We All Have Meaning

• Amy Lane, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2013

Words are frail, yet they can slay a soul, if they have enough meaning.

The seams of the world are fraying, and someone is praying. I can hear it in the distance. The words are not understood to me, but I can hear it above everything around me. Someone is praying, but I fear it is not for my soul because of what I have taken away.
I feel my heart beating. I hear it pounding like the drums of war around me. My breathing is ragged and my chest hurts with every breath. There are flies around me, trying to get a feast from the sweat on my brow. It’s hot. So goddamned hot. There’s dust everywhere from the dry, barren ground around me. I can barely see in front of me. It burns my eyes and lungs. I look down. My uniform is filthy and sweaty, and in my hands is… a musket. Its blade drips with blood. It soaks into the thirsty dirt like a feast. I can’t think clearly. My mind is racing and I’m full of this unknown fear inside me. I don’t know what I’m doing here. I hear a deafening sound in the distance that shakes the ground beneath me. More dust rises. I can hear gunshots somewhere, maybe all around me. I take a few slow steps forward, but I feel so weak, and the heat…

I bump into something and my heart jumps and the fear lurches forward into my stomach and I nearly throw up. I look down, slowly, not wanting to know. I realised I was crying as I looked down at my fallen comrade. He bore the same symbol as me and the same uniform, except his was stained with blood where his life used to be. My tears ran down my dusty face. I had never met him, but I felt I knew him nonetheless. While I stood there I wondered about his family. He would never return home. He’d never see his family and they’d never see him. He surely meant something more to them.

I looked up with tear filled eyes. I hear more gunshots around me. I see in the distance through the dust a figure running towards me. It was a man. And before I knew it he was in front of me. He was said to be the enemy because he wore a different uniform, but he looked just as scared as me and just as young. He raised his musket, but he hesitated.

Out of reflex and imprinted training, I thrust my musket forward first.

He fell to the dust, gripping his life while my musket fed the dirt once again. As I cried, I thought of his family and what he meant to them. I had taken him away from them. I had reduced him to a memory. How could I do that?

I know we all have a meaning, but some others see us less than what we are.