I’m at home, the peaceful hamlet of Farningham. As I rise from the depths I remember where I really am, in the chaos, carnage and confusion of D-Day.
I tear up the beach to the first row of tank traps. I sit there for what seems an age, just looking at the surroundings and the hellacious atmosphere of the battlefield. Soldiers run past me, bashing my head into the tank trap, I go numb and faint, my head spinning; I try to focus on what was happening out on the beach. A brave soldier is running up the beach, darting, dodging between tank traps. His face is young, freckly and covered in mud; he couldn’t have been more than 16. As he places his foot down onto the wet sand, a click is heard, the land mine explodes. One more distraught mother.
I look back towards the sea, at the boats gracefully floating through the blood red waves, I see three old soldiers making a dash out into the sand. As the last one jumps out onto the beach, he falls backwards as a bullets tear into his chest, his face drains of colour and his body stiffens in mid air. As he falls his eyes are still open, surprised, he falls into the sea along with the rest of the dead drifting bodies. His friends run on, not noticing the body now floating out to sea like a piece of driftwood, one of them jumps behind a tank trap and screams at his friend, telling him to hurry. In a flash the running man falls on his stubby legs, blood pouring from his knees, bullets still ripping though his flesh. His wrinkled face screws up in pain, bullets scream into his torso and face. I look back at his friend and see that he is crying, like a lost child look for his mother.
As my senses return to normal and my focus becomes clearer, I stagger to my feet. I sprint over to the last remaining soldier out of the group of friends. He is distraught, up close I see that he is an old soldier of about sixty, I grab his arm and feel that he is even colder than I am, also that he stinks of urine. When he feels the touch of my hand on his arm, he looks up and I look back into his ocean blue eyes, tears still hovering around the eyelids.
I grab hold of his wrist and pull him to his feet, I shout in his ear to move forward. He doesn’t hear me, or doesn’t listen; all of a sudden he bursts forward, tearing for the bank. As we run up the beach we are joined by four or more soldiers, we run up the beach side by side towards the bank. I brake off from the pack and pull the old soldier away with me; I jump behind a tank trap. With the force of my pull the old soldier stumbles, then falls, headlong into the tank trap. His forehead smashes into the hunk of metal with a thud. Blood splattered over my face, skull fractured off and hit me in the face. The body falls on me, the smell of urine, and the guilt that I killed a friend.
The bank jumps out at me just ahead, looking like a haven fit for a king from all the terror of the battlefield. My heart drops the pit of my stomach when I hear another blood curdling scream; I look across the battlefield and see that it had come from a mangled body writhing in pain. My heart sinks as far down as my frostbitten toes. Simon is laying there in a pool of blood, shoulder hanging on by a thread, stubs where his legs should be. As his pale blood soaked face looks up at me I hear him say two words.
“Kill me….”
As I look into his eyes, I remember when we were in school, college, I remember his face when we signed up for the army; happy, enthusiastic. My mind veers back to the present; I see his face, red with blood, screwed up in pain.
I load my gun. Point it at my best friend. Squeeze the trigger.
Silence.
“They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old, Age shall not wary them, at the going down of the sun and in the morning we will remember them.”
Silence.
