Just Another War Letter

Dear Alex,

I feel different. I feel like all the happiness and good in me has been sucked by the agony of this place. A place that is scary and dull and lonely. I’m so scared…for real Alex. People here are mysterious, they’re skeptical about talking, about smiling, about trusting. I have nothing here except guns and ammo that I don’t want to use. I hate war, I hate people hating each other, I hate hate itself. I want to tell you about so many things I did, but I feel that they’re not worth your time. You are back at home, and I can picture you, sitting in your chair with your headphones on, doing what I used to do before I came here. Before war swallowed me up. About three nights ago, I killed a little girl. I killed a girl that was walking along one side of the camp and I still don’t know why I did it. She was wearing a white tank top and blue shorts, she had brown eyes and brown hair; like you. She was playing with a flower, plucking each petal slowly, almost rhythmically. I loaded my gun and shot her, right in between the eyes –just like people in the TV shows we watched remember? I cried after I heard the shot, the shot that came from my own gun, and the shot that killed a girl. A girl that was walking along one side of the camp, a girl with brown eyes and brown hair…just like you. I walked over and closed her eyes, ran away and hid in my foxhole until the next day, and while I was crying in there, all I could see was her eyes. Looking over me, and in her, I saw you. I saw your eyes, I smelled your hair, I heard your voice, and I felt you hug me; but around me, all I have is death. Death is here to remind me where I am, what I need to do, what I must forget. I want to forget about the people I killed, I want to forget about those eyes but what they want me to forget is things that make me doubt violence. Things like talking, smiling, trusting. They want me to forget people that make me happy, like you; yet they want me to remember that every person I see is one more animal I must kill. And honestly, I’m tired. I want to kill myself, I want to be the one that they forget, because I know I can’t. I feel helpless and I need to keep my head up if I want to make it back home. Sad thing is…lately I wonder if I even want to make it back home. I hope that the tears being shed right now won’t ever come back, I want this tragic feeling gone, I want the filth of death out of my system.

Promise me you’ll sing for me tonight, promise me you’ll look up to the sky and think of me, pray for me, love me and miss me as much as I miss you right now.

Sincerely,

Natalia. 

I wrote this letter to Alexandra, because she’s the only person in this world I can be honest with. Writing a letter to my parents or my sister would not help me get things out of my system, out of my head. Expectations are too high, and my agony is too overwhelming to lie. With Alex I hide no stories, I hide no feelings, I say what I need to say. She is a part of me, a fragment of my mind, my heart and my memory; she is the only one that will understand without explanations, without excuses…she is the only one that understands me.