Remember
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Sharnali Barua, Grade 8, Keilor Downs Secondary College
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Short Story
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2017
Excellence Award in the 'Spread The Word 2017' competition
It had all started months ago, an international dispute that people considered unsolvable without violence. It was a time of nebulous skies, locked homes, weeping families and minuscule rations of sustenance—It was a time of war.
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In that small dank room, the child clutched onto the ragged teddy bear he had found at the age of four with a youthful adoration. It was a strange sight to see, that of his father trudging from their dilapidated home, a tiny bag containing his entire lives’ memories slung across his shoulder. The boy could not understand the words spewing from his father’s mouth: ‘I’ll come home soon, son.’ He never fully comprehended the severity of the situation as his father stepped away, leaving his promises draped on the threshold of their door.
The letter had arrived early one morning, a day on which the little boy could not sleep. From his tiny bed, he could clearly hear the sound of their unstable door opening to the gales that raged outside. As he lay, awake, he listened as his mother shrieked, a sound so full of horror and sorrow that even the boy understood that something had happened.
However, that day passed, and so did the one on which his father left, and the little boy lost the memory in the fog of his developing mind. Now, as he watched his mother sobbing upon the ground, he registered the fact that something was terribly wrong. Her pale fingers gripped the cold ground, body sprawling over it as tears escaped her eyes. He clutched his dirty, old teddy bear within his arms, slowly approaching his mother with the intent of providing the comfort only a mother’s child could give.
He remembered now, he remembered everything. The days on which his father and he laughed with one another, his mother smiling at them with sheer affection. The weeks where their lack of food, money and hope ceased to matter because they had one another. He reminisced everything then, each scene an ornate picture of colour and love. And, as he released his beloved teddy bear, letting it tumble onto the unforgiving ground with his childhood, he released a tear. That tear held the memories of his father, the man who had died whilst fighting in World War II.