Harkness – MacGillivray Stories

There are things that happen in our lives that are forcibly thrust upon us, even if we don’t want them. War is such. At the tender age of nineteen, I, William, of sound mind and body, became a reluctant soldier. I am forcibly uprooted from my country and transported to a place I scarcely know about, forced to fight a war I hardly understand. I am a young man, and I want to live a happy normal life: finish college and then marry my high school sweetheart. However, those dreams end abruptly.

So here I am in this brutal country, my combat shoes trudging through muddy trenches and sometimes marching on endless, dusty tracks. Even though my helmet shields my head from flying shrapnel, it can never fully drown out the deafening sounds of gunfire and chaos. I have used my rifle to kill my enemies, but what they don’t know is that I am already dead on the inside. My spirit and conscience have long since fled my body, and I am but an empty shell now.

Being a murderer does that to a person. Yes! I call myself a murderer. I have killed enemies, people who are unknown to me, and soldiers of another country. Yet, they are still human beings. They have families waiting for them to come home. And now I have turned their wives into widows and their sons and daughters into orphans. In this vicious and merciless battle, where lives are lost in the blink of an eye, I am but a piece in the grand scheme of things.

I have seen death many times on this battlefield. Men become lame and blind, crying out for home. I have seen friends writhing in pain and agony, choking, and drowning in their own blood. I couldn’t unsee these images until today.

But every now and then, I become alive. Letters coming from my childhood sweetheart have become my lifeline. Even with the sounds of bombs going off and whizzing bullets in the background, my thoughts often wander to the sweet words written by Anna, my love. Hiding in the trenches, I take out the letters she wrote to me from my pocket. I have read them countless times, yet every time, they never fail to bring a smile to my face. I savor each and every word she writes because they all bring me back to the world I used to know, a safe haven that I have to leave behind.

Her letters crossed continents, and with them are her words of love, hope, and encouragement. With every word, I envision our future together. We dream of babies and a happy home. Those letters have become an elixir to my constant loneliness, an anchor to my jetsam thoughts. They serve as a reminder of what I am fighting for: a future free from the cruelties of war and a future where I can be in the arms of my Anna again.

Yet, amid the love-filled letters and promises, a quiet remorse takes hold of me — a guilt that casts a dark shadow on our relationship despite Anna’s unwavering declaration of love for me.

Through the grapevine, I heard a singer will visit the frontlines to encourage us soldiers. It has been a strategy of many a government to send beautiful, gorgeous women to the battlefield and ‘encourage’ soldiers to kill the enemy. There is almost quite a ‘sick’ element to this act; but then the sight of those singers and actresses gyrating and cooing in front of soldiers who have been devoid of female company for a long time has spiked testosterone levels.

It might have proven to be effective since the government never failed to send these women to the battlefield time and again. And these women are just doing what they are told to do, ‘brainwashed’ that it is their patriotic duty to ‘seduce’ the men and get them to do as asked.

I take a seat in front of the stage, beside my friend Harry Reid Harkness. We were determined to lose ourselves in enjoyment and give ourselves a temporary respite from our melancholy and boredom. Now, my friend Harry has a wife named Alice back home. He misses her so much, even though he doesn’t talk much about her.

Harry is extremely patriotic and a born fighter, as opposed to his brother James, who objects to war of any kind. You might say that James is a born pacifist. Most quarrels that erupt between the brothers are because of their opposing viewpoints with regards to war. Their parents, James and Charlotte, cried a lot when Harry left Edinburgh to join the war.

Harry doesn’t talk much about his other brother, Charles, though I have a feeling that he has an extreme fondness for his first cousin, Alex. He told me once about Alex, who was born in the same year as him, in 1916. I notice that most cousins who are more or less the same age are often close to one another. Perhaps it’s because they play the same childhood games and consider themselves friends rather than cousins.

I did not expect much that night. I just want to relax for a while before the morning comes. The war has aged me beyond my years. I may be a young man, but I am very tired in body, mind, and spirit. It was the average night until I see her on stage for the first time, with soldiers surrounding her.

