NO MAN'S LAND

1918

I left from one war and found myself coming home to another. One would argue it wasn’t the Great War’s trenches that destroyed me, but what was waiting for me when I returned home. I had nightmares about it, the terror of returning to no wife, no baby girl. As if covered in debris and the spits of war wasn’t enough – I was burdened by nightmares while sleeping in those trenches. They say war brings you closer to life and death, that some soldiers lose themselves in it that they begin to see things, moments that haven’t happened yet, relatives long dead and buried. I never believed such things could happen; but it seemed life and death met in the battlefields of men in more ways than one.

By the time I came home they were both part of my past. The sheriff told me a man had walked into my home, our home, at night. He was drunk and wielding a belt around his fist, they never caught him. My heart sank. I had seen countless men fall around me, but it never sank like this. They had been dead for 8 months, and no one sent me a letter.

The house was quiet, I couldn’t bear it. No sounds of drawers being closed, doors slammed, chairs being pulled back at the dinner table, nothing but an obnoxious silence. I’d spent countless nights on the porch, staring out at the ranch and the acres of green that spread before me. I’d imagine my wife and I chasing our little owlet around at night, stars raining glee down upon us. Margette loved scouting for owls up on the trees, her mom and I would indulge.

The owls seemed extra loud, they cried with me many nights.

I fell asleep on the porch one night, thinking, hoping the man would show up again. I wasn’t a man of violence, until I had reason to be. I woke up to the sounds of gunfire, faint echoes of a war long and over with. It was just in my head. I rubbed my eyes and took a breath as heavy as sandbags. To my surprise, no owls were singing, no crickets chirped, the earth stood still – could I have been dreaming?

Off in the distance two beads glowed like white embers, as if someone were holding two faint stars open-handed miles off between the trees. Were those eyes? I went inside and grabbed the shotgun. Maybe it was him. This was it. My moment to dig another trench in my damaged psyche.

When I returned outside it seemed as of the sky had dropped its stars. Countless glowing embers of white were spread out among the trees, it made the forest seem as if she were alive, watching me as I approached her grasp. I stopped; every glow seemed like sniper’s glass from a distance. I shook it off and kept walking.

Owl’s, hundreds of them were perched on the crooked branches of the trees for miles. The slight nudge of a wing or jerk of their head made the trees seem alive. I’d never seen so many of them at once. Margette would’ve been equally as in love with the sight as she would’ve have been hugging my leg from the fear. The sky above looked particularly alive, as if someone had swirled a bowl of blue and purple paint, and in the middle was a wide gaping hole littered with stars. I’d never seen nature act in such a way, and certainly not all at once.

Amidst all the strangeness, stood a flower, right in the middle of the forest. It seemed a long way down, past all the observant and feathery night creatures, and the looming cosmic window in the sky. But the flower seemed to glow vibrant, its red hue drew me in, it was a red Marigold.

No Man’s Land, September 17, 1917

Jasper and I had spent 4 weeks inside the trenches of no Man’s Land, the Germans were panicking. They’d send more troops over as the days went by, attempting to get us while we slept. The nights were long, the days longer. We could taste the dirt between our teeth, our uniforms were barely recognizable, and our boots were weighed down by the mud produced from blood and rain. It was a patch of earth where nothing felt like it was meant to live. And if the thought ever evaded you, the smell of decaying flesh, burnt clothes and gunpowder would remind you.

Jasper had been holding on to a flower for the better part of a day, his knuckles white as he crushed it his hand, he wasn’t letting go. We had been laid up against some sandbags, guns at the ready.

“You keep holding on to that you’ll be too slow at loading your weapon Jas, what am I going to tell your mom then?” I joked.

He looked at me, a bittersweet smile on his face, “she’s the one who sent me this in an envelope, it’s supposed to heal.”

“And she didn’t send two? I would’ve liked one. I would’ve thrown it at the Germans,” I joked.

He got sadder as he looked at his palm, “It’s called a Marigold, she also said, in Mexican culture, it’s supposed to lure spirits back to the living, these are placed all over a loved one’s gravestone,” he spaced out, “I think she’s come to terms with the idea that I may not come back home.”

Sounds of gunfire and metal seemed to ring all around us, getting closer and closer.

