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  “I have to go.”


  I stared at him, lips pulled tightly into a pale thin line. My eyes held no sadness or hurt; they remained blank and gravely numb. My body, now seeming much colder despite the late summer evening, shook with terrifying thoughts. No words grew from my closed lips. All I could do was stare at him with fascination. Fascination and disbelief.

  “No.”

  My own croaky faded voice had surprised me, and seemed to awaken the emotions that were somehow hidden down deep in the core, waiting to evolve and burst out with horrifying life.

  At my words, he looked up and stared hard into my blank pupils. At the expression of my unemotional, almost aged face, his eyes crumpled with perspiration and regret.  He breathed out harshly as both his sturdy hands reached to roughly grab his sandy thick hair.

  “This wasn’t what I wanted, damnit.”

  The stony expression on my face cracked leisurely and warily as I raised an eyebrow at his words.  “Of course it was.”

  The hands that were once grabbing chunks of his own light hair, dropped heavily to his sides. His regretful eyes quickly turned fuming and defensive.

  “How could you say that? You think I wanted this?”

  The only thing my weak strength allowed me to do was stare at him in distrust. My eyes which were minutes ago the diameter of blurry marbles, now turned into slits of skepticism and irritancy.

  “Don’t you dare.” My voice spoke forcefully between my lips, sounding more calm and certain than it had before.

  “Don’t I dare, what?” he asked, his eyes held confusion and dim measurement of amazement.

  “Don’t you dare lie! You took the examinations! You applied! Don’t you dare say you never wanted this to happen! If you didn’t, we wouldn’t be in this mess right now.”    

  His eyes grew wide with astonishment and he shook his head, regaining his direction to the cemented sidewalk. He scoffed out breath that was dripping with annoyance.

  “I didn’t ask for it. It just happened. I didn’t know they would accept me. I’m too young for heaven’s sakes.” He lifted his head slowly, almost intimidated to meet my accusing face. “Why can’t you get that?”

  As if a sniper had gone off in my system, triggering my dangerous sensations, emotion climbed through my throat, causing it’s hollowness to grow thick. My  tear ducts now swam with watered denial. I could feel my thin lips turning into a harsh snarl.

  “You said you would never leave! You promised.”

  His eyes rose from the floor to meet my icy glance. His eyes widened, though not very noticeably, and then they fell in misery, their grey irises now seeming more foggy and gloomy.

  “I’ll come back. I will! They won’t get to me.”

  All I could do that very moment was shake my head as continuous sobs rose from my throat. I wanted, with all my gut and sense, to believe that very statement he had blurted was true. How I wished at that very moment, that he somehow could precisely predict the future, and that all his accusations would be correct. How I longed for that to be factual. Somehow, the feeling in the pit of my stomach, the tiny feeling that didn’t show its true meaning but would make its existence known, made me doubt his words were going to be true. It was just that feeling, that little insignificant feeling that forcefully pulled at my chest with fear.   

  A new swarm of salty warm tears burst from the inside of my eyes, and my hands impulsively shielded my suffering face. I will never forget how horribly my body was shaking that day, how my pale hands and shoulders trembled with fright.

  I felt his lean yet sturdy arms wrap around my shoulders in a consoling manner. It had only taken me mere minutes to notice that his body was shaking too, and that I could hear deep and husky sobs rising from his throat.  With my quivering arm, I slowly draped it around his strong waist, muffling my head against his sweet smelling chest. If only we could’ve remained in that very position for eternity. If only.

  “I’ll come back,” he whispered repeatedly, his soft breath tickling my ear.

  While our cries of anguish sliced through the silence of the evening, my thoughts ran into a deeper perspective. He was so young and inexperienced to be facing what he was going to encounter. How a young adolescent, barely above the age of 17, could volunteer for such circumstances, such brutal circumstances, was a question never answered in my desperate mind. Nor did I ever muster up the strength to ask him.

  After what felt like long dosing decades, he carefully broke free of my hold. He stood perfectly still in front of me, studying my presence, mostly searching my eyes for an unhidden answer. An answer that would greatly get him out of this dilemma.

   The deep crimson setting sun stood directly behind his sandy hair, illuminating his striking features intensely. Without knowing how long, my arms resumed to trembling once more.

  As if noticing this, he slowly put each of his warm smooth hands on each of my miserable arms. And as quickly as he had placed them, he softly brought his hands back to his sides.

  “I’ll be back, doll.”

  I could feel the hotness of my tears stinging my eyes once more. “I’m going to miss you.”

  Though it was swift, I could easily make out the soft quiver of his lower lip. I wanted nothing more than to crawl back into his secure arms, but I knew that would cause our current situation more pain, so I merely stood still.

  “I’ll miss you too.”

  As he slowly bent forward and gently kissed my head, I thought back to days when neither of us cared for strife, and wished nothing more than to relive that time. How this day had come, I would never know.

  “I love you,” he whispered delicately into my ear, causing me to close my eyes as soft tears trickled down my pastel cheek.

  When I opened my dark eyes once again, his figure was turned and I was met with the sight of his rigid back, walking further away from the spot in which I was standing. My body felt paralyzed, and though I wanted to yell at him to come back, only a small voice conjured from my mouth.

  “Please…don’t go.”  

  My arm rose, outstretched, as if reaching and yearning for him to return. Though it wouldn’t be possible, I only wished that he would hear me, and run back to me with willingness, telling me he would stay. But that was an alternative world, and this was reality.

  All I could do was stare as I saw his body grow smaller and smaller as the distance grew in between us. I never moved a speck from the spot in which I was standing, not even until his figure only appeared as a tiny black dot. I never remembered how long I stood there, just waiting. Waiting for his figure to reappear again, so he could tell me that he wasn’t leaving.


   
  That was the last time I saw him. The last time my eyes witnessed him alive, and unhurt. I will never to this day forget the letter I received of his conditions in the Second World War.  He never came back.



- September, 1939.