The emotion was building up, like lava through a volcano. It was shooting up the base and waiting at the top, ready to burst out and destroy all in its path. I had seen too much, the mangled bodies, the sounds of screams from the dying men, the cries of the wounded for their mothers.
I couldn’t get out of my head how blood had washed down the field like a river. The impact, and concussion of the shells punishing the ground, and taking everyone's lives with their explosions to the Hell was still breathing its destructive ways on me. Me. I see gruesome images of decaying bodies, and all of the families who I had ruined by a twitch of a finger, and a pull of a trigger, my brain cannot kick.
I can’t shield my eyes from the violence, for it is permanently embedded in my brain. The screams, the blood, the bodies, the smell, all still surround me. I still can catch a whiff of decaying flesh from where I am sitting. The retching smell reminds me of the boys who I put to rest. Who would have ever thought I would be here.
It’s like a big nightmare that I will never wake up from. The emotions are boiling up, scared, sad, and angry, they swirl around in my head like something being flushed down a toilet. I can't remove the horror from my brain. Someone help me, please, Mom, Dad, help. But they are nowhere to be found.
The feeling of death crawls up my spine. I have caused so much damage; those kids were just like me. Some clueless kid sent to honor his country. I wonder if he told his family that he loved them. Thoughts, smells, and sights torture me. I feel so lossed. We had lost so many good men back there, and the fact that the death and destruction I, and the enemy has caused still lays around me, just makes this nightmare more real.
I just want to go home. Home in Vermont, with Mom and dad, and Sue, and Mary, and Jack, and Wilson. I just want to be with my family. I want to go home. I want to hug my Mom, and play with my dog, and hang out with my friends in town. I want to smell apple pie, and turkey not dead bodies. I want to go hunting in the woods with my Dad and brothers. I want to talk to see Mary and Sue again. I want to go back to High school, and keep playing football, baseball, and basketball. I want to see my big mansion, and my own yard, not a grass field in the middle of some Asian Island.
I bury my head in my knees and let the emotion pour out. The volcano finally erupts, and there is no fire crew to extinguish the lava. I let the tears stream down my face like a waterfall. Let the anger, frustration, and sadness out. I feel the warmth of another man's arm around me. We cry together. Letting the tears carry as much emotion as they can hold out of my eyes and down my face. The soldier and I are as one, but for now we are just two normal human beings, who have seen too much.