Phantom Limb Syndrome

1. Of men and boys

I couldn't hide myself from my own fear; It was frigidly cold and I sat what had to be neck deep in mud. I could hear the German shells not far off from where we were, and it made me toy with my helmet. I obsessed over where it was placed on my head, tightening and loosening the chin strap, trying to make sure it was straight. My back rested against the muddy trench walls, a piece of paper and a pen rested in my lap. I had been trying to write a letter to my mother, but quickly found it hard. What the fuck was I supposed to say? Dear mother, I shot a man today? Dear mother, I saw a man today, but he didn't have shoes anymore. His boots were blow off when he was killed by a shell blast. No! None of that, snap out of it, I scolded myself mentally for even allowing those types of thoughts. The second I let those thoughts and memories take a place in my mind they became actual tangible thoughts. Actual things that happened. Thoughts like that made sitting here in the mud intolerable. I had seen them break even the strongest of us.
I often forgot I was nineteen, not any older than a school boy. I was supposed to graduate a month after I was drafted. They said I would save my country, be a big hero. The posters and radio ads were ambivalent and omnipresent. Even my professors had encouraged us to join. Told us that we would save posterity, that we needed to protect the women and save the children. He would always throw his arms above his head and talk about glory and honor.
My mother was past saving and I knew that. Diagnosed with tuberculosis several months prior, she only hung on to see me graduate. The funds that could have gone to saving her were drinken away by my father before he was killed in a bar fight. My mother was trying to hold on to see her only son graduate. But instead of a diploma I got a helmet and spit shined boots. I was far from a child now. Anything but that, really. In order to survive on the front, boys became men and men had to become something akin to a monster.
Mother's letters had stopped coming two months ago, and I refused to let myself think she was gone. It terrified me to think that I might actually be alone now. I shoved that back in the far corners of my mind with the thoughts of war; things I knew but didn't want to acknowledge. I kept writing letters home even though somewhere inside me I knew no one was reading them. I finally finished the one I was so painstakingly trying to write. I tucked it away, doubting I would send it for a while. Maybe I wouldn't ever send it at all. We were scheduled to advance the next morning.
Rations for the night were bread and soup. The cook afforded the luxury of butter and an extra ration of cigarettes. I traded my butter for several more cigarettes. More useful to me. I had smoked long before the war and had a strong addiction. I ate slowly trying to savor the food. The soup was thicker than normal and I couldn't help but feel like a man at his last supper. I knew that was why the meal was better. There wouldn't be so many of us to feed come the next night.

James Wright had always been my competition. I had never seen the boy before training and we had been friends at first. Got along as well as any two boys in bootcamp could; thoughts of heroism and duty fresh in our heads and hearts. But, quickly the two of us rose in skill. I was a much better marksmen than he was. But he could run circles around me any day. We battled skill by skill, each trying to oneup each other until it wasn't friendly rivalry anymore. It was simply a competition: beat the other guy. Then it became more than that. Do better than the other guy. It wasn't about beating. It was about winning.
It's funny looking back on that now. It was about winning. It was a war. Maybe if I had learned from that hatred I wouldn't be here now. This war. Maybe I wouldn't be here like this at least. The pure shock of war. The death. All that destruction. And here after, all that was done and over, Wright and I were friends again. We got along, even worked together. We relied on each other. After all that hatred, once we were out here, petty animosity from before the war simply ceased to exist.
Wright and I were lying next to each other in the mud. I was at the machine gun and Wright was next to me with a pair of binoculars. In the mud we weren't enemies anymore. All the competition from camp was gone. Now we were two boys. Boys who shouldn't be out here. But we weren't boys anymore. We sure weren't men. I didn't know what we were. And I made myself stop thinking about it.
"You got a girl back home?" Wright asked, he didn't sound like he really cared. He sounded like he was afraid but didn't want to admit it. He simply wanted to break the silence. Silence might have been more dangerous than the enemy's machine guns and shells. I was glad then, that I was covered in mud. Because I didn't in fact have a girl at home.
I shrugged. "How about you?" I asked him back, watching the horizon through my sights.
He laughed softly. "Seb, you should see her," he said slowly. "She's got perfect hair and bright eyes. And her body!" He sighed, carving an hour glass in the air as if to show her figure. I wasn't sure if he was lying or not. Our conversation carried on about things I didn't remember after we finished talking about them. Little small talk to keep us from admitting that we sat three feet behind thick barbed wire waiting to do what we rationalized as protecting the nation. I looked through the sights like I was watching a movie. Like this wasn't real.
The shells started far away, but I jumped all the same as the ground shook. The sound echoed in my helmet and made my skull rattle. Wright all but whimpered. The first time we had been shelled Wright had soiled his pants and he still whimpered when the bombs hit. I put my hand on his back.
"There a mile off," I said softly. But I almost couldn't convince myself. I was afraid. Terrified really. I was pointing my gun through a little gap in the barbed wire. The wire itself loomed over us like a death trap. The rest of my comrades were still lying in the muddy trench below Wright and I.

The first grenade hit the ground not ten feet from us and the dirt was blown what seemed like a mile high. It rained back down on us and I covered my face with my arm. Wright grabbed my arm and I tried to tell him it was okay before repositioning myself at the sights. I fired back in the direction the explosion had come from.
My machine fire was met by more grenades and we deserted our trench as fast as we could. I took off running. My heart raced a million miles an hour and my lungs burned. But it felt as if it was happening to someone else and all I could think was to keep running, as far as I could as fast as I could. The enemies were close enough that I could peg them as German. Wright was several feet behind me. I dove into a shell hole to try and find protection and I fell hard. My knees took the shock and I fell face forward into the cold, wet muck. I stayed there as if pressing myself into the mud could make it all go away. Make it all stop. Eventually, when it sounded like the shelling finally had ended, I stood up on shaking legs. I looked around for Wright. I called his name a few times terrified he had been hit. It wrenched my gut and made my heart rate speed to a near unbearable pounding in my ears, thinking that he might not respond to me. After a moment he stood up slowly. I looked back at our trench and immediately wished I hadn't. It was littered with the bodies of my company. Most of the men hadn't made it out and several got caught in the barbed wire. About twenty of them survived and Wright and I met up with them in the dusky, fading light.
We weren't far from the French front. I knew that if I ran far enough fast enough I could be safe. But running wasn't an option. It wouldn't ever be an option, not for me anyways. Not in this career. I was the best shot here. Most accurate. But I didn't want to brag about that. That meant I would be put on front lines. And I was afraid. So afraid I was numb to my own fear.
I had my gas mask on, just like everyone else who had made it. After bombs came the thick, yellow, suffocating gas. There were still shouts of men dying. I could hear them but no matter how hard we searched we couldn't find them and that made their cries even more haunting. I was tired and hungry. We had to make it to the next camp for our meal and that meant a three mile trek through no man's land.
The walk wasn't long. That wasn't the issue. The problem was the territory, and that scared me the most. This wasn't French land. It wasn't German. Or British. Or Russian. It just was. That terrified me. We walked in silence and as we quickly finished the last half mile, I was silently praying to whatever god forsaken heaven there was left to pray to.