Chapter Twenty: Edward Robertson:

There was this one soldier who fought alongside of us in that pointless war. His name was Edward Robertson. He was an American. He belonged to another troop. Edward was a strange guy. I only knew him for three days, but he left a lasting impression. I think we were stationed over in Thailand at the time. Yeah, that had to be it. We were at this gathering on the night before we went off to war. This was a joint party. My unit was going to help the Americans take out a rebel group down in the south. Some of my fellow soldiers were itching for action. The order came as a surprise to me. I mean, I knew it was coming. But still…

I remembered when I first met Edward. It was that party I was talking about. This was before I got on the elevator. I sat alone in the corner with my drink. Hours earlier, Kaori tried to get me to come home. I told her that I couldn’t. She didn’t understand. I was doing this for us. That’s what I kept telling myself. That night, I wasn’t so sure about that stance anymore.

“Why the long face, man?” I heard over my head. Huh? I turned my head. A pale man stood over me. I couldn’t help but think of a vampire for some reason. Now that I think about it, I couldn’t help but be reminded of Keau Revies. (That’s the only American actor I knew of at the time.) I blinked at him.

“Uh… who are you?” I asked. This weird man laughed.

“Oh, my bad,” he said. This man held out his hand. “I’m Edward Robertson, nice to meet you.” I stared at him for a second.

“Um… Toshiki Okawa,” I said. (My English still wasn’t that good at the time. I probably sounded weird to him. I didn’t remember whether he could understand what he was saying then, either. Take the rest of this story with a grain of salt.) We shook hands.

“Mind if I sit down?” Edward asked. He didn’t wait for an answer as he sat down next to me.

“Ah!” he said. Where was this going? Did anyone else see us? I don’t think they did. I didn’t know how to flag them over anyway. Edward took a sip of what I assumed was whiskey that he had with him.

“We just kill, kill, kill,” he said. “It must be so exhausting.” I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. Edward dropped his shoulders.

“This was the best I could do,” he said.

“Uh…” I said. That was as much as I could get in. He didn’t stop talking.

“I never wanted to work in the factory,” Edward said. “My old man did. So did his old man. And his old man. And his old man. And his old man. And his old man.” He took another sip of his whiskey. Edward turned his head.

“Don’t mind me,” he said. “I’m just rambling on.” I didn’t know what to say. This man randomly started talking to me. He was the one who came up to me. Now, I didn’t know how to get out of it. And Edward didn’t stop talking either.

“What is our purpose in life?” he asked.

“Huh?” I asked.

“I mean… why are we here?”

“Uh… a party.”

“Not here in this room. I mean in life.” At some points, he would talk so fast that I could barely keep up. I tried to cut in and tell him as such, but either he ignored me or didn’t understand. That man took another drink from his whiskey.

“Oh,” he said. He looked down at the empty bottle in his hand and shrugged.

“Oh well,” Edward slurred out. The man tossed the bottle aside. I could barely hear the crashing noise over the pounding music.

“Do you think you should clean that up?” I asked. “Someone could get hurt.” Edward looked in the direction where he threw the bottle. He shrugged.

“Someone else will get it,” he said.

“That’s not the point,” I said more to myself. Sure enough, someone came by and swept up the broken glass. I didn’t get a good look at who it was. Maybe it was because Edward was talking again.

“I don’t get it, man,” he said. “Why are we doing this? We don’t even want this country. Half of us don’t know where they were going. I couldn’t even pick out our destination on the map.” I dropped back his head and groaned. “But we have to serve our countries, right?” Edward snorted.

“I guess…” I said. He looked over at me, but said nothing. That man struggled to stand up.

“I’m going to get another drink,” he mumbled.

“Okay,” I said. It took Edward about five minutes to stand up straight and wander off to the bar. I waved at him for some reason. It just happened. Moments later, I got up and made it back to the elevator. I had no idea how long Edward sat there and talked to me. It could have only been minutes, but it sure felt like it was much longer. Once I got back to my room from the elevator episode, I thought that was the end of that.

I would see Edward two more times before everything went sideways. The second time was when we were about to head out on the mission. I didn’t know how I was going to handle sitting next to him while we were waiting for the shuttle. It was surprising to see him sober. He did have a bit of a hangover. I tried to speed past him and pretend that he didn’t see me as I hurried all the way to the back of the shuttle.

“Toshiki?” he asked. I froze in my tracks and peeked out of the cracks between my fingers. He tried to squint through his headache. That man’s face glowed.

“Ha! I knew it was you!” he said. Oh crap. There went my original plan. What else was I going to do now? I lowered my arm and turned around.

“Oh, hey there,” I said. “Good morning. I didn’t see you there.” Okay, I knew that wasn’t a good lie, but I didn’t know what else I was going to do. However, that thought didn’t last long. I squinted as I got a better look at Edward.

“You don’t look so good. Are you okay?” I asked. He just waved me off.

“I’m fine, man,” he said. “I just need a little water and a nap, and I’ll be fine.” Without thinking, I sat down next to Edward. This time, he didn’t talk much on the ride to the rendezvous point. To tell you the truth, he wasn’t so bad when he wasn’t drunk and just talking about nothing. Maybe we could try again, and I could get to know him better. Sadly, I would never get the chance.

The last time I saw Edward was when they were taking away his body from the battlefield.