Debts Repaid
A Short Story
by Daniel Martinez
I
My son went into the war when he was only eighteen years old. My husband had been in the First World War, the very last year of it, and he died the first few months he was there. I cursed him for days and weeks afterward. Then when I was at his funeral I forgave him and realized that he was telling me the truth when he told me he was going to fight for his country because he loved it. He'd told me that any red-blooded god-fearin' man would go to war to fight for his country if he loved it, but I'd thought he was going because he didn't love me no more.
So when my son left for the war a few months after he turned eighteen, I was crushed beyond words, beyond conciliation. But my son was drafted, he was ripped from my home and his and he was sent off to die.
I say he was sent off to die. But I realize now that he was sent to fight for his country, the same as his father. It's just that he was chosen in a different way. And I raised him to be a good, church-goin' boy. A good, church-goin' boy.
II
Ever'body who was alive on December seventh, 1941, and old enough to comprehend the monstrosity of the destruction wrought by them damn Jap bombs, remembers that day. I remember it because it was the day my mamma died, after a long bought with tuberculosis. I was down in Florida, where my mamma lived after having gone through the death of my father, her husband, and I was at her side to the end. I saw her die. She had lived long enough, she told me, and now it was her time to go. "Besides, I don't wanna hafta suffa through anoth wo', Baby. I jus' don' wanna suffa no mo'."
I held her hand as it went limp, and kept holding it even as it grew cold and stiff in mine. When the doctors came to take her away, I left quietly and drove back to mamma's house, a house I didn't much know, seeing as how I'd never lived there before. I'd visited with my sister when mamma'd moved, but I'd never lived in it. Mamma'd moved to the house after my father died.
It had pastel walls, pink in color with yellow, pastel trim all around the house, and a pastel purple door. It was gaudy, and we'd told her so, but my mamma'd loved it and we'd let her alone. Inside, the walls were that same bubble-gum pink, that same yellow trim. The kitchen - mamma's real home - had the newest, finest furniture and utensils she could afford. Which, living off the state, was not much. But my mamma always had a knack for making the best of things, and she had done so here.
I went though some of her effects, but decided that it was just too emotional for me to handle, and so I called up my sister down in Mississipi. She told me she would be down in a few weeks: she had a big factory job, and in order to keep it she had had to stay there rather than come to the funeral. I thought I would have chosen the job, too, but after a while I'd get tired of it all. My sister had to stay at work late, work more than eight hours a day; she had to ignore her kids, her family was made fun of. At work, she was teased about her husband not having a job and being left at home to raise the kids while she brought in the bread, and at school the kids were made fun of because it was their father who packed their lunches and not their mamma. Now that I think about it, I don't know why they didn't just switch places. Her husband would have a job, and she could have come down to the funeral.
I decided I couldn't handle going through my mamma's things without my sister or any other family there, so I drove back home, where there was no one waiting for me because my husband was dead and my boy had been drafted.
He'd got a damned letter in the mail one day, and he tells me after readin' it that he's gotta go to war. I screamed at 'im 'n' yelled at 'im 'n' tried beatin' the livin' daylights outta 'im, but 'e damned-all wouldn' listen. He just got his bull-headed mind set, sayin' he had t'do it or he'd be forced in anyway or at worst arrested, and I had t'swallow m'pride 'n' let m'boy go down there to the damned wo'.
III
Sorry 'bout that. When I get all worked up it gets harder for me to talk right and proper. I think I'm all right now.
When I got the the letter in the mail sayin' my husband'd died, I cried and cried and cried till I couldn't cry no more. I blamed God for my loss, and lost faith. But when I got a letter on the tenth of December, sayin' my son had died, I was infuriated, livid, ragin' and wantin' t'go down to that damned boot camp to yell at the drill sergeant that'd yelled at my son and failed to shape him up for the war, yell at 'im like he yelled at my son. I wanted to tell him to go into that war and face the death and the trauma and the slaughter of men on both sides that my young little baby boy had to face. He was forced to become a man when he was barely eighteen, and he was forced to die after he'd prematurely aged. He had to see heads blown apart by bullets, the agonized faces of the men as they died, he had to feel the shrapnel hitting his skin as he fell to the ground in death, callin' fer 'is mamma, wantin' to live an' prayin' t'God t'let 'im live or let 'im die, but soon enough jus' wishin' to die. I wanted the drill sergeant to feel that pain, to scream it into his head.
Soon my anger turned to sorrow, and I no longer wanted to go down to the drill sergeant and yell in his face and make him go out to war to see the boy's faces, the terror in their eyes, because to wish that upon anyone is just terrible. I just wanted to preserve the memories of my husband and my son.
My husband fought and died because he loved his country, and 'cause he loved God. My boy went an' fought 'cause he was forced to. And I learned to stomach my loss, swallow my pride, and realize and accept that my family was gone.
I guess I should be angry with the people who started the war. Adolf Hitler, FDR, the Japs. But they fought and they died and they suffered too, as I have suffered. And they learned to accept their losses, to repay their debts, as I have repayed my debt to God for losing faith, by learning to accept the things that I must, and finding the strength to do so in Him.
The End
This short story is brought to you by Daniel Martinez. He is the author of How God Was Created, Artemis Grant, Paranoid Schizophrenic and Queen of the Undead. He lives in Tucson, Arizona with his fiance, Wendy. Check out his profile for his web site, which contains much more information about this young, Tucsonan novelist.
Uum . . . this story is written to follow the context and mind-set of the main character and the time in which this story takes place. I do not condone violence, war, anti-semitism or racism of any form. Thank you!
- Daniel Martinez,
Novelist
