Private Andrews | Teen Ink

Private Andrews MAG

February 14, 2012
By a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.


He couldn't hear a thing. The shells and mines and gunshots exploding all around in the smokey gray air were deafening. His sight was growing foggy, his ears were ringing, and it was getting more difficult to breathe with each second.

Soon, it would be morning in Oakland, California. The air would be golden yellow, and the trees would shimmer and stretch, leaves fluttering in the soft fingers of a breeze.

His hands and face were caked with gritty sand and blood in the creases of his palms and under his nails. One hand was clutched uselessly around his rifle, and the other twitched and scrabbled against the wound in his chest from which grew a small red fountain when his heart beat.

He was dying.

When the sun rose in Oakland, Elise would wake with Pete. She would talk to him happily as they sat outside the house she shared with friends. None of them had a child, but Jessie was expecting. And all five women had husbands or boyfriends all the way across the sea, serving proudly and sending letters when possible, telling of how boring it was sometimes, and the things the men did to pass the time. Elise told Pete, who wasn't old enough to understand, about his father, who was bravely fighting the communists a continent and an ocean away.

She wished he would come home to meet his baby soon.

He imagined how Elise would look now, holding a baby boy who was faceless in his mind. She would smile toothily at him, her long brown hair curling over her shoulders.

There was no sound, and the water washed inside his government-issue boots and socks, soaking the bottoms of his dark pants and staining his ankles scarlet.

Andrews turned his head to and saw only fuzzy outlines of men on the beach falling and falling and falling. So he looked up again, and everything was gray-white and red and coldly damp. And in his mind's eye everything was warm-yellow and soft and comforting.

Later that morning, Elise sang to Pete, out of tune and melancholy, of men who were too far away, and wives who waited and hoped for letters. Her voice blossomed, a rose in the warm air, only to wilt and be washed away with the tide, bleeding into the weeping red water.

And Private Andrews choked out rose petals onto his chin and the sand, and the green sunlight in his eyes faded and was gone into the sea.

The author's comments:
What I wrote after we studied D-Day in history.

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This article has 15 comments.


on Nov. 10 2013 at 11:00 am
congratulatins! you have successfully broken my heat into million pieces! how in the world could you wirte something so utterly amazing?  please answer! 

on Jan. 8 2013 at 11:12 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

oh thank you so much! :)

on Jan. 8 2013 at 11:12 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

thank you so much!! it means a lot :)

on Jan. 8 2013 at 11:05 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

ah thanks much!! :)

on Nov. 25 2012 at 7:03 pm
KristinHopkins8 SILVER, Aspen, Colorado
7 articles 0 photos 83 comments

Favorite Quote:
"If a writer falls in love with you, you can never die"

i absolutely love this, because that's a situation that i think about when i think of men dying for their country during war times. thank you for writing this!

Katia K. said...
on Nov. 23 2012 at 9:11 pm
This is seriously amazing. Great job.

on Nov. 22 2012 at 8:50 am
patticakes BRONZE, Rochester, Minnesota
4 articles 7 photos 15 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Many great things indeed have been achieved by those who chose not to leap into the mainstream”

"Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake."
Henry David Thoreau

this is fantastic. it's simple & very touching.

on Nov. 11 2012 at 5:26 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

thank you ever so much!! :)

on Nov. 11 2012 at 5:26 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

oh wow thank you for the incredibly kind comment! :) 

on Nov. 11 2012 at 4:04 pm
AudreyW DIAMOND, Springfield, Missouri
56 articles 0 photos 10 comments

Favorite Quote:
"Live the life you've dreamed."
-Henry David Thoreau

That was amazing and very well written! Congrats on getting it in the magazine!

on Nov. 11 2012 at 10:01 am
TanazMasaba GOLD, Dhaka, Other
16 articles 10 photos 214 comments

Favorite Quote:
"You've gotta dance like there's nobody watching,
Love like you'll never be hurt,
Sing like there's nobody listening,
And live like it's Heaven on Earth."













---William W. Purkey

This is undoubtedly one of the bests works in TI, and there are many talented writers here. two thumbs up!

on Nov. 6 2012 at 6:46 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

ah thank you so much for the kind comment! :)

on Nov. 3 2012 at 6:24 pm
shinegirl24 BRONZE, Grand Rapids, Michigan
3 articles 0 photos 49 comments

Favorite Quote:
"All, everything I understand, I understand only because I love." Leo Tolstoy

Wow, this was beautiful. Perfect word choice, awesome imagery, great job!

on Nov. 3 2012 at 1:06 pm
a.singlenote SILVER, Little, Colorado
6 articles 0 photos 33 comments

Favorite Quote:
The truest beauty in the world is exsquisite and makes your heart ache with something that you can't name.

ah thanks so much!! wow i didn't even realize it had gotten printed... haha :)

CammyS SILVER said...
on Nov. 2 2012 at 7:07 am
CammyS SILVER, Papillion, Nebraska
5 articles 0 photos 188 comments

Favorite Quote:
No passion in the world is equal to the passion to alter someone else's draft.
H. G. Wells
Don't say the old lady screamed. Bring her on and let her scream.
Mark Twain

That was really pretty! I liked how you switched from Private Andrews to his wife. All in all, a great job. Congrats on geting it in the magazine ;)