This 95-year-old widow lived a happy life; she had enough friends around her and never felt lonely. But in her old age, she made a discovery that scared her to death. While looking at old photos of her husband, she discovered a big secret.
One night when Martha went back to looking at old photos of her husband, she suddenly noticed a photo she’d never seen before. It was attached to another photo, so she hadn’t discovered it before. But when she picked up the photo carefully and looked at it closely, she noticed something strange. The photo showed a smiling young man holding a small document in his hand. Clearly, it was her husband Paul. But when she grabbed her magnifying glass to take a good look at what was on the document he was holding in his hand, she got the shock of her life.
To understand a little more of Martha and Paul’s story, we have to go back in time. The two met fleetingly at a dance party in their hometown. Martha was the mayor’s daughter and came from a wealthy family. One night in 1941, she put on her most beautiful dress and went to a dance party with a friend. When they arrived, all eyes were on Martha, the most beautiful girl in town. But no matter how beautiful she looked, no boy dared to ask her to dance. She was of high ancestry, and they didn’t think they had a chance with her.
Until one of the boys suddenly took a step and approached her. The boy didn’t look familiar to Martha, so she thought he must be from another town or village nearby. The young man kissed her hand and with a cheeky smile on his face, asked her if the most beautiful girl in the world wanted to dance with him. Martha agreed, and the couple danced the night away. But when the party came to an end, the boy suddenly disappeared without a trace, and the worst thing was that she had no way of contacting him. She didn’t even know his name.
Saddened and disappointed, she returned home. Five years passed, and she never heard from that daring boy she’d met at the dance party. But she kept him with her in her thoughts until one day someone knocked on the door with a very special message.
The doorbell rang one morning, and the maid opened the door. « It must be the milkman, » thought Martha, so she didn’t pay much more attention. But then the maid called out to her; there was a young man at the door for her. Confused, Martha ran to the front door, and when she opened it, he was standing there—the brass young man who had always remained in the back of her mind.
She squealed with excitement when she saw him, and the boy seemed to be enchanted by the beautiful Martha once again. And then it happened; the couple instantly fell in love. Martha learned that the young man’s name was Paul Smith and that he’d been a sergeant in the war. He was of good ancestry and had therefore been given a high position in the army. Martha’s parents, therefore, didn’t object to her marriage; a sergeant from a well-to-do family—that was all they could wish for their daughter.
The couple married soon after meeting and were very happy together until Paul suddenly started behaving strangely. One night shortly after their wedding, Martha woke from her lethargy; her husband was tossing and turning in bed and kept talking in his sleep. « No, Paul, please, » he murmured in pain. Martha didn’t understand why he was talking to himself, but her husband’s dream became more and more fierce until suddenly he started screaming, « Paul, no! »
Martha woke her husband, frightened. « Honey, you’re having a nightmare, » and gently shook him and hugged him. « You’re safe, » she said gently. But this nightmare didn’t turn out to be a one-time thing, as it returned often. When Martha asked her husband about it, he always answered evasively; it was nothing, he told her. But nothing could be further from the truth. However, Martha didn’t want to pressure her husband to tell her what his nightmare was about; he would tell her when he was ready, she thought.
Unfortunately, Martha never heard this explanation because after dozens of happy years together, her husband died at the age of 83. For months, Martha was inconsolable, until she decided she could not go on like this. Paula never wanted her to be unhappy after his death, and she did everything she could to make the best of the life she had left.
Years passed, and Martha felt happy again; she was completely revived. But she still liked to look at old photos of her husband until one day she came across a very special photo. The photo was stuck behind another, but she managed to release it with a letter opener. In the photos, she could see her husband—an old photo, and he was still young. He also had a document in his hand. When she approached the camera smiling, Martha took her magnifying glass to see what was in the document. But when she did, she got the scare of her life.
The document turned out to be a passport. When she looked closely, she saw her husband’s picture on it, but the name that came across it was not correct. Who was Jacob Peters? Martha was shocked and couldn’t believe her eyes. She looked again and again, but the name and picture on the passport didn’t change. This was her husband, but why had he been lying about his identity all this time?
To find out, Martha, who was still in good health, decided to search the internet. Slowly, letter by letter, she typed the name with a passport into the search bar. But she wasn’t quite prepared for what she would discover. The name referred her to a memorial website for fallen soldiers. Jacob Peters had been a simple infantryman who died in battle. Martha looked at the screen in confusion; her husband hadn’t been killed in battle. Could her husband have been pretending to be Sergeant Paul Smith all this time when he was actually the simple field soldier Jacob Peters?
Martha couldn’t believe it; why would he do such a thing? She frantically searched through her things; maybe she could give her clue as to why her husband had lied to her all this time. And if you guessed it, when she looked through an old box, a letter she ended up finding—a letter she had never read before.
The letter was addressed to her but had never been mailed. « To my dear Martha, I have something very important to tell you—something I have never been able to tell anyone before. When I met you that night at the party, I didn’t know what came over me. I knew I was too humble to dance with you, let alone marry you. But I couldn’t control myself; you were the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen in my life, and I loved you from the first moment I saw you. But we couldn’t be together; of that, I was sure. That’s why I left you that night. Soon after, I was drafted into the army and met Sergeant Paul Smith.
Paul came from a good family, and I was lowborn, but that didn’t matter much in the army. We soon became best friends, but when Paul Smith was hit by a German bomb and didn’t survive, my world collapsed for a moment. I still have nightmares about it often. However, to my great shame, I decided to pretend to be Paul. We both had no family left, and I was the only survivor from our battalion that day, so there was no one left to recognize us.
I figured this was the only way I could marry the girl of my dreams. So, I kept pretending to be Sergeant Paul Smith, who came from a good family. I’m so sorry for lying all these years, dear Martha, but I couldn’t help it. Every day I was away from you, my heart broke a little. But like a porcelain bowl falling into a thousand pieces, you glued my heart back together, piece by piece. Every day with you is a gift for which I will be eternally grateful, my dear. I hope someday you can forgive me. Sincerely, your loving husband. »
Tears welled up in her eyes once again as Martha read her husband’s letter. Her husband had been pretending to be someone else all these years just to be with her. Of course, she forgave him; she still loved him with all her heart. When she read the letter, she carefully pressed her lips to the paper, « Goodbye, sweetheart. I forgive you, and I will always love you. »
Slowly, she put the letter back in the box and looked out the window with a sad smile
