Saturday XXXX,
Do you remember how, when we were young, we used to lie on the field near the old uncle's house, and hear him speak to his dead wife? We laughed at him, and called him names, and one time we called him crazy to his face. Someone needs to call me crazy now, for I'm still writing to you, even though you will never read this, will never need to. Or perhaps you will. Who knows?
Things are strange here – new, and not in a good way. How little I know of death! There is a rifle in my hand, and I fear myself, for I am now a monster. I killed. Do you hear? I have killed.
It is so easy to write to you. So easy to list my sins in a letter than talk it out. Probably because you will never read it. Or perhaps, reciting the horrors aloud makes them real.
My rifle is a beauty. It fits as snugly in my hands as we used to fit in the niche of the hedge around your house. It is as silent as we were when we hid there. It is not, however, as innocent as we used to be. Every time it sings, my little beauty, a soul goes up to God. May they rest well.
There is death in the air, and fear seeps through us like the damp from the floor at home. I'm scared – and I'm not even ashamed of it. Yesterday, we were crouched in a trench, when a shell exploded above us, and for one heart stopping moment, all I knew was glacial silence, and I swear, when my hearing returned, I heard Death call to me. Did you know how silent and melodious Death's voice is?
They say we die for our nation - it's all golden and glorious till you get here. This kid - young and bright and annoying – he kept going on and on about how happy he was to serve his country, how he enlisted to come here. He enlisted. Who does that? Do we now teach our kids to fight? And then, the lad got blown off the other day with nothing to send back to his mama other than a paltry 'We regret to inform you...' letter. He... he... deserved better, I think. Everyone here does.
How selfish I must be to be grateful that it was not Unni! A while later, we will sit outside together and play a game of dice. In war, it is easy to be happy with little things. For all I know, I might as well be still pining over you – shamed be I! – but it is something I've longed to learn, and Unni is happy enough to teach me the game. I lose anyway, but it makes Unni smile, and – it's weird, I've known him no longer than a week but – it makes me smile too.
It is important to be happy - and it's not a realization I've had, it's a fucking epiphany. Pity, it took a war and a broken heart for me to realize that.
I hope you are happy, dear one. I hope I can see you smile again.
Sincerely yours,
The Soldier.
YOU ARE READING
At War
Romance"Revenge by young men is considered victory, but old men who stay at home in times of war, and mothers who have sons to lose know better." -Chief Seattle This is an anti- war epistolary novella written for ONC 2022. Prompts 5 and...
