(I made this short story as a
practice for my writing skills. The task was to make a story on which the main
character is a father and on a first person viewpoint. Please feel free to put
comments. :D)
I
lit up another cigarette and watched as the end of the stick burned red ashes.
I inhaled a puff of smoke with exhaling. This, I know, did not help me feel
calmer. I sat here on a rusted bench with my wife on the city’s train station
for almost three hours. Two trains have already come and gone. The next train
will be the last. The place was full of other people sweating because of the
heat of the noonday sun. Everybody hardly talked. I guess they, too, were
waiting for the last train bringing the news that would either make us or break
us.
Last
night, my niece told me that today the soldiers who fought on the war will go
home riding the last train for the day. The war had happened so suddenly
that one night someone called over the phone. My son, Fred, took the call and
learned that it was his battalion leader. He left the next morning. My wife had
nothing to do but hugged him and wished him luck. I, despite the urge, have not
even had the chance to tell him I was proud of him or even say “good luck”.
I
was awakened from my wandering thoughts by an approaching low rumbling sound.
The train came toward the station and stopped with a screeching sound. Everyone
stood up eagerly. Soldiers on their khaki military attires, some with bandages
and splints, started to disembark the train. My wife and I watched patiently
for our son to appear and come running to us. A tall man with a bandage on his
left arm, the last passenger of the train, went out the train and slowly walked
towards us, probably because he noticed that our worried eyes are fixed at him.
“Good
day, Sir. I am Lieut. Stradford. Are you Mr. Pryster?”, he asked.
I
nodded. He handed me a small white envelope…a letter from the US Air Force. I
took it with trembling hands. I looked at him eye to eye, searching for an
answer to a question I could not bear to ask. He just looked back at me with
sorry eyes.
I
opened the letter. Every word hit my heart like the bullets that killed my son.
I stared blankly at the empty train in front of me while my wife embraced me,
sobbing.
