Andenken
Somewhere in France there's a farmhouse Jimmy never left. It's all charred wood, ashes, and distinct piles of dust today, but he still sees it as it was in every doorknob, dream, and nightmare.
He sees hairline fractures in 400 year old plaster, the rise and fall of earth convulsing under the constant tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap of artillery, dirt dancing and arching, and the lunar surface of a man's skull where the scalp and face had been blown off, all eye sockets and leering teeth, a death's head in soldier's clothing.
He sees these things and he sees Arthur, a rifleman in his company, months from turning 18 and still painfully green. His eyes are wide and doe eyed. His voice is a kind boyish drawl that makes Jimmy think of corn fields and family and never being alone. Arthur still flinches when he sees the bodies.
They've been holed up in the farmhouse for five days, seven hours, four minutes, and three seconds when the Germans finally appear, sprinting out of the surrounding forest like the wraiths they made Jimmy read about in Princeton-grey and fleeting, blessed by death.
Somewhere in a distant corner of the farmhouse, Jimmy thinks maybe the kitchen, a lieutenant named Elkins finds a grenade set upon an oak table, a table which once held onions and apples, but now is occupied by maps and ammunition. With the snap of a pulled pin and the crunch of metal hitting frozen earth, Jimmy's world explodes into hell.
He's at the window and shooting hard, gun recoil jarring his arms into numbness and scraping his elbows against the pale wood of the windowsill, which has begun to splinter under the strain of battle. At another window, perpendicular to Jimmy, Arthur is doing the same, with less grace and more fear.
In the section of earth below Jimmy's window there used to be a garden. The garden used to grow peas, carrots, squash and flowers, and every spring the ground would glow with new life. Now three dead men no older than Jimmy lay there, pale faces pressed to the dark soil which hasn't seen life in a long time.
These men could be making snow angels, or playing "Cowboys and Indians", or simply listening to the sounds of the earth, if weren't for the holes that Jimmy has put in their brains and hearts and lungs and, oh god, these men could have been Jimmy's friends, Jimmy's classmates, or someone Jimmy met on the street. They could have been Jimmy and, for at least this moment, theyare Jimmy.
One by one, the other Germans are picked off, smacked into the earth by bullets and grenades. Things grow painfully silent; as they tend to do after every "encounter", the calm before the storm. Small trails of plaster dust fall onto Jimmy's shoulders, face, and hair, and for the first time in what is now five days, seven hours, nineteen minutes, and three seconds, Jimmy needs to leave. He needs to get outs of this room, with its exposed beams and boney plaster. He needs to walk through the doorway, down the hall, he needs to be in the yard and in the woods. He needs to be anywhere but here.
And so, Jimmy rises, ignoring the blood rushing into his legs after hours of tense squatting, and the trickle of plaster running over his spine, depositing on his protruding vertebrae. He crosses to the door, or at least where the door used to be, and decides to pause in a moment of brief complacency.
He leaves his window unmanned and doesn't see the German soldier down in the garden. This man by all rights should be dead, after two shots to the torso. The man shifts his arm ever so slightly. Jimmy doesn't see the man, face still buried deep within the dead soil, inch his fingers into the pocket of his greatcoat and clasp at a grenade.
Jimmy doesn't see the soldier eventually lift his face from the ground and focus his gaze on the window. He doesn't see the glimmer in the soldier's eyes and doesn't hear him whisper: "Es tut mir leid, Mutti". Jimmy doesn't see the quick snap of the soldier's arm , a result of a final burst of adrenaline. The soldier's final movements send the grenade curling through the air towards the window-Jimmy's window.
As Jimmy stops to stand in the doorway, Arthur turns around and flashes a smile-all white teeth glowing on an ash stained face.
Both boys are still a little shaky. There's a cut on Arthur's eyebrow. A small trail of blood over his eyelid. Jimmy's ribs and arms ache like a bitch, but otherwise they're fine. They're fine, and they're strong, and they're going to survive this fucking war.
Arthur shrugs his shoulders. It's not a dismissive gesture Jimmy observes, but to release the tension in his muscles and bones, and says in that innocent, country-boy drawl of his: "We're gonna be fine, aren't w-"
Arthur cant finish his sentence because the grenade flies through the window and heads directly towards him, eventually landing at his feet, like something inconsequential like a broken toy or a discarded gift.
Arthur's eyes move slowly downwards, like he doesn't understand what's happening. Like the entire thing is just a stupid joke. But then he knows, and when he knows, it's already too late.
One millisecond of calm and the thing blooms like a fucking rose, and all Jimmy sees is red on red on red on white. Carnations never looked the same to him since.
The explosion throws Jimmy against the wall, three ribs cracking in a way that's so clean and efficient; it's almost as if the Germans engineered that too. He crumples to the ground almost instantly, delicate cheekbones smashing into splintered wood. The fractured ribs burn with pain, and he's just beginning to process the biting pain in his leg and back when he manages to glance at the far corner of the room and oh shit, Arthur.
Except there isn't an Arthur, not anymore. Arthur was fawn eyes and apple pie. Arthur was nervous fingers that fumbled to hold a gun like a man, and soft fingertips tracing the curve of a lover's photograph. This isn't Arthur. This is one of those men by the side of the road, in trenches; faces blown away by the weapons of war. This is one of those death-heads that had forced Arthur to turn away, eyes wide and pupils dilated. Where did Arthur go?
Beyond the ringing in his ears and the searing pain in his leg, Jimmy can just make out the familiar crunch of jackboot treads on splintered wood, and a voice that is only half recognizable;
"Oh, shit"
The last thing Jimmy sees before he drifts into unconsciousness, besides the red that paints every wall, and he knows now not to look at the corner, is the wide open sky where the ceiling once was. It's a beautiful day. The clouds are milk white, the sky is blue as an eye. Jimmy watches as darkness begins to seep into the edges of his vision. Darkness like dead soil, shadows like hollow eyes.
In the final moments of consciousness, Jimmy feels more at peace than he has in a long time.
. . .
He falls back into reality when the waves of an orgasm crash over him – violent and warm and almost unending. He gasps, staring into Richard's eye before grabbing the smooth curve of the nape of his neck and ramming his fingers through soft, short hair.
He kisses him soft and breathlessly, like a signature, an after-mark. Though his post-coital movements are languid and calm, Richard sees the fear in Jimmy's pupils, the way his lips move almost incessantly, as if he's praying to a god they both stopped believing in long ago. Richard sees and Richard knows. Slowly, he pulls away from kiss, lowering his head to the smooth skin of Jimmy's chest, pressing his lips against hard muscles and all-too-prominent bones. He kisses everything; the protruding clavicles, the knife-like ribs. The beating heart.
And Jimmy shivers under the gentle pressure of Richard's kisses. He shivers and, slowly, he forgets.
AN: First of all, I'd like to thank eyeneversleep for being an amazing beta reader, and for putting up with my first-time fanfiction writer insecurities. This is my first serious fanfiction, so reviews would be greatly appreciated.
Andenken (German) - memento, souvenir.