so it’s mainly based around the line “i tried very hard to die, but i seemed to bear an enchanted life” from jay in chapter four, but i have expanded a lot of it. for now it is titled Mars
During the Great War, Jay Gatsby notices a soldier. There’s something about him that causes Jay to realize he doesn’t want to die at war. Daisy’s letters have been getting more vague and panicked lately, and after the Cody situation (both the man and the case being brought against him by Ella Kaye), he thinks for a second, Dying might be simpler. But there’s just something about the tall soldier that makes him realize maybe living isn’t so bad.
He talks to Nick once, about some minor issue he’s dealing with. He’s got these wonderful eyes, brown and blue and gray and greens all mixed together. His eyes are expressive and beautiful and Jay is not likely to forget them. His gaze is beautifully uninhibited from any of the jealousy or hurt he’s seen other men carry in their eyes.
The man disappears shortly after Jay first sees him, and Jay is worried for him—there is only so long you can live because of a man you have never met’s existence before you start to get attached. When he gets out of the army and his ticket gets mixed up for Oxford, England he worries about them both, Daisy who is married now and the man who has simply disappeared. When he gets back to America, his attention is split between the two: a random stranger (of which he only knows the name Nick) who made him want to live, and the only nice girl he’s ever met.
