Letter to Julia

Julia Hughes-Humphries and Thad Tanner are the heroine and hero in Returning To Friendship and have been best friends for most of their lives. I thought it would be fun to sneak a peek at some of the letters and emails they’ve sent to each other over the years. This letter is from the summer after they graduated high school. Enjoy!

Hey Jules,

Boot camp sucks. August in South Carolina is a little bit of Hell. My balls haven’t stopped sweating since I stepped off the bus, and I swear to God our barracks smell like feet that haven’t been washed in three years.

I miss your smell. You smell like strawberries. Did I ever tell you that? It’s one of the benefits of having a girl as your best friend, she always smells good. Other girls never smell as good as you. Even when we go running, I stink to high heaven, but you still smell sweet. How is that? It’s not like you don’t sweat.

Speaking of running, I did a five-minute mile the other day. My second mile sucked at seven minutes and by the fifth mile I wanted to heave. Maybe if I’d had you threatening to pull down my shorts as you flew by me, I would have done better. FYI – You’re tougher than my Drill Sergeant, but don’t tell him I said that. At least he’s not sitting on my back eating ice cream while I do push ups. That was just cruel.

Thanks for writing so often. My dad’s only written once (not that I expected more), but it’s nice having mail and hearing about what’s going on in Friendship.

Are you ready to start school? Just think, in a week you’ll be in Philadelphia, where no one knows you or your business. Be careful, Jules. You’ll have guys lining up and they won’t all be good guys. I know you’d smack me for saying that, and I know you can take care of yourself, but this is the first time I won’t be with you to stare down the dumbshits. Worse yet, I don’t know the dumbshits. So, just promise me you’ll be careful. Don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you.

Gotta go. We have combat zone exercises in twenty. Should be a blast (Haha, see what I did there?). Write soon.

Miss you,

Thad