THE SCARS OF WAR
This war has taught me that life is unfair.
I hate it when people say they deserve something. That life owes them.
Life doesn't give a damn and life owes you nothing. Anything good that happens to you is simply a bonus.
The war ended about 2 months ago now. Families have been released from the showgrounds and I have been able to see my family again.
I didn't know how to feel. It had been 2 years since I had seen them. It was weird. They looked so different. They were all underweight, but then again so was I. They had changed. After two years locked in the showgrounds, walking out was like they had never seen the outside world. Frankly, I think I've seen too much.
A lot of people had been killed. Rebelled against the soldiers and paid the price.
You know I saw a couple of my old mates from school and suddenly I felt like such an arse as I remembered all the things I'd done.
My mum said I should try to find help, like therapy. I actually felt angry at that comment. I had just spent the last two years of my life as a soldier and trying to win the war with my best friend who I used to hate, of course I'm messed up. But I'm pretty sure the entire town is going to need the bloody therapy. The rest of the town has spent the last two years locked up in the showgrounds. That's going to twist your head a lot as well.
When the invasion started I missed my house, my bed, but now as I lay down on the warm soft sheets of my bed, I don't want it. I want that abandoned trailer. Those three-sizes-too-small camping beds with the worn out sheets, the small spaces, the rations of food. I want my best friend. Alexei's house is so damn far from mine and I feel extremely restless sleeping in the room upstairs without Alexei's presence. We've spent the last 24 months never leaving each other's side. It goes against all my survival instincts. Without a second thought, we would've set up camp on the lowest floor closest to an exit, with our rifles at the ready.
Every car that goes past I stiffen immediately, ready to pack up and run. We've had to do that before. Not something I want to experience again.
The lights of another vehicle passing by flooded through my window lighting up my room. I need to get out of here. I need to get back to that trailer.
I slowly made my way towards the door and down the stairs, I never realised how damn creaky those stairs were. Luckily my folks needed the rest and weren't going to wake up at creaky stairs. I guess I've adapted to living on very few hours of sleep.
The breeze hit me full force as I walked outside. Without thinking I decided against taking a torch, I suppose some habits never die.
I could see all the police cars and ambulances surrounding the showgrounds from our spot on the hill. It didn't matter though, there wouldn't be anyone where I was going.
…OooO…
The trailer did look rather ominous in the dark. It really did look abandoned from the outside, just how we wanted keep it. On the outside it appeared to be nowhere near suitable for living. On the inside was another story.
We hadn't taken out any of the stuff yet. The guns, the food, the beds. Everything was still there. Alexei and I had decided not to tell anyone about our hide out, everyone would want to see it, see how we survived outside.
No one was allowed to get in that trailer. No one except Alexei and myself.
I pulled open the door.
A hand roughly grabbed me by the neck and threw me to the floor. I retaliated with a kick to the stomach.
I heard soft cussing in Russian and I held my attack.
"That you Elias?"
"Yeah" I grunted.
Alexei flicked on the light switch so we could see.
We always kept the curtains closed so no one could see the light.
Alexei looked tired and worn. He sighed as he ran a hand through his hair.
"You know I thought-"He let out a shuddering breath and tried to continue. "I thought it would be better, you know when the war was over, but it's worse."
He looked at me and honestly he looked like he was going to fall over. I reached out to steady him and lowered him to the bed.
"You're just waiting for the next shower of bullets, waiting for the next patrol, waiting to get up and run."
I just let him talk, he needed to get it out.
"I woke up, and for a few seconds I couldn't remember where I was, you weren't there and I assumed the worst and…" He groaned. "It was horrible. You know no one looks at me the same anymore, even my mum looks at me like she doesn't even remember who I am, like I've committed some horrible sin and I can't be forgiven. I mean I'm no saint but what choice did I have?"
"I know Bro" I said draping my arm over his shoulders. "Same here, it's like they're thinking we didn't do it tough, like we had the easy ticket out. They don't know a damn thing about the hell we had to go through."
My ankle, from that day I had injured it, Alexei had done his best, but he's no doctor. Hell, without Alexei I would've died. I couldn't walk on my leg for a week and a half, I would've been up sooner but he had insisted I rest. He did everything by himself that week and a half. Got the food, the water, stood guard, everything. My leg had never healed properly. I limped ever so slightly on it, the ordinary person wouldn't notice it, but to Alexei and myself, it was a little too noticeable.
About a year and a half into the war was the first time Alexei had got badly hurt. Sure, both of us had been pretty banged up before but I'm talking like serious injury.
We were outside the old news agency, the soldiers were performing an execution. A frigging execution! We had to do something. So Alexei and I were crouched just below the window looking out onto the line of some of the citizens of our town ready to die.
I was busy hooking up the grenades on a timer so when the timer went off, the pin would be yanked out and the news agency would go up in flames.
Alexei suddenly tensed. I carefully set the timer to 2 minutes and I joined him by the window.
"What it is?"
"The soldiers, they're really uptight, keep looking around nervously" he said.
"Looks like we've given ourselves quite the reputation" I grinned, trying to loosen Alexei up a bit.
"We need to go, we've got a minute thirty" I said coming back to earth in the situation.
Once the grenade went off, the soldiers would be distracted and we would sneak the civilians out. Yeah, there were a thousand ways this could go wrong.
Alexei pounced out of the cover of the trees the second the grenade went off and frantically picked the locks of the chains that were holding them all together. We guided them out and they wasted no time in running away. I recognized some of them. The priest at the catholic church, Mr and Mrs Stevenson who lived next door to us and several others. They didn't even bother to look at us, too terrified. I thought it was ironic, shouldn't we, the kids be the ones running away, not the fully grown adults?
