Coming Home

Short story about a mother's pain and sadness while remembering her son's early days, how proud she is of him and his time in the military.

She hated to step foot on a plane but she would do anything for her baby. No, he wasn't a baby. Hadn't been for some time. He was a man. A man fighting for his country. A man injured.

At the age of twenty-one, Jack Keenan made the decision to go into the Air Force. Friends were going away to college after high school. He couldn't. Mom couldn't afford it. He was a bright boy but his grades just weren't as they should be.

Besides, Jack wanted to experience life. Against his mother's better judgement, he was allowed to hike and camp all over the United States with his close high school buddy, Keegan Jackson.

Sadie Keenan pulled two photo albums from her carry-on luggage. The first, covered in a faded blue cloth held baby pictures. A shock of dark hair stuck up on an infant's head, a flat nose appeared smashed into his red, splotchy face; a crocheted multi-color blanket wrapped around his slight torso. Dark eyes peeked out of a laundry basket, fresh clothing tossed haphazardly on the floor. Playing with the puppy, swimming, his first bike ride, shaving, baseball team, prom, graduation. She smiled as she turned each page slowly.

The second album was a scrapbook. Letters from boot camp in San Antonio, Texas. Pictures in his blue uniform and newly buzzed haircut. He had been a skinny child but now he was so muscular; barrel-chested.

Maybe his excellent physical condition and all his training would accelerate his recovery?

Jack was a Loadmaster. He loaded and unloaded boxes of supplies and equipment into big cavernous aircraft and flew with others to different locations. Sadie Keegan was so proud. She would ask questions but mostly Jack would say, "Sorry, top secret!"

She got the phone call early in the morning. The C-130 he was on had gone down. Jack and his dorm-mate, Keegan Jackson were the only survivors. Jack had a severely mangled leg that might require amputation, a broken arm and collar bone and burns on his chest, face and hands. Keegan Jackson was in much worse shape with severe burns to his face, broken bones and internal injuries.

Sadie stared out the window and listened to the chatter behind her. A lively family was going on vacation and happily deciding what they were going to see first, where they were going to eat and what souvenirs they would bring home.

She would bring home her baby soon. She would hug him and hold him and smile at him like a child's teddy bear won in a festive carnival.

He was coming home. Yes, he was coming home.

As she stepped into the hospital she was shuffled into a tiny room and left alone to have some privacy. Stepping toward the bed she looked passed the tubed and beeping machines into her son's burned and lacerated face.

But ... it was not her son.

Keegan Jackson's eyes moved rapidly beneath swollen eyelids but they remained closed.

Punching the nurse's button, Sadie sought answers. A chubby woman, greying hair and large pale eyes sauntered in with a clipboard in her age-spotted arms.

"This is not my son," Sadie announced. "Where is my son?"

The woman glanced at the paperwork on the clipboard. "Jack Keenan is your son, correct?"

"Yes, but this isn't Jack. This is Keegan Jackson. This is not my son."

The nurse stared at the young man, white sheets up to his chin, made a clucking noise and turned from the room.

Seconds later, a short, petite, balding man in a white smock and eyeglasses in his hand stole into the room.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Keegan."

"It's Keenan, Doctor."

"Mrs. Keenan. I apologize. You can understand our mistake. The name's are so similar."

"Mistake? What mistake?"

"Unfortunately there was a clerical error. Files got mixed up. Boxes were checked incorrectly."

Sadie began to sob softly.

He had lived a full life, albeit short, but now her son was coming home. He was coming home.

Author's Note

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