How long have I waited out here in the cold? How much longer must I endure the unseeing stares of my countrymen; the sneering of the Verisiennes? I am invisible and hated—a bum begging for change and an enemy who has received his due abasement. Do they not know that I want to vanish? Do they not know that I loved them?
Every night I lay alone by my sputtering fire, shivering under my dirty and torn trench coat. No matter how weary I am, I use whatever strength available to me to prevent my eyes from closing, because I know that if I do, I’ll see your face again. I’ll feel my missing arm as if it’s still there, reaching to hold your cheek like I always did, to run my fingers through your soft and dark hair.
Oh, Fritz. Why was it you who had to die? Why would you promise me you would come back, only to leave me broken and alone?
Or so I would have asked you before I met her: a little girl named Cat. She’s sort of like a feral tabby—bright red hair and a little feisty. Her name is Áine, I think, as she introduced herself as such on accident before quickly correcting it to Cat.
She can’t read or write. She doesn’t even know her own age, but she can’t be older than seven. Most of the time, she eats rancid food she dug out of the trash or rats she managed to catch in her little ‘den’ in the city wall. When I asked her where the rest of her family was, she told me she doesn’t know.
She’s alone like me; she’s already lost things like me; and she’s scared like me, even if she pretends that she isn’t. I admire her, the poor girl, because unlike me, she hasn’t yet given up.
She spends a lot of time with me, probably because I treat her like a human being and not an unwanted and discarded toy. She is a kind, smart, and bright child. She loves to hear my stories—the same ones I used to tell you. The funny parts get a gap-toothed smile or an irregular childish laugh, like an uncontrollable giggle; the exciting ones, she listens to with wide, glistening eyes; the scary ones, she clutches to my empty sleeve, and it feels like my arm is still there, touched by her small and trembling fingers.
One night, she fell asleep with me underneath my coat, her head leaning against my stump. In the flickering light of the fire, I saw the bags and tired lines beneath her eyes, how gaunt her cheeks were, her cracked lips. Still, she looked at peace, though she muttered for her mother from time to time. Watching her there, I felt I saw her whole, that little girl as she was beneath her tangle of matted hair and dirt. I saw her there, and I loved her.
I wish you were here, Fritz, because I know you would, too.
She’s been pick-pocketing the Verisiennes to buy fresh food, and I think they’re starting to catch on. And if you want to know how your countrymen repay wrongdoing, look no further than the Scar. For the first time since losing you, I’m truly afraid. I need to help her, protect her, because she has no one else. But how can I, broken as I am?
Whether I have the legs to do so, I must stand and walk again. I must make a promise to you, Cat, and myself. I will become the man you saw in me then and the older brother she sees in me now. Though I am afraid, I shall not let it stay my labored steps, for I need not take them alone.
I will find the home the world denied the two of us: a quiet and gentle place where she can laugh without fear smoldering in her eyes or hunger writ upon her face. A home where I can watch her dance among the tall, green grass and mélange of blossoms and remember the days were two fools played at war, unaware they were already walking dead.
I only wish you could see it.
July 5, 2023
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