Home Sweet Home

I survived the battle with the skin of my teeth, others were not so fortunate. My front door, standing in front of me, waiting to be opened. Gunshots are still echoing within my very skull. The door handle creeks as I turn it; fearing what is on the other side I push the door open with the last of my energy. My mother is screaming with joy while I use what’s left of my soul to at least form a smile.

My mother wants to hear about everything that happened, I want to do no such thing. Knowing her, she immediately knows that something isn’t right.

“Michael, whatever is the matter?”

I stammer, my voice being interrupted by my memories.

“Th-the war was n-no game, it was not fun, it was a blood bath. They say we’ll all be heroes and that we will be remembered, I’m just a piece of meat that means nothing to them. I must’ve watched a thousand men die in front of my very eyes, I shouldn’t be alive, I don’t deserve to be alive.”

My mother embraces me as I collapse on the dining room table. I remember what happened: the cold biting at my face; rats nibbling on my toes; the booming explosions just meters away... The smell of death.

I’m so grateful that my mother understands me, she doesn’t scold me for being upset. Though she has no idea of the suffering I’ve gone through, she can at least appreciate how terrible it really was. My mother is all I have, both of my brothers died in the war earlier this year and my father died in the American war years before. I’ve always been told to suck it up, as a man I shouldn’t show my feelings but this, this was too much, I had to let it out.