Her name is Vera Lynn. She is not your typical beauty, but she has an unassuming charm and a mysterious kind of allure you couldn’t put a finger to—the kind that goes beyond physical appearance. There’s something about her that reminds me of home, my country, and my mother’s warm, home-cooked meals.

At first, Vera Lynn looks like a shy, innocent girl, lost in a world of men. She was slender and not the type of woman men would fight to the death for, nor the type who could launch a thousand ships like the mythical Helen of Troy. But then she starts singing, and all my prejudices flew out the window.

She sings with so much passion and raw emotion. Her voice is that of an angel, heavenly, lifting me up, reaching beyond the boundaries of my weary, mortal body. It is a lighthouse—its beacon guiding me safely to shore in the midst of a raging storm.

Her voice is a siren song, luring me in, and drowning me in its beauty again and again. It is a portal, that which takes me to a place where the air is full of the familiar aroma of the home I left behind. It takes me back to a period of time before my world was filled with the brutal noises of war. Her songs provide a bittersweet respite from the horrors and brutality of war.

As I sat listening to her, little did she know that I had fallen in love with her. It isn’t her beauty that draws me in, no. Her voice has an exquisite quality that can make even the hardest of men break down and cry. Even though it’s my first time seeing her, I feel like I’ve known her for a lifetime.

I think even my friend Harry has fallen in love with her. He keeps staring at her, as if afraid she will vanish when he blinks an eye. Even I can’t help but stare at her because I know that after her show, I won’t see her again as she will go to another country and perform for other soldiers.

I look at her, taking in every angle and curve of her face, trying to comprehend the depths of her gaze. I imprinted her memory deep into my heart and soul. Our gazes lock for a brief moment before she looks away. My heart stops for a fraction of a second, as does my world. With that fleeting look, I knew I was forever hers.

From that moment on, I became a fierce soldier on the battlefield. I am like a madman, relentless in my determination to help end the war. The only sound I hear inside my head is Vera Lynn’s voice, a haunting echo that plays on and on. Her voice is a nostalgic melody, the soundtrack of my battle.

Harry, my ever-loyal friend, worries about me a lot. He thinks I have turned into a madman. In a way, I have indeed turned into one. I know I can never be with Vera, and Anna is waiting for me at home.

Suddenly, the war took my friend Harry. He was killed in action at the age of 28. I fell into a state of depression but slowly snapped out of it. I could not allow myself to succumb to Harry’s fate. He is too young to leave a widow behind.

Fast forward a few months later, and I, a bemedaled soldier, return home. The first thing I did was visit Harry’s grave. His headstone reads, “To the Memory Of A Devoted Husband Loved by All. Loving Wife Alice.”

I am physically unscathed by the war, but emotionally, I am scarred. The death of Harry affected me a lot. The worst part is that I left my heart at the place where I first met Vera. Anna does not know that my heart now belongs to someone else. But I am selfish, and life has to go on. We marry, have kids together, and build the house of our dreams, complete with a picket fence and a dog or two.

Anna does not know about my secret, which I keep close to my heart. I got accustomed to the comforting routines of building a home. Anna is my today and tomorrow, but Vera Lynn is my yesterday, which I can’t forget.

Sometimes, in the stillness of the night, when everyone is asleep, I turn on the radio in the living room. In the darkness, I lay on the couch, closed my eyes, and let her soft voice wash over me. Her voice transports me back to the time in my life when I was the happiest.

Years turn into decades, and before I know it, I am old and gray. I am sitting on the porch with the radio next to me. Vera Lynn’s voice fills the air, bringing with it the shadows of the past. Anna shows up out of the blue and looks at me with a sad smile on her lips.

“You still love her, don’t you?” she asks softly.

I look up at her, startled. My secret is no secret after all. How long has she known about it? Our gazes lock, and I know she can read my answer simply by looking into my eyes. With a bittersweet smile, she takes a lingering look at me, then goes inside our house, closing the door quietly.

I feel devastated. But how can I explain to my wife that I often think about Vera Lynn after all these years without hurting her? How can I tell her my heart is forever divided between my family and her? How can I tell her that my love for Vera Lynn, forged by the blacksmith of war, is enduring and as strong as ever?