When I close my eyes at night all I see drifting and weaving behind my closed lids are eyes of deep turquoise. I then reach out in terror for my wife only to find the bed empty and my body cold in the night air. I can't bear to look in the mirror any more for all I see reflected in the smooth glass is a murderer. I had killed my own son. I was the one who ordered for him to come here. I was the one who allowed him to become bored and begin to adventure. I was the one who had allowed the house to be so close to that godforsaken camp. I'm the one who kept telling my dear wife it was fine, he was just curious, he was young boy, and above all else, I had given the order that had killed him. We were running out of room, we had to continue on with our leader's plans, it was my job.
I am afraid to fall asleep. I dream of the Jew I had watched die in the gas chamber, and there in front of my eyes Bruno takes his place gasping, spasming, drooling, his turquoise eyes rolling back in his head until he finally he falls to the ground atop hundreds of dirty Jewish corpses. I then have to watch as his body is lifted up into a wheel barrow and brought to the furnace. They load his body into the tightly crammed oven and bones of past victims grind into his pale flesh. And just as they were about to close the furnace and complete their task turquoise eyes opened. Bruno was burned alive.
- A Murderer, a father, and a soldier, a man I am what you wish to call me