What if...

“Come on! Higher!”

“Nnnneeaowww! I`m coming. Wait up!”

“Faster! Faster!”

“Hunter, watch out for the enemy!”

It was already too late. His plane crushed - headfirst into Lisa’s belly. I caught up; my arms still extended to both sides like the wings of an airplane. “Ouch! Congratulations flight lieutenant you just hit a civilian.”, she said laughing: “Seriously though boys: Watch were you´re going!” He looked at her with the biggest grin on his face, put his feet together with his toe tips facing outwards. Then he raised his hand to his forehead in a perfect angle and responded: “Yes ma´am!” Lisa smiled. “Alright boys come on! Even soldiers have to eat. The others are already waiting.”

She turned around and waved us to follow. We walked over the gras in the front-yard, up the marble stairs and across the white sign on the big oak front door. I´ve always admired it´s initial. A big, curved, golden “H”. The other letters were plain black but still beautiful. “Home of the orphaned and homeless children”, that´s what the sign said. This is where we met. This is where we lived. This is where we became friends – Hunter Steward and me.

None of the children here ever really spoke about their parents. Most of them didn´t even remember anything about them. Hunter did. That was the first thing he told me about himself. The boy, whose father was saving the world. The boy, whose father was a high-ranking pilot in the army. The boy, whose father went missing on his third tour. He was holding a picture so close to my face that I couldn´t see at first. I took a little step back and noticed that the photograph showed a man. His father. Who else could it have been? The same bright green, friendly eyes were looking at me. The same mouth was mischievously smiling at me. “This is him and one day he is going to come back to get me.”, insisted the boy I didn´t know then. His eyes were so full of pride and hope anyone would have believed anything he said and so did I.

“The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas” by John Boyne came in one of the three boxes of donated books that arrived earlier this year. It was already late, and Lisa had already turned off all the lights when I was still reading under my blanket with the mere light of the little flashlight I found in the storage room downstairs. I turned page after page until the bold letters at the beginning spelled out “Chapter 19”. As I kept reading, I got sadder and angrier up to the point where I was downright furious. So much so that I even started crying. I jumped out of my bed and threw the book clear across the room. “OUCH! Why would you do that?”, came out of the dark. I must have hit Hunter. I picked up the flashlight, pointed it in his direction and mumbled: “Sorry. I really hated that ending.” “It´s alright.”, said Hunter drowsily and rolled closer to the wall. Then he slightly nodded at the free bit of his bed and I picked up my blanket and walked over.

Mmmh! Can you think of anything better than waking up to the smell of fresh pancakes in the morning? Well, I sure can´t! We always got to choose what we wanted to eat for breakfast on our birthday and for me there was simply no other choice than warm, soft, drowning in maple syrup kind of pancakes. Hunter must have already left for the dining-room. I jumped out of bed and ran downstairs. “Wow slow down champ!”, said Sam one of the caretakers, who couldn´t hold back a short chuckle. One look at the mirror next to the door and I knew why. With my pyjamas still on, my hair standing off in every possible direction and a grin that seemed to be frozen on my face I looked nothing short of a little goblin.

Hunter saved the seat next to him for me and after everybody sang “Happy Birthday” I blew out the 12 candles on the pancake. At this point I was basically drooling at the sight of the sugar bomb in front of me. Finally, it was time to dig in. In the middle of a big bite hunter poked me in the arm. “Dude, I got something for you.”, said Hunter asking me to follow him. After taking a long look at what was left of my meal I asked to be excused, because the only thing better than another bite was of course a present.

Back at our room he pulled out something wrapped in newspaper from underneath his bed. “Here! Open up!”, pressed my excited friend. I quickly pulled of the paper and saw a little black notebook with my name on it in golden beautiful letters. “Hunter, how did you afford this?”. “I sold one of the cufflinks my father left behind.” “Thank you so much you didn´t have to do that.”, I answered to the boy with the friendly green eyes and hugged him. He took the notebook and went over to the desk in the corner of the room. Then Hunter opened the book and wrote in big red letters across the whole page “WHAT IF”. “Look!”, he told me while demonstratively crossing out the “F” with a black marker and drawing a big black “S” next to it, “This is how easily “what if” becomes “what is”. Just a few lines in this notebook and you decide how the story ends.”

9 years later…

I know I cannot change his mind. His eyes have the same green as the air force uniform, he is wearing. It is almost like it was made for him. “Oh, come on spare me the puppy eyes!”, says Hunter interrupting me, “I am coming back you know.” “You don’t know that.” He sighs, “It´s 24 months. Two years and I´ll be standing at your front door… I promise.” “Don´t make promises you may not be able to keep.” “Ok. Look, do you remember two years ago when the orphanage ran out of funding and we said we were going to open it up again? I make a lot of money in the army. We´ll be able to afford it if I go. You see I have a reason to come back now.”, he reassures me, “The army needs me. All these children like you and me, that are going to have a home. They need me too.”

I put my feet together with my toe tips facing outwards, raise my hand to my forehead in a perfect angle and say, “You better go then flight lieutenant Steward. Planes don´t wait – not even for you.” He smiles at me one last time with that mischievous smile he had when we were little. Then he picks up his bag, turns around and walks away. I can feel one of the tears I´ve been trying so hard to hold back roll down my cheek while I whisper, “You are my brother. I need you too.”

2 years later…

I got up way to early this morning. The excitement to see you again didn’t let me sleep all night. I arrived here 30 minutes early. Still two minutes until you´re supposed to walk out. Time seems to run so slowly when you really look forward to something. There! The first soldier walking through the gate. One after the other walks out. I can´t see you. The last one walks out. It isn´t you. Where are you. “Hunter Steward?”, I ask one of the others, “Hunter Steward. Have you seen him?” “Yeah, he went back to the plane to get something. He´ll be out in a second.” I can almost feel the panic fall off my face. There you are. Walking right towards me.

You are alive!

You are alive!

YOU ARE ALIVE!

You were wrong. With the one story that matters – your story, our story - no matter how often I write it down, “what if” will never become “what is”. What if I was still trying to catch up with you playing pilot? What if you were still here? What if I still had a brother? I just hope that with the 20 000$ you left me, the children that walk over the gras in the front-yard, up the marble stairs and across the white sign on the big oak front door, will get fewer what ifs and more of what is than we did.