence.*

Instead—

She crashed into him.

The force nearly knocked him backwards over the threshold as her arms wrapped around his neck. Before he could even speak, she was kissing his cheek, his temple, his forehead. With trembling hands she yanked the ridiculous army cap from his head and tossed it onto the nearby table.

"I hate that thing," she whispered.

Henry let out a breath that sounded suspiciously like a laugh before it cracked into something rougher.

"You've still got my welcome."

She buried her face into his shoulder.

"Don't ever do that again..." Her voice shook. "Never enrol again... you idiot..."

His arms tightened around her instinctively, almost afraid she'd disappear if he loosened his grip. For months he had imagined this moment while crouched in freezing trenches, surrounded by mud, gunfire, and boys who should never have been soldiers.

Now all he could smell was home.

Soap.

Fresh bread.

Her hair.

She pulled back just enough to look at him, tears streaking down her face.

"Four years, Henry..." she whispered. "For what? You're so stupid..."

"I know."

"No... you don't."

She kissed him again, slower this time, aching with every second they'd lost.

Only when she rested her forehead against his did she quietly ask,

"...Did you get my letters?"

Henry smiled—a small, exhausted smile that reached his eyes.

"Every single one."

"And... the photograph?"

His hand slipped into the inside pocket of his tunic. Carefully, almost reverently, he unfolded a weathered envelope. From inside came a faded photograph, its edges bent from being handled countless times.

Their son.

Curly-haired, missing one shoe, grinning at the camera on his second birthday.

"I kept it here," Henry murmured, pressing the picture over his heart. "Closest place I had."

His voice faltered.

"When everything around me reminded me I might not come home... I'd look at him."

His thumb brushed across the tiny face.

"And I'd look at you."

Fresh tears escaped her as she cupped his face.

"He's three now," she whispered. "Staying with your mum for the week."

Henry nodded.

"I know."

"He had a nightmare before you came home. Said the house felt... scary."

Henry swallowed hard.

"I'll make it feel safe again."

She reached for his hand, weaving their fingers together.

"You don't have to leave again."

"No."

He leaned forward until their foreheads touched once more.

"I've already come home."

For the first time since September of 1914, the little cottage was full again—not with silence or fear, but with two young parents who had survived a war that had tried very hard to take everything from them.