For months they shared the same routine. A quiet reveille followed by the groans of sore muscles and the pop of tired joints. In so many ways, they were all the same, in very few were they different.

It was true, for these men, that misery loved company. But when that company would fade… the misery remained.

He sat there for an hour waiting for help. In one hand he caressed the head of his brother, in the other hand his rifle. He had done everything he could. And as he watched the life of his buddy fade away, the young enlisted man could only stare down the muzzle of his rifle.

“I prayed,” he said. But no one came.

“I cried,” he whispered. But no one heard him.

Help finally arrived, but it was too late. At that point, it was nothing more than a gesture of goodwill. His brother was dead.

His uniform was stained crimson and his fingernails were outlined in brown, crusty, dried blood. The last physical remnants of his fallen comrade.

The man looked at the oil filter. The black, slimy liquid covered his hands and seeped into the cracks of his fingernails. He threw the filter into a bucket and grabbed a paper towel.

“Why pray?” He thought. No one will come.

“Why cry?” He thought. No one will hear.

He wiped his hands. It had been ten years since that day. He still had not forgiven himself, nor would he ever.

Panic filled his heart as he scrubbed furiously at his fingernails. There wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t remember. In some manner, he was always taken back.

“No, no, no, I… I can’t brea..” His buddy gasped.

“I looked at him and grabbed his hand.” The man said. “I told him I would never let go.”

He threw the paper towel in the bucket with the filter.

“Sometimes I think that forgiving myself means that I will forget.” The man said.

And so is the reality of war. A trauma that few will understand, and one that even fewer will experience.

“He was my brother, but now he’s my ghost. I see him every where.” The man said.

The burden rests with the few, as they carry the final, lasting memories of the ones they lost. They see their ghosts everywhere they go, because they are their witness.