G4+Group+4

By: Samantha Pompeo, Daniel Orol, and Patrick Lambert Darkness covered me like a blanket. “//What happened?//’ I thought. I remembered nothing and had a massive headache. When I reached back, there was a bump the size of a large chicken egg growing out of my head. I looked around, cautiously and warily. I was in a deep, dark, dank hole, filled with dirt and filth. When I looked behind me I saw the rock that I had hit my head on. It was large, with cracks and a dark, black color to it. Then I saw the man.
 * The Two-Sided Hole **

He was wearing a military uniform that was dirty and smelled like sweat and blood. The man was digging into the dark, never-ending soil at the bottom of this small, confining hole we were in, with a determined, haggard, and tired expression to his face. He noticed me looking, and turned back to digging with a relentless anger that I couldn't begin to understand. It was silent until he said, “You gonna help? I don't want to be here right now either.”

I was petrified by the fear that this man would kill me as the realization came to me that we were enemy soldiers. “Yeah, well,” I said, unsure of myself or exactly what had happened. “Are you gonna fight me or something?” (All I remembered was fighting. In the deep recesses of my mind I remembered happier times, but couldn't remember what they were.)

The only answer was silence.

Suddenly, I was up in his face grabbing his shirt. “Don’t try any tricks on me. They won’t work.”

The man pushed me away as easily as if he were swatting a fly. “You Southerners are all alike,” he muttered under his breath.

“I have a name, you know. It’s James. Use it,” I snarled back.

“Your troops didn’t seem to care if we had a name or even a life when they were trying to kill me. You’re not worthy enough to know my name, but I’ll tell you that it’s Brad. I think that head of yours should be doing something other than making you stupid and ugly.” I touched my head- the bump on it a reminder of where I was- and I flinched.

We went into a stony silence. I thought for a bit as I dug in this dark, musty, gritty place. I didn't trust this guy, Brad. I got up and looked around. The hole was about 50ft deep and 100 ft in circumference, and we were digging deeper. The sheer rock walls that rose up like foreboding giants seemed to close in on me. I could never climb that. “Why are you digging down?” I said, “Are you that much of an idiot?”

“I happen to pay attention to the land around me, unlike //your// people, so I know that there are mine shafts in this place. It’s the perfect setting for one.”

I muttered something about him being a crazy Northerner with no sense of direction, and he glared at me. His eyes seemed to send red daggers through my skull when he said, “I know we hate each other, but we have to collaborate if we want to ever get out of this hole.”

I shut up for a while, knowing that Brad was right. We didn't say anything for a while after that, casting suspicious and angry looks at each other. It was like we were daring each other to make the next move. “Well, how much longer is it going to be?” I complained after a couple more hours of digging. By now the hole we had made was getting to be a lot deeper. It was about 10 feet deeper than the main floor and we were starting to look for mine shafts. It was time to learn something about this guy Brad. I had to be sure I could trust him, and I needed something to take my mind off the seemingly endless task of digging. "I've been thinking...”

“Well, that’s a shock,” Brad replied abruptly.

It was obvious that, although I was making an effort to get our minds off of the digging, he wasn’t going to. The men from the North were so barbaric, I thought. The next 10 minutes were tense. We were shoveling dirt, leaves, and rocks out of our way with single minded intensity, so engrossed in our task that we didn’t stop until the constant gloom suddenly turned into the pitch black velvet of night. I was extremely tired, but Brad continued to shovel leaves and dirt out of his way as he furiously dug downward towards the mine shaft he knew is nearby. "Work doesn’t stop when the little boy gets tired,” Brad told me.

With that I furiously said, "I was just taking a break. You’d better be right about this mine shaft idea," I responded in a haughty tone before starting to dig back into the matted leaves and soil that coated the bottom of the hole. Silence had encased us for the better part of an hour, when I noticed his arms and became envious. I spoke before I could stop myself, "I hate asking this, but how did someone as lame as you get such thick arms!"

Brad spoke after a moment’s pause, "I have to chop firewood for my family during the winters. Where I'm from, you must be strong to survive the cold."

//I stopped as my mind drifted off. I was sitting in my living room playing with my two-year-old son on one knee. The watery sun of a cold winter morning dimly shone through the window. My wife walked into the room and lit the whole place up with her smile. “Hi James,” my wife said sadly with a kiss to my cheek. “I love you. Promise me you will be careful in the army.”

“I’ll be careful, honey. Please don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine,” I replied with a smile.//

I came back to reality with a start. “I have a family. I have a wife and a son,” I shouted before remembering where I was, and registering Brad looking at me with confusion. "I have a family." I repeated more softly. "I will dig my way out of here and work with you, so that I may see my family again. It was because of them that I started fighting in this war. I will not give up until I can see my family again." I shivered and then started digging again with renewed strength.

Brad mumbled to himself in confusion. Brad then rejoined the digging then with new strength. After digging for hours, Brad’s stomach growled. "What I would give for one of my mother's apple pies right now. She makes the best pie in the world. It's warm, with rich baked apples seasoned perfectly, and it has crust that is not to crispy or too mushy. Just thinking about it makes my mouth water."

"My mother makes amazing apple pies too," I said. We sat down together and actually flashed brief smiles at each other. I was confused and wondered if the smile I got from Brad was because he meant it, or just because he was in his fantasy with apple pies, and didn’t even know I was there. We then settled into comfortable silence of men in thought and saved our energy so they could continue to dig later.

Hours later after we had rested, the digging continued. My voice floated out of the dark. “I can’t even remember why we were fighting."

“I had no choice; I was drafted into the army,” Brad said.

That triggered something in my mind and I sat down suddenly as my mind popped into another world//. I was walking down the front hallway of my house, to open the door. As I opened it I saw a large, hairy, muscled man in uniform outside my door, “I am here to draft you into the army,” came a deep voice. “You must enlist according to the new law. I will see you at the local military base in three days. Be there,” the man in the uniform had told me. I nodded my head and closed the door. I stepped backwards and turned around and found myself face-to-face with my wife.// //“That was the army recruiter. It appears I am the newest member of the army." My wife tried to protest but I quieted her with a glance. She seemed to grudgingly understand. If she agreed, I knew not // //“Just be careful,” was all my wife replied, and she turned and walked away. // I snapped back into focus to see the gloomy interior of the hole and the concerned face of Brad staring back at me. “You okay?” Brad asked, with a hint of concern.

“Yeah. I just had another flashback,” I responded.

I looked at Brad and wondered if the people I was told and believed were monsters, were really just people in the same sticky situation?

We started digging in two separate areas, one of which we knew was the mine shaft and the other one a dead end, although we didn’t know which was which. I shouted to Brad suddenly. I was jubilant. I had fallen into a hole and was looking into an old tunnel supported by strong, wooden beams.

“James? James?” Brad called and looked around.

“In here!” I replied. I had found it! The mine shaft! This Northerner Man actually knew what he was talking about. With a cry of joy Brad ran towards me and together we climbed through the old, long mine shaft and out into the fresh air. I then collapsed onto the ground in prayer while Brad breathed in happily. After a while I said, “I should be getting back; my comrades will be really worried.”

Brad stopped jumping and looked at me. That’s all he did at first, he just looked at me. But then Brad put out his hand and I shook it. “I wish the best of luck to you and your family,” he said.

Before I could say, “You, too,” he had turned and walked away to his campsite. With a final glance at Brad, I turned and walked away. I knew I would never see this man again.