Chapter+30

The Last Battle

Comp. Lit. III He was in Iraq fighting along with the Iraqi army special forces and was reporting for duty the next morning, when his lieutenant told him “son your duty in the army is all complete and you can may go home back in America were is safe and you can talk about how you saved my life, thank you for doing that boy.” Alexander or simply Alex, the brave soldier who received a purple heart and felt relieved that he could go back home with his mother that was probably worried about him if he had survived this terrible battle that he had just lastly fought and didn’t have time to write to her and send her a letter to her and was very worried of how his mother would be so worried about him too. But with this great news he got from his lieutenant he rather then just go home and tell her about his last horror experience and everything else of course he had just survived and how he got a purple heart for being so brave and because of this bravery he lost one of his ten fingers (his pinky). When he got back home from the airport he noticed that a few things have changed from when he left, which was four years ago. And also some things remained the same as when he left, for example his high school that he went to. The high school was going under construction and had some of the buildings already were remolded, and when he got home he saw that his home was just the way he left it, except his tree that he had in his backyard, which grew very tall and since it was a peach tree and for the first time the tree was old enough to give fruit. He had planted the peach tree since he was a little kid and he was really happy that his peach grew old enough to have some harvest. He decided to go inside the house to greet his mother and tell her bravely about his final battle he had in the army. He rang the doorbell in his house and his mother came out so surprised of seeing his strong son. She started to cry of happiness and then she invited him to go in and rest a while from the long flight he took, and meanwhile she was going to cook a delicious dinner. Then he went onto rest in his old room and got the chills for some reason. He decided to listed to some music, which was one of the best things to do besides, snowboarding, hiking, camping, running, any sport, and hanging out with his friends to have some fun. But then he got sad thinking about his friends. His mother call him down “Alex come down to dinner,” but there was no response because Alex was listening to music and can’t hear anything, and just then when his mother yelled again he stopped the music, so he turned off his iPod to come down to dinner and asked his mother “what did you cook this time.” She replayed, “I cooked something spicy and it is a Mexican plate called Chilaquiles.” They started to eat and you can hear the spoon tapping with his plate as if he was nervous, which indeed he was nervous because he was start to remember about his journey in the Army. He was thinking about how he just wanted the war to end or waiting for his lieutenant to tell him that he completed and finished his duty in the armed services. The main reason that he wanted to leave his friends and stay there for them and also his other buddies that he began a good friendship in the Army. His mother asked him “Is everything alright there Alex, is anything wrong or bothering you,” he responded “No just thinking about the old memories in the Army.” He decided to start telling his mother every single experience and what he put up to in the Army. He started from the beginning with more details that he did not include in his letters he wrote to her. He was talking about what he saw in the Army was just brown dust all over because everything was covered in sand and how he heard the morning calls because they were so loud along with his lieutenant. In another thing is that how the food in Iraq tasted all weird and also how he felt that the in the next second he was the one that was going to die. Everything was going well until he started talking about his last battle and it seemed that each time he mentioned his friends he will start to run tears down his face and it looked like he got the chills also and get all very sad. Furthermore, how he was in the front line, and that was his first time out they’re being exposed to even much greater danger then any other place or location in that war. He talked about how he accidentally killed one of his high school friend that had join along with him and then his other buddies, getting killed in front of his eyes in that battle. In addition, how he almost got killed and seeing death approaching toward him each second but just then he saw his lieutenant in danger so he saved him from an attack and during that saving scene he lost his finger and he doesn’t remember the rest or what happen after that because he went unconscious in the middle of the whole battle. He decided not to talk about any more and told his mother “I am going to take a peaceful walk around the block mother then I will come back and finish of the rest small part of the story which just a little more” his mother replayed “Alright son but don’t take to long and take care.” But in that walk that he took he started to have a bad headache and suddenly he fainted and landed in the middle of the street. And because of that he got ran over by a drunk driver who was driving a big truck, the driver didn’t even noticed but the wheel from the truck separated the soldier's head from his body. The drunk driver later on got arrested and was put in jail and condemn to spend in jail for the killing of a United States soldier. In addition, the mother fell into great depression and committed suicide, and this was the story about a young, strong, friendly, and brave soldier who managed to stay alive and survive every obstacle and danger in the Army but died in his own country where he was to be in safer place.

VelasquezJ

Edmonds, Bill. "Soldier Story." The Naion 26/11/2006 6. 01/June/2007 