«letters to the somme»

beacon rose.

The trenches are like snakes. Long, thin, and slimy, they wind around the borders of France. A terrifying thing about them is that they are only a couple hundred yards, at most, from the Germans. The near silence in the trenches during the day is eerie and sinister – the sound of soldiers awaiting unknowingly for their deaths. Dried blood is caked in the dirt, and the puddles of muddy water are hardly covered by the pathetic boards used to cover makeshift drains. The dug-outs are infested with rats and every other imaginable type of vermin. All of the Tommies are exhausted. They come from everywhere, these men, from farms and cities, from shacks and castles. Pain does not discriminate, and screams pierce the otherwise still air from diseased soldiers delayed from going back to England.

This is the hellhole James arrives in after his training. To be very honest, he did not see the point of it – all he has learnt is to shoot a gun. Tactics and trivia crammed into his frazzled brain make no sense to him. Practice raids have prepared him little for the utter horror of the trenches. He is ordered into a support line, relatively safe but still rather dangerous. James puts his meagre pack into a dug-out and sighs, sitting against the wall. Something about the dull, hollow atmosphere of the day makes him feel tired already.

“You all right, there?” He looks up, and sees a young man, probably in his mid-twenties, with brown hair and gray eyes.

“Yeah. Just got here.”

“Ah. I’m Robert. Robert Hurst. But everyone round ‘ere calls me Bobby.” He grins, sliding down the wall to sit next to him. Bobby has a tough, country accent, and James thinks he’s a farmer.

“I’m James.” And they shake hands. Bobby pulls out a packet of cigarettes and lights one carefully with a match, pulls on it, and sighs in relief. He methodically takes it off his lips and breathes the smoke out.

“Nothing gives you more happiness than a nice fag. Well, except for a wife, that’s for sure.” He pulls a worn piece of paper out of his pocket carefully, and unfolds it to reveal a small, freckled woman smiling slightly with a plump baby on her knee.

“That’s Ann, and that’s my son Joseph.” He says proudly. James detects an edge of melancholy in his tone, and smiles uncertainly as every boy does when someone mentions babies.

“How old’re you?” Bobby then asks, slipping the photograph back into his pocket.

“Just nineteen.”

“You got a swee’eart, lad?” He leans against the wall, pulling back on his cigarette again.

James thinks about Rose, and her tears and having to say goodbye to her for God knows how long.  

“Yeah.” He mutters, trying to swallow back tears. To his surprise, instead of laughing at him, Bobby slaps him on the shoulder.

“Everyone cries at least once. At least you didn’t do it in front of ev’ryone, righ’?”

James nods, head lowered.

“You miss her a lot already, don’t ya.” Bobby grimaces, and sighs.

“Think of her as a beacon, all right? You get through this, you go back to her.” He is about to continue, but a hiss comes from outside.

“Sergeant needs me. You need to talk about something, you come to me, all right?” He slaps a silent, melancholy James on the shoulder, who looks up at the man who is leaving, and thinks that they might just become friends.

He pulls a piece of paper from his pocket like Bobby did, and unfolds it to reveal Rose, his reason for living, for not giving up.

But he puts it away before he can mar her face with dirt and tears.