Words that held meaning
Which could crash and burn her down
Sending in a tidal wave
Emotions which would make her drown
He held her hand tightly
“Stay afloat!” He screamed in pain
The sky empty, no one was listening
His plea was in vain
She tried, she really did
To find her way back to the sky above
His calls unmistakable
Or perhaps the lack thereof?
For if he cared
Wouldn’t he jump in too?
Three words which crashed and burned her
I love you
In this war, everyone has a different reason to fight, a person or idea they make themselves believe is worth hall this, this suffering, this never-ending fighting and this ever-lasting battle between two sides, which both don’t really want to do this.
You need something, someone, to keep you going. You need to have this dream, this vision of perfection you want to achieve, in order for you to get up in the morning and continue the life that has been so rudely taken from you all those years ago.
Some fight for freedom, a noble cause of course, the thought that everyone will be able to walk on these streets, Jew or not, male or female, they don’t care. Everyone has basic rights they wish to achieve, because what kind of world are we living in, when little kids can’t go to school just because of the star they’re forced to wear?
Some fight for loved ones. The man next to me? He’s writing a letter to his wife and children, every week. He’s fighting for them, he didn’t enlist for his family, but you can be damn sure they are always in his mind, gun or not, whether he is in a battle or not, it’ll always be his family.
The young kid, he’s fighting for honour and pride. Maybe not as noble as freedom, yet interesting to say the least. He feels like he owes his country this, a country which not too long ago, wasn’t even ours to begin with. He thinks this is what he should do.
Others fight for shelter and food, the money they get. They have seen hard times, lived through them, and they saw the perfect opportunity to have shelter, rations and a pay check. You should’ve seen their faces when they were sent to other countries.
Some fight because they expected it to be fun, to have all the ladies swirling around them, to have them look at him, while their panties drop and they fall on their knees before him. That didn’t go as planned either, as I bet you could’ve guessed already.
Me? Why I’m fighting? I’d love to say something heroic, something brave, something that would make you think that it was the best thing I ever did, enlist in the army. But to be fair, I did it because I saw everyone who already enlisted look so honourable and shiny in their green suits, I was jealous. That’s a reason too, envy.
I know it sounds stupid, that I envied them. But all the reason’s above, they didn’t apply to me. I didn’t feel the need to bring freedom, because I didn’t expect myself to be able to. I didn’t have anyone I loved, except my mother, honour and pride had left me a long time ago, the shelter and food, the money, they didn’t draw me in. I was used to living without much gold and glitter, I didn’t do it for the ladies. I did it because of the most stupid reason anyone’s ever heard.
If I look back at myself, I swear to God I would hit myself so hard I’d fall through the ground and straight into Hell, where I belong. I was foolish to think the war was just another stupid decision that might work in my favour.
It didn’t.
The photograph shows the original Band of Brothers: Easy Company, US 101st Airborne Division. There have been multiple books written by the man that served in Easy Company and a short series (partly) directed by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg
I know I’m human, like everyone else, and maybe it’s arrogant of me to say this, but I never expected to get shot. Perhaps the red cross on my arm made me feel safe or was it the unrealistic dream that people knew they weren’t supposed to take me down. I was a medic after all.
Is this what they felt? All the people I’ve helped before, as they lay crippled in the sand, seconds before it’d swallow them whole? This burning ache in their chest, which wouldn’t stop, no matter how hard they screamed, no matter how many prayers they spoke, this was their reality.
My reality.
I think it’s fair to say that I was in pain. I had never understood it, not completely. I had seen people cry out loud for their mother as the torturer stripped them from their breath, and now that he marvelled over me, I couldn’t hold back my grunting.
It was almost funny. It could’ve been a joke, would’ve been a joke if it wasn’t myself laying there. Running towards me, silent but swift, was a medic.
A medic who came to help another medic.
I told you it could’ve been a joke. And I would’ve laughed, if it hadn’t been for the devil who send acid through my veins. My face flashed in horror and pain, the expression I had seen often enough to know what it looked like.
Was this revenge? From all those I couldn’t save, to make sure I’d respect them more? Because if it was, it worked.
Their history had become my own. Their yesterday my reality. And I’d make sure their tomorrow, would be my today.
The short story was based on the picture above, of a medic being helped by another medic during D-Day.
