How Wrong I Was

Chapter 3

I placed a sand bag onto the heap that I had already created. I saw a worm like tail flicker behind it and grimaced. Rats had taken over the war, I didn't care abut the Germans being at war with us, I cared about the oncoming and unstoppable army of rats. Some were creatures that made you shiver inside; to think that at night they crawl over you in a hurry to find food. Those rats, were the very much feared Brown Rats, the biggest one I had recorded in my diary had been a victim to another soldier's bayonet and was over the size of a regular house cat.

            Rats in the trenches were both vile and very disgusting, when a soldier died and his body was not removed or buried immediately, the rats would start to feast. The huge vermin would bury themselves into the flesh and occasionally I have seen them come out from the open mouths of the bodies. Even the severely wounded have been known to be nibbled on by the rats even when they are fully conscious.

            The grimace stayed plastered on my face and I stood up lowly, reaching out for a hammer as I did. As soon as I saw it's whiskers emerge from behind another pile of sandbags I lunged forward towards it, in the process I of course caused my uniform to be completely covered in mud and dirt, but when I felt the hammer hit the soft rat it was definitely worth it. My face took most of the mud and when I looked up I couldn't see anything, but I did hear loud laughing behind me.

            I turned round so I was on my back and then sat up and wiped the dirt from my eyes. Standing next to me was my best friend George and also my newly acquired friends Barney and Neville. They were almost keeling over wit laughter at me and were on the brink of tears due to the amount of laughter they managed to emit. Neville was the first to stop the hysterical laughter and pointed to where my hammer had hit. I looked over and understood why they were laughing so hard, I had hit a sandbag and sand was slowly pouring out of the rip I made.

            I could tell my cheeks had turned an almost crimson even though the mud was like a mask over them. As my hand released the hammer and it fell to the ground with a splash, I saw the dreaded tail of the rat as it dived down a tunnel in the wall.

            We were in our sleeping quarters, which is more like our own personal patch of mud. It was, in fact, a walkway going to the medical centre, so having to move in order for the stretchers to come through was a very regular occurrence. We learnt to live with it, and even with the hundreds of casualties that passed, all of us learned to ignore them. Even the ones that were too horrific to even be featured in my worst of nightmares.

            But the hundreds of rats could never be ignored. They drove me and my friends near to the brink of madness. Neville actually seems to sleep with either a hammer or his rifle, and Barney, in his sleep, fidgets like there is a rat wandering across him. In the morning I never hesitate to ask whether he had dreamt about the rats, but every time I do, he says he never dreams and never even moves or talks in his sleep. Well we all knew that was wrong, once even, he shouted loudly, “Hey rat, not now please.” He had then mumbled incoherently for a minute or so before then shouting yet again, “Sure, whatever, come back next week and get some cheese, I’m sure I’ll have some in stock then ok?” Neville, George and me joked all the time about Barney and we called him the ‘Cheesemonger’ but usually that nickname was followed by an almost broken nose. Caused, of course, by Barney’s strong right hook.

            George suddenly snapped his fingers in front of my face, which was still directing my eyes the hole in the wall. The snap brought me back to the present and I slowly stood up, “Well that was….” I said, and bit my lip to think of the right word that didn’t make me seem like a fool.

            Barney inputted a few words that definitely didn’t come into the category I wanted -to not seem like a fool- though, “Hilarious, hysterical, amusing, comical, and about a million other words which we will annoy you with for the rest of our time here.”

            I glared angrily at him, “At least I’m not a Cheesemonger.”

            That comment sent all but Barney into laughter. He however stood mimicking my expression and had his arms crossed, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” He said bitterly, curling his fingers into the palms of his hands.

            I rolled my eyes, gave up on the glare and patted him on the shoulder, making him relax and smile, “So is anyone going to help me get this bag fixed?” I pointed and looked to the pile of sand that had formed and was mixing with the mud. All of the others agreed to help and started to scoop up the completely soaked sand.

            Just in time as we finished packing the bag, the Captain walked down the slight slope of the walkway towards us. “Have you finished all of those bags? Good, you should probably delouse your uniforms while you have time. Everything else is taken so you can do what you want for a while, but delousing your clothes would be best.” He said almost cheerily. I could understand his cheeriness though, I was covered in mud, which added humour, but also the fact that, as Captain he chose what he wanted to do and always stayed manning machine guns rather than making the suicidal run towards the enemy over no mans land towards the guns. We all hated him even though he was nice to everybody. It was his extreme cowardice that made us feel that way about him; we all knew that at the end of the war he would be one of the ones that was awarded medals for bravery. He was going to be a coward to be brave.

            He turned his back on us and walked in the direction of the medical centre. Four sour faces trained on him and he didn’t even know the loathing that was being directed at him.

            Neville finally spoke when Captain Marson was fully out of sight, “He’s right though, these lice are killing me.” We all took out our lighters, which are key in delousing clothes. It is a simple process of running the flame along the seams of the clothes.

            We did that and there were numerous little banging noises as the eggs popped from the extensive heat. George, somehow though, managed to set his jacket on fire slightly. He put it out quickly but only after it had turned the fabric black and there was a hole in it. Neville laughed, “George, you have to run it along quickly, like this.” He ran the lighter along the seam of his jacket at a good speed and managed not to do any damage. Unlike George.

           After delousing all of our clothes, some in a bit of privacy, we climbed onto our beds. They were only small, slightly cushioned mats but after a normal day of hard work they were the greatest thing we could have ever wished for.  And even though the day wasn’t hard the bed was the greatest feeling thing I had had in the few months I had been at war. It was still daylight but I fell asleep. Asleep until night came, until the action started.