Snow

A lonely village lay straddling the end of the river.  The water flowed in fresh currents under a belching blue winter sky, and the grass grew wild on the moors. The lone walker on the hill shivered a little. He didn’t expect snowfall for the next two weeks, although it had already begun to get a little chiller. He always liked the cemetery at dawn. Not because daybreak would offer any sort of ‘fresh beginning’, but because it was too early for anyone else to be there. No prying eyes to wonder what he was doing, head bowed down before that particular grave. Even in the dead of winter, when the pale morning light was so late in coming, he could guarantee solitude.

 The people of Ramsgate believe that snow has healing powers. The enemy somehow always left this peculiar little village untouched. The war may go on for the whole year, but in winter, the boys will return home for Christmas. Many wars had come and gone, but the boys from Ramsgate always came back, unscathed. Many wars will come and go, and they will always return, cured by the snow.

“I do not understand why you have to go,” said Eira, “I do not understand why war has to begin on the eve of our wedding. I will only have the same story to tell our children.”

“What do you mean?” said Aden, packing the bag that lay on the floor.

“I mean that I have to tell the children that their father died in the war? Now that’s the story almost every woman in this country will be telling their children,” smiled Eira.

Aden got up and laughed as he embraced his wife-to-be, and then looked into her Nile blue eyes and said, “You’re a wicked woman to have said that.”

“You’re a wicked man to be leaving me all alone before our wedding!” she replied holding his hands.

“Don’t worry, Eira” said Aden, “You know I will come back. I have been to many wars, since I was a boy, and I have always returned, without even a scratch.”

“Then you are a very bad soldier,” said Eira.

Aden laughed heartily, and said, “The snow heals me Eira. You heal me. You were named after the frost. You are lucky for me.”

“No reason for me to put faith in an old wife’s tale, but I hope that is true,” said Eira.

“Of course it is, love, why would you think otherwise?”

Eira let go of his hands slowly and turned around to arrange the flowers in the vase. “What if,” she said reluctantly, “What if you fall in love with another woman, while you are at war?”

Aden turned her around and reassuringly held her hands again, “Then the first letter I write to you will burn in the snow the first time a snowflake touches it.”

“Fair enough,” she said as they laughed together.

“And what if my beautiful Eira falls in love with another man?” questioned Aden jokingly.

“That can never happen,” she replied.

The war went on for seven months. The fatal explosions never once did fail to send a deafening pulse through the soldiers’ ears. The battlefield was a deathly arena with gun-fire and the smell of rotting carrion left a war-cry face on them. The smoke obscured the enemy trenches in the distance, a strange aggressive language spouted out, but became quiet as they were granted an eternal rest.

All members of the platoon had smiles trailed across their lips, however, their grins abandoned them as a company of the enemy emerged from the far mist.

“Do you think my wife trusts me, Sarah?” Aden asked as he wrote to Eira like he had been writing to her every day.

“She is not your wife yet, Sir, “ said the nurse, “But I am sure she trusts you.”

The cackle of the machine-gun in the pillbox burst into life. Bullets whistled by, hitting men and dirt alike, covering the sludgy ground in a red liquid. The sound of the legion being killed off was a mellifluous noise to the soldiers in grey.

Quietness took a hold of the land, except for the cry of painful agony. Three hundred thousand people had died.

Aden wrote to Eira every day. One day, the letters just stopped coming.

Aden did return for Christmas, but he came home to see the whole village ablaze. He fell to his knees right in front of his house. He was never to see Eira again.

The lone walker on the hill smiled a sad smile. His mind was on dinner with his parents, and his heart was still on the girl whom he loved more than his life. He was never to love again. He bent down, and put the letter on the grave and left.  Snow fell softly from the belching blue of the sky. The flakes touched the old, yellowed paper, and smiled at it, as it burst into flames.

Somewhere far away, a woman with Nile blue eyes tells a story to her children as they fall asleep. She ends by saying, that it was all just a dream. The village no longer exists.

Reviews

[KurKota]

This is a very beautifully written story. The sadness is exquisitely set. You are a wonderful writer, I am looking forward to reading more of your works. Thank you, and keep writing, as you are very good.

[Bleda]

Thank you so much! I am so glad that you enjoyed the story and told me how you felt about it. Indeed! Thank you for your time! :')

[KurKota]

You are very welcome.