[fic] Street of Dreams 1/1 (Band of Brothers, gen, Guarnere-centric)

[garnettrees]

So, the authors of Berlin by Christmas have been revealed. I was right, Leigh did write "Dead Men and Dreamers"! Yay for me, I win. ^_~
(Just the title alerted me, darling. It was a Leigh title. Also, no one writes Lipton like you do-- no one could actually crawl inside Speirs scary brain. You have slain me with the beauty of this story, honestly.

Comments

And once more

[gamesiplay]

He's almost pissed-- he's working up to it, settling into it like a tall glass of beer, like an old coat.

Love this line, too.

Luz makes a crack-- in the dull mess light, the two look like brothers; dark, irreverent, Perconte just a head shorter than Luz.

I practically squealed out loud at this. Too cute. And that's absolutely them, "dark, irreverent."

Guarnere chews harshly, mouth screwed up in a merciless twist-- he's sure to shove Perconte, just a little, on their way to formation.

Hey, always picking on the little guy!

(The United States Marine Corps regrets to inform you...
Last night, half the boys in the company were writing letters home, one last shot before Normandy.
Bill never even picked up a pen.)

It's interesting how the parentheticals didn't come up until very late in the story. Very interesting. It's as though his thought process just starts breaking down, fragmenting, here.

Eyes narrowing, he opens his mouth, ready to toss out some acidic comment, something about being a Jew. Liebgott will fight with him, Guarnere knows it. They'll throw punches, get in blows when the other man is down, kick it real dirty-like. Satisfying. He's ready, he can taste it-- but there, in Joe's hand, is the rosary, beads black and lacquered, blinking like eyes.

Great, great scene, especially taken with the Liebgott-Guarnere fight; that's always been problematic for me, and I like your answer to it. "[B]eads black and lacquered, blinking like eyes" is lovely writing, too.

Bill is thankful, unbelievably so, when Lipton tells him, gently, to quiet up-- he sits on the bench and stares, unblinking, waiting for his hands to change.

YES LIPTON. :) You knew it was coming.

The world below is chaos in minuature-- a bird's eye view of battlements and trenches that look almost like a maze. Like streets in a dead city, leading nowhere.

Fantastic. I love how there are never any loose threads in your story; even the seemingly throwaway lines lace together in the end.

As he falls, he chants the same thing he did as he touched each smooth black bead.
"Bastard. Bastard."

He puts four bullets in the first Kraut he sees.

This is seriously one of my favorite endings ever, so stark and blunt and Bill. I admire the simplicity of it so much; whenever I'm finishing off a story, I feel as though I have to be at an insanely high emotional pitch, but it's even harder to finish off on this sort of note, grim and unsentimental. Lovely, lovely work, as always.