I wake to the sound of mortars.
They fall on us from above. Unseen before it’s too late. Even before I open my eyes, my heart pounds and my hands shake—the side effect of being woken to the sounds of death.
Adrenaline courses through my veins, like an old friend ready to be embraced. I hear Lieutenant Gates yell for us to stay where we are, swearing at the men who would rather take their chances in the open than be trapped in holes.
Trees fall around us.
Dirt rains from above.
Mortars scream and pound the earth.
I grip my rifle to my chest, my fingers numb from holding it so tight. Adams and I stay huddled in our hole, only able to pray one doesn’t land on us. So many times I’ve wondered if it would. If I travel back in time just to die. To become a part of history and disappear without anyone knowing what happened to me.
I glance over at Adams. His face is pale and his jaw is set.
The silence of the forest returns as suddenly as it left, but it’s not alone. The broken trees creak where they’re split, and the moans of men echo through the morning fog.
Adams gets to his feet, unsteady like he can’t walk right, and climbs out of the hole. He’s covered in dirt, probably the same as me, his clothes the color of dark ash. I watch as he looks around himself, surveying the damage before fully standing.
“Come on, Jackson.” He motions me up, and after pushing my fears aside, I follow. My feet are numb in my boots, and I can’t feel my legs. The forest is full of fallen trees and half buried holes. Everything around us is not what it was. Blood paints the snow where soldiers whom I once knew have died.
Parker.
Whitt.
Campbell.
My stomach turns over at the sight of their broken bodies. Knowing I could’ve been one of them. I’m shaking again, the cigarette long worn off.
I watch Adams look into the hole next to ours. It’s bigger than it was. Misshapen. We were five yards away from death. I still can’t feel my legs or anything else besides my heart, which beats unevenly.
Adams looks back at me and shakes his head. The emptiness in his eyes is something I’ve grown used to. The war is taking a greater toll on him than me. I don’t know why; Adams has more to go back to than I ever will. Maybe it’s because I only take this a couple days at a time. He doesn’t get to come and go like I do. Doesn’t get any reprieve. He’s here for good.
I fumble for another cigarette in my pocket—needing a smoke now more than ever—when I hear a scream from the sky and someone shouting.
“Take cover!”
Those two words never fail to make my heart pound.
And there is nothing I hate more than a late mortar to catch us off guard. It’s a dirty game they like to play with us.
The mortar lands close, before I can get back to our hole. It’s death to those of us who aren’t fast enough. The world goes black, and I’m thrown to the ground by a force nothing could compare. The air rushes from my lungs, leaving my body as fast as I want to leave this place.
I wish I could go with it.
And I will. But not yet.
Nothing but a high-pitched ringing invades my ears. The medic always tells me that’s a good sign; my hearing will come back when there’s ringing.
And while the darkness consumes me, thoughts enter my head without reason or order. The chaos on the outside coming in.
Ringing and blackness and the fact my heart is still pounding and maybe I’ll live to see the next day and what I’ll see when I open my eyes. It’s so black even my thoughts are lost. My eyes are heavy. Something hard presses against my body. Everything is cold. Always cold.
I want summer again. I want warm afternoons at the river, lying under the sun with a bare chest, soaking in the heat with the cool grass under my fingers. It’s easy to forget summer here. Easy to forget the things I live for.
I force myself to wake.
I open my eyes, feeling the crumbs of dirt fall from my lashes and onto my face. The ringing in my ears has lessened—I can hear someone yelling far away. The snow is frozen against my cheek, so cold it hurts. My fingers respond and twitch, curling into the dirt and snow, telling me I’m still alive.
I see Adams not far from me. For a moment, I’m glad to see he’s still alive, staring at me differently than the dead do. But something’s wrong. He tears his gaze away from mine and looks past the trees, toward the clouds with glossy eyes. His helmet has fallen off, left forgotten next to him.
His body convulses, dark blood dripping from his mouth. I push against the ground, somehow using the adrenaline to work my legs and arms. I can’t feel myself walking toward him, but I am. I can’t feel anything. Somehow I yell for a medic, hoping one is nearby and close enough to save him.
I fall to my knees beside him, curling one of my frozen hands under his neck.
He still stares at something above me.
“Adams.” I can finally hear myself and my voice shakes. “Adams, look at me.” I want to tell him he’ll be all right, but I can’t. I can’t so much as look down to see what’s there and what’s not.
Someone kneels next to me, and I get a fleeting glimpse of a white Geneva cross. His hands are flying and cutting, covered in red as he tells me something I can’t hear. The medic yells to someone else and a stretcher comes.
The only thing I can do is stare into Adams’s eyes, wondering if he’ll look at me one last time. They’re as gray as the sky—something I never noticed before now. My mind reels through the things he’d told me, of his home and his family, of people who want him to come home alive.
“You’re gonna be all right, Adams,” I hear myself say.
Finally, after so long of getting nothing, he looks at me and tries to smile. It’s hard for him, I can tell. His body still shakes and his skin is cold. He’s in shock. The medic and another soldier put him on a stretcher and carry him away, leaving me kneeling in the stained snow.
I am numb.
I look down to see my hands still shaking. Covered in red.
The blood of my friend.
3.
Harper
Uncle Jasper leaves sometime after midnight.
I’m lying in bed—my sheets tangled around my legs and my eyes heavy—when the phone rings downstairs. I stare at the moonlit ceiling and hear him walk down to answer it, saying a few muffled words before hanging up.
His truck pulls away moments later.
I have no idea where he has to go in the middle of the night on such short notice, and my foggy brain doesn’t care. After he leaves, the house is quiet and still, feeling so empty with only me to occupy it. The moonlight is bright coming through my window, followed by a breeze that tries to drag me back to sleep. It’s like I’m nine again, waking up in the night and wondering what tomorrow will bring.
But I’m not nine anymore, and I’m not going home.
Whatever anyone says, growing up sucks.