War Once Again

• Cara Heskey, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2017

Deafening bangs. Landmines blow. Helpless hands shivering.

Lives blown in three seconds. Men's shattered hearts for they will see their friends no longer. Dark green uniforms, red and black bullet holes everywhere. Black pieces fly like darts into veterans’ innocent bodies.

My papa runs for his life to the natural shelter of a cliff that seems to have rusted with time. He can hear the swelling ocean waves thrashing ferociously up onto the blood stained beach.


It’s strange what a person recalls amidst the chaos. My papa once played basketball at an elite level. In an instant he was there again. My papa retained his memories of when he was cantering down the basketball court going for the goal! He shoots. GOAL! He also remembered teaching his infant students the skills and rules of the basketball game. A smile in return.

The reality of the moment.

Soon, afterwards, unexpected silhouettes come down from the peak of the cliff. Some are sketched like bubbly moon like monsters and some like cardboard-boxes with long pipes out the front. Papa moulds into the rock underneath the crusty overhang.

My papa plummets to the ground at the sound of guns firing. SNAP!

Steel pierces his flesh like a distant voice interrupting a dream. Stars twinkle above him as they vanish into the airspace together with the old days. Buildings burst with souls to heaven as bombs strike. The cold dark blue sky shivers as he finally feels the mini hint of relaxation. A final breath. His muscles and figure eventually de-stress.

“War once again, it’s just war once again”,He thought to himself.


It’s under that same overhang, of that same cliff, of the same town in the same country, where it is all quiet and peaceful, that my extraordinary papa lies and will forever lie beneath his old crusty cliff.

His name nobody knows. Except for ONE.