I didn't have time to dwell on those thoughts for long though as Alexei suddenly fell over; and didn't get up. I looked behind us, the soldiers hadn't spotted us, but were firing around the news agency. It must have been a rouge bullet. We needed to get out of the open, it was only a matter of time until we were spotted.
I ran over to Alexei and carried him over my shoulders.
I guessed he was getting even with me for that time 18 months ago when I had got hurt.
The bullet was lodged in his shoulder, he got fed up with my procrastinating and fretting and somehow dug the bullet out himself.
It was the worst time of my life. I had no painkillers, no antibiotics in case the wound would get infected. I had tried to keep it as clean as possible and thankfully Alexei's wound didn't get infected. He was okay.
He even still has the damn bullet.
I stared at the rusted bullet on the table.
The sun was rising over the trees.
I hadn't realised we'd been sitting for that long.
Alexei still has that long jagged scar and I still had my limp and we both had nightmare worthy memories over the two subjects.
I've had to wake up Alexei numerous times from been trapped in some scream inducing nightmares. Usually they were about me, or his family being shot to death, or if my injury had been a lot worse than just a simple dislocation and I had died.
Alexei's woken me up more times than I can count as well. My nightmares pretty much went the same. Alexei dying. My family dying, and me the only one left. Those were some nasty times.
I glanced over to the person I now considered family.
He had fallen asleep and definitely looked better than when I had seen him last night, he didn't look so pale and had gained colour in his face. I knew that we'd be coming back to this place a lot more often.
I don't care if any one tells me I need therapy or whatever psycho crap people come up with. Alexei is the only person I need for comforting.
No one would ever be able to pull us apart. We are brothers, forced together when times got rough. I feel that this was our destiny, to do something great, to help the world. We were meant to be best friends. I was just… meant to be.
I bumped Alexei's arm gently.
"Bro we should get going"
He sat up slowly, his hair tangled in every single direction. I snorted in laughter.
"I look like I've just been through the dryer don't I"
I let out another snort of laughter.
He smirked and tackled me on to the floor trying to mess up my hair.
It was nice. To pretend we were normal 19 year old guys just being guys. Not 19 year old soldiers, having seen too much of the world.
Alexei grunted as I managed to get the upper hand and pushed him to the ground, my victory didn't last long though as he pushed me over so he now had the upper hand. And bumped the small table next to one of the beds.
"We are going to break something" He said looking at the table, willing it to stop wobbling.
We both stood up. My stomach decided to make its presence known by grumbling incredibly loud.
"Come on and let's fuel that monster appetite of yours"
"It's not that big" I said trying to convince him.
"Oh come on, you make my metabolism look pathetic!"
"You are so dramatic" I said punching him in the arm. He grabbed his arm and rubbed it pouting at me. I gave him an I-told-you-so look and he just smiled.
"Whatever, come on, I need some food before you eat everything!" He grabbed his shirt and opened the door with some unnecessary force and slipped the worn fabric over his head.
"How did I ever deal with you?" I muttered. He pretended to ignore me.
When I first met Alexei I swore he had no emotions. It was just that annoying mask that let through absolutely nothing. Around people other than myself he would put the mask back on. I feel I can see through his mask easily now and honestly I think he's thankful that there is someone to see through that mask. Around me he would actually show the real him. The real Alexei was pretty cool and it's a shame he doesn't see it like I do.
Alexei told me that he thinks that the war has turned me into a better person, and I have to agree with him. I was the bully of the school, the big jerk. Honestly, that person died a long time ago. I still, to this day feel ashamed of my actions back then and there is no reason I should be forgiven by those kids I beat up but I've got to start somewhere.
We made it to the diner that had survived through everything and with some repairs the place was good as new. The old couple who run the joint were the only two people in the town who didn't look at us like we were aliens.
"Good morning Mrs Jones, Mr Jones" I said, pulling myself onto the one of the stools. Alexei did the same.
"Just the usual boys?"
"Yes please" Alexei and I said simultaneously.
She had gotten pretty used to what we ordered in the month they'd been open and Mrs Jones seemed to enjoy our company but then again I didn't know how much of that was just for show.
We sat in a comfortable silence waiting for our breakfast.
Mrs Jones handed us our cooked food of hash browns, poached egg, tomato, toast and bacon. We both thanked her.
"I never would have thought I would become best friends with you of all people!" I said with a mouthful of food.
Alexei gave me a rather disgusted look but grinned like a maniac regardless. "Yeah, I honestly thought you were the biggest jerk. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with you!"
"I thought you were a loser, always sitting by yourself!"
"We've both changed a lot huh?"
"Yeah but I think we've changed for the better" I reassured him. He seemed pleased at the answer.
We finished out breakfast quickly, paid and said goodbye to Mr and Mrs Jones. We were starting school again in 3 hours since it was only 5 o'clock. Our very first day back in school for 2 years. I was nervous as hell. Nothing would be the same. I was just hoping they put Alexei in all my classes so I didn't feel totally lost.
We were both 19 now so really we would have finished high school but we kind of missed out on two years education so they wanted to bring us back.
We slowly meandered our way back to Alexei's house because it was closest.
"Three hours" I muttered under my breath.
Alexei shook his head in disbelief.
"Still can't believe it, school just seems so long ago"
"I know man it's hard to picture now"
"You know I have no idea what career I want to have" Alexei said with a hint of amusement in his voice.
"Me either!" I said smiling also.
"I'm nervous man"
"Of course you're nervous! I'm nervous too" I told him "it's only human"
"Thanks Elias"
"Anytime"
I couldn't help but find it funny that after everything we'd been scared of, school terrified us! We were tough as nails and not scared of much but school was a whole new realm entirely.
All I knew was that today was going to be very interesting.
-To be continued