Defeated (Winner of WC contest)

Defeated

566 words

Prompt: Write a story or poem about finding something that should not exist.

I saw them lying on the ground, collapsed in a heap next to a twin-sized bed. It was a mother cradling her child. There was a blank expression on the woman’s face, her vacant eyes staring upwards towards the ceiling. I wondered if she had prayed before she was shot, or if there was even time for such things. I wondered if she had suffered, but in my heart, I knew she had probably been suffering for a while.

I looked around the meager house which stood in a city thirty miles from the bombing site. These people hadn’t deserved to die. They were not our enemies. They had done nothing wrong. They were just living out their lives. Poor, hungry, sick, and probably already dying from starvation or disease. Even before the bombing, this house would have been condemned in the States. Before the bombing, these people had nothing. Now they had less than nothing. No wonder they hated us.

Thankfully, the little girl’s eyes were closed and she almost looked peaceful. She couldn’t have been more than six years old, with long dark hair pulled back in a braid. She looked so tiny in her mother’s arms, so fragile and innocent. I wonder what sort of threat this child could pose against a group of soldiers. Why had they killed her too?
The sound of flies buzzing in the air was almost too much for me to take, and the house, it reeked of death. Although it was a smell I’d grown accustomed to, I knew I would never get used to seeing the bodies. Innocent people. Their lives stripped away from them, and for what reason?

Freedom?

I may have laughed had the setting not been so grim, rather, it saddened me to stand in this house. Freedom was the furthest thing being fought for. I could see that now. In the mother’s dead eyes, in the child’s sweet face, in the small and sparse bedroom, I saw exactly what we were fighting for: power, control, money, fear, and, of course, pride…this was the type of crusade we were on. There was no winning or losing in this. It would never end because a glutton always wants more.

I sat on the ground and brushed my hand over the woman’s face, closing her eyes forever. A strangled sob escaped my mouth even though I tried to hold back. You are told not to get emotionally attached, to view people as puppets. You are told these are your enemies and if they had the chance they would kill you. You are told these things and you believe them. Most of the things they tell you are lies.

I wiped my tears away, peering into a small cracked mirror standing on a vanity table. My eyes were sad and bloodshot. I could not return until I pulled myself together. My face was expected to remain expressionless in public, much like the woman lying dead on the floor. I sighed, and took in several deep breaths. My heart ached in retrospect of those who lost their lives fighting for a cause which may have seemed important, but now, to me, seemed utterly pointless.

As I stood to leave, I placed my hand on the dead woman’s back and I thought to myself:

Of all the things man has created, war should not exist.