Horrible Harvest

I tell you true ain’t but two thoughts that go through your mind when you bury someone who your own past was hitched to for the most god-awful reason, war. One, you think on the hell you was put through, and two, you think on the hell you put others through. When it comes down to it, me and Felix brought more misery to folks than misery was brought to us. That ain’t to say we didn’t suffer much. We suffered more than our share. S’pose that could be why we give out so much suffering. We dealt what we was dealt. It’s what we knew.

There was a time when it was said I had a good heart, but it was grow’d over by moss and old moldy fury by the time I was a crusty old goat standing graveside for a man who would forever be the boy I trafficked into war. Of all the unforgivables I done in this world, who I turned Felix into was the most unforgivable.

I tried in my younger days not be this. I did. I loved and ached for others. My mother. The tiniest of nature’s creations. Even Charles. And then there was – the one. The person on this planet that made me feel like I belonged on this planet. That I had a right to be here. To hope for quiet days. Days where I could breathe. Where one minute would creep into the next without dragging hurt and doubt along with it. But I ain’t got it in me to go there yet. To talk about – him.

But I reckon it’s time to give up the story about the first Virginia. Didn’t know her for more than the hours it takes to burn from dawn to dusk, but there ain’t been a day since that I ain’t spent ruminations on her. From the moment I laid eyes on her, I was desperate for her find safety in this world, and I know there ain’t no logic nor any kind of sense in this, but I hate her for not finding it. She broke me in an invisible way.