The Guns Of May

Thunder rolled in stark contrast to the deep blue sky above with its gently billowing clouds.

Hirschel knew instinctively it was not thunder, but he did not know what else to describe the cannons drumming their tattoo beyond the horizon, so close and yet still so very far away.

The bombers had gone over day and night for weeks now, but this was the first time he heard the guns so close. For ten years he’d prayed every night to hear those guns. Ten years with his head down, identity tucked away in an attic. Ten years of cold sweat each night as he slept in whatever barn or bed he could find.

But a man could only run for so long. There were only so many righteous or sinful paths he might take in the name of survival before the path tumbled into the valley. Even the Temple fell before Rome’s legions.

He thought of his Rachel. How long had she been gone now, six years? It felt like yesterday they ran out of the alley door, gunshots snapping off the bricks all around intermingled with the shouting, the chanting. He went left, she went right, a miscommunication, one of the many they’d had that never before diminished their love.

She was upright on the street, hand reaching back as their opposite directions pulled their fingers apart, shawl still wrapped tightly around her face against the smoke. He remembered her head slowly, ever so slowly turning to find him.

And then…there she was. Face down on the cobbles.. His wife, the love of his life, the one he once hoped might bear him children until...well, until circumstances shoved such selfish hopes aside. Hirschel didn’t even stop to see if she breathed. He’d lived with that, told himself he was living for her now, but that was a simple lie he now knew, one born of fear. In his disregard was he any different than Moses? He felt the answer was no, for he wandered through the desert to look upon the holy land to which he was denied entry. The guns rumbled again. Hirschel hoped she wouldn’t judge him too harshly for his cowardice.

He’d come upon this town two months before and took refuge in an abandoned farm outside a quaint village. The regime’s structure broke down in the face of the advances coming from both the east and west. Those men that remained burned their uniforms, hid in homes same as Hirschel had. Some surrendered. Others, well, others knew they couldn’t outrun their fate no more than they could outrun a bullet.

As ever more planes flew over, Hirschel thought himself safe, and he traveled into the nearby town. It was foolish, but his stomach demanded bread after his foraging yielded nothing and no manna fell from the heavens. Still, no one questioned him; did not even think twice in accepting the marks he’d found abandoned beneath the mattress in the bedroom of the abandoned farm. Despite his caution, someone must have noticed. Who? He knew his mortal soul would never learn that truth. There was peace in that.

Ten years, he’d survived, all leading to this place beside a small lake watching the oncoming cannons illuminate the sky. In another life, it would have been beautiful.

In the gap between volleys, he heard the hammer click.

The evening after his journey into the village, they arrived. Their Wagen pulled to a stop in front of the barn, lights extinguished. Most nights since he’d arrived at the abandoned farm, Hirschel had slept in the upper rafters of the barn. That night, overcome by his relief in finding bread, he sat at the dusty dining table, giving thanks to God, blessed by a cup of wine he found stashed in the cellar. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was his own foolishness, but he never heard them approach. That was until the door shattered and they pulled him to the ground.

Two of them stood over Hirschel, one rifle pressed into his face while the other two turned the abandoned house apart. They were all so young. He knew he should’ve been terrified with his eyes staring down the barrel of the gun, but it was impossible. These boys would have been maybe ten years old when Hirschel started running, yet here they stood with patchy beards and eyes so full of hate.

They pulled him out of the farm and through the woods, stumbling as he did so often in the past years. He thought again of Rachel. For all the years of mourning, he now imagined her death as a mercy. He should never have kept running, and instead knelt beside her until the bullet or brick took him. Instead, coming upon a narrow clearing before a gently lapping lake, the boys, unwilling or incapable to see the defeat before them, forced Hirschel to his knees.

The guns rolled again, flashes illuminating the tree line. Hirschel closed his eyes.

Truth was, it didn’t matter how many or how large the guns over the horizon were with a pistol pressed to your head.

Hirschel looked out toward his promised land, and wished God hadn’t granted Moses such a mercy.

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A/N:

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