“Hey, none of that. We’re going home, and there ain’t a damn thing that will keep that from happening, you hear,” I grabbed the back of his neck forcing him to look into my tired eyes. His mouth quivered as he fought back tears. We touched helmets, “they’ll be a parade for us, and you’ll meet my wife, she might adopt you,” I joked, this one was forced.

That night I found Jasper’s body lying lifeless in the trench, miles off from where we first were. We had gotten separated during a gunfight; I’d yelled for him whenever I wasn’t returning fire. He was only 20 years old. He died clutching the Marigold in his cold firing hand.

1918

I found myself crying, my knees dug into the ground beneath me, as I stared at the single Marigold before me. So much loss, it made me feel so small. My wife, my baby, my friend. I was left untouched, to continue on resenting myself for not being present when they needed me.

The Marigold felt enchanted. What were the chances? I heard shuffling ahead. The owls were still perched on the trees swaying their orbital heads on occasion, it played tricks on me, I felt unsafe. I always felt unsafe.

A man stepped out of the shadows, he sported a long beard, and a disheveled suit – a bottle hung from his hand like a public execution. I cocked my shotgun and pointed it at his heart.

“Who are you?” I growled.

“Um…I’m Lee Harold,” he spoke low, softly. The bottle shook in his hands, this was a man on the edge of nothing.

“…get…,” I couldn’t finish the sentence, “get off…,” my hands tightened around the shotgun. I wanted to shoot him, I had blood on my hands already, would one more make a difference?

He dropped the bottle on the dirt, and spread his hands out, seemingly disarmed. “I’m so sorry,” he uttered, it came out weak.

“You’re sorry?” I growled, I could barely see as puddles filled my eyes, “You’re sorry?” I took three large steps toward him and sent a blow to his nose with the butt of my gun. He hit the ground, and immediately back peddled himself against a tree.

“Stop, please, I’m sorry,” he was a broken man, broken and confused. “Please, god, that wasn’t me. I swear, I wasn’t myself.” He continued to beg, as if crawling against the walls of a trench he couldn’t get out from. I was his trench.

“You took everything from me, you hear!” I placed the mouth of the gun on his cheek, forcing it against his teeth.

The owls around us had begun to hoot, and then their hoots became screeching.

His tears weren’t enough, I wanted him to feel the pain that was unfamiliar to him and home to me.

“Please,” he fell forward on his elbows, “I wasn’t the same coming back either, I just…,” he couldn’t finish his sentence, he was choking on his tears. “They never tell us how hard it is to come back home; you don’t recognize yourself, and your loved ones don’t recognize you.”

He fought in the war.

“You lie,” I heaved.

He reached into his suit jacket, and pulled out a heart-shaped, gold medallion hanging from a purple ribbon.

The Purple Heart.

He had been wounded in battle, he had fought, same as I. And he had returned with nothing more than a pat on the back, same as I.

I kneeled down in front of him, arguably more broken, but with something in common.

“We are brothers in arms,” my face was heavy with dried tears, “in the trenches, but here you’re nothing. And you’ll live the rest of your life in a cell knowing you came home with nothing, and you will die in a cell with nothing.” I watched him wither. He was defeated. I was incomplete. And somehow, I felt lighter.

The sheriff came by an hour later and put Harold in cuffs. He was an old, round country man, who always had fried jerky between his teeth, his voice hoarse from all the obscene amounts of smokes.

“Who would have thought the man would be stupid enough to come around here and confront you?” He pats me on the stomach, “shows man may be capable of heinous acts, but living with them, that’s a whole different story.”

“I guess so, sheriff.”

“Welcome home, by the way, thank you for what you did out there,” he gave me a look that said everything. “You know I had a grandson who was drafted, his name was Jasper,” he paused. “I don’t speak to my daughter anymore, so I’m not sure if he has returned since the war ended, but I hope he ran off to Paris with some beautiful gal.”

I smiled at him, half remorsefully. “Me too.”

When the sheriff left with Lee, it was just me and the silence again. What happened that night was surreal; Lee showing up at my home, the Marigold flower. It’s as if Jasper wanted me standing there infront of it. I found comfort in the thought that a part of Jasper lied planted on my field.

The owls, that could only have one explanation. I looked over at them from my front porch.

“Goodnight my Margette.” And I stepped into our home to rest my head on my pillow for the first time since I came back.