The Sailor's Prayer {Alicia Sykes DP}

[charade]

He speaks, but the words are empty.

He does not know who he is. He fancies himself the hero is this tale, but he cannot keep his story straight. You do not want his praise, nor his condolences. You want him to fall so you can focus on climbing the pyramid of bodies arrayed in front of you. He lies. He has no cause to return to, not one that means something. You can tell that he is not one of you, even if he pretends to be in this moment.

You have to brace yourself to keep from falling over. They’d taken your legs. Hamstrung you like a farm animal on the way to the slaughterhouse. If not for that, you would have been able to dodge. As it was, while you were trying to pull the knife out of your arm, you are unable to stop the next one from hitting your chest.

You do not cry out, but you fall to your knees. You have taken one too many hits and Jackie T. is not around to patch you up anymore. Tango, twelve ‘o’ clock, you want to scream into your radio. But you do not have your radio, and Yessenia is not laying down on atop a hill, tracking movement below with her scope.

You have always known you would die in battle. It was an inevitability. Soldiers like you do not fit into society. You do not retire. Soldiers like you do not grow old. You just keep going and going until you no longer can.

You hold your head up high, defiant to the end. Tall, pale and pretty, whose name you will never know, catches the corner of your eye. You want to tell her that if this pretentious Capitol stooge survives where so many rebel soldiers have fallen, you will find her in the afterlife and kick her ass back to the land of the living. You do not have the strength for that though.

You wrap your right hand around the hilt of the knife in your chest, the motion forming a type of salute. “L-long live the rebell-," you manage to say before you pitch forward. You do not feel the turf when you hit it, but for some reason you can smell salt in the air. It must be the blood in your mouth. You close your eyes.


You open your eyes.

You are standing on a dock. The waves break softly against it, boats shifting, creaking quietly where they are moored. Music is playing. There is a bar in front of you with a green violin on the sign. You know it means something, but you cannot remember what. You enter and as your eyes adjust to the light, you are greeted by the sound of welcoming cheers. The music is louder now. Rick leads the band in a jaunty tune with a fiddle. You recognize some of the people in the bar, though there are many that you do not.

The Skipper sits by the back, whittling something out of a piece of driftwood. There is a woman and two small children sitting by him, the latter playing with their food. Derek and Yessenia have found a corner and are oblivious to anything except each other’s hungry mouths. You shake your head. Thompson invites you to a game of darts, but you decline and stroll up to the counter instead. Jackie T. sits on it, using a needle and thread to sew a patch onto a quilt.

Machete Creel laughs heartily from behind the counter when she sees you and slides a mug down to your waiting hands. You down it. The whiskey is warm and tastes like honey, sunlight and every good day you’ve ever had. The sign above the keg says that all the drinks are on the house. Rick leads the band into another fast-paced song and you nod to Bulldozer when you see him on the drum kit.  You feel like you are home, but you do not remember how you arrived here. 

You start to sing with them.

Now, I don’t want a harp nor a halo, not me
Just give me a breeze and a good rolling sea
I’ll play me old squeeze-box as we sail along
With the wind in the rigging to sing me a song—

Someone taps your shoulder. You turn to see a flash of blond hair. Canary winks at you and dances a little jig, holding her hand out to you. You take her by the hand and twirl her around. You’ve never been great at dancing, but somehow, you feel like you have all the time in the world to learn how.

—Just tell me old shipmates, I’m taking a trip mates
And I’ll see you some day in Fiddler’s Green—

You smile.