Disclaimer: I do not own Michael, Davita, Annie or Teresa. I don't think that you need to have read the book - Davita's Harp - to understand this story. Takes place just before WW2, in Spain. Michael is a journalist, who travels to Spain for the paper he works for... will he come back alive? This, my friends, is HIS story.

Michael’s Story

I stood on the uppermost deck of the boat, waving my cane as a last farewell to my family. The morning was full of sunshine, but the air was deathly cold. I smirked to myself thinking, ‘the morning is just like me. On first glance you would think I am happy, with the smile on my face and all. But if you stand by me long enough, you can see that I am cold and dead.’ Slowly we pulled away from the pier, my family of a wife and daughter became smaller and smaller. I sighed as they finally disappeared from view. My family, oh how I would miss them. Annie, my beloved wife, always encouraging me. Davita, my darling child, always so inquisitive, so thirsty for knowledge. Shaking my head I went inside to my small room. Setting down my cane I lie on my bed, and fall into a restless sleep.

The trip was long and boring, but at the same time I wished it hadn’t come to an end. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to face the villages full of defenseless women and children covered in dust from of the bombs. Houses toppling over. People who were missing limbs, or worse, they could even be missing their family. Family is the most important thing in a person’s life. ‘What will my family do while I am away? Will I ever see them again? I surely hope so.’ Eventually we arrived, much to my dismay. I shouldered my bag and walked as best I could onto the dock.

A young man who stood about 5’10 took my bags roughly from me and began walking towards a nearby village. He had long black hair and cold gray eyes. ‘Oh yeah, I was really going to enjoy my stay here. Fat chance!’ He shoved the door to the ‘Inn’ open and dropped my things on the floor then stormed back out again. An elderly man who had been sitting at a table in the corner of the room strolled casually over to me, scooped up my bags and motioned me to follow him. We walked up a battered staircase and down a hallway. I was the fifth door on the right.

The old wooden door creaked slightly when it opened and closed. The floor was made of wood, and there was a small green rug in the middle of the room. My bed was to my left; it was a small cot with dirty white sheets that looked almost a brownish yellow color, underneath it was a chipped bedpan. Towards my right was a short vanity, which served as both a dresser and desk, made of blond wood. The attached mirror was very gritty, and you could hardly see anything in it. Straight ahead was a shattered window, next to it was a ‘bathroom’ of sorts, featuring a washbasin, and a stubby bathtub.

“Home sweet home.” I muttered. The elderly man had left my bags on the bed for me. I slumped my shoulders and trudged over to the vanity and began writing a short letter to my family. I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I remember is opening my eyes and coming to the realization that it was sometime in the evening. I stood, and stretched my aching legs. Grabbing my jacket, I set out for the nearest pub. I pulled my coat tighter around me for warmth, as the air was really quite chilly. ‘Annie would hate it here.’ I thought, smiling at the memory of my wife.

I approached the bar. It was surprisingly well intact. The door was made of heavy dark wood, and was hard to open. I hobbled inside. The floors were made of the same wood as the door and were only slightly scratched. The bar was to the right, and to the left were many round wooden tables. I took hold of one of the barstools and took a seat. The bartender was a short, stout man with a graying beard and thinning gray hair. He held up a chubby finger, telling me that he would be with me in a moment. I waited patiently for him to finish his conversation with a man three stools down from me. Though the stools looked battered and beaten, with the stuffing coming out of the seams, they were quite comfortable. Their comfort made having to wait for the bartender an easy task. The bartender waddled over to me. He was smiling and I could see that he was missing three front teeth, two on top, one on the bottom.

“Good evening’ sir. My name is Sal. What might I help you with?” his voice was deep and rough, but not at all unkind.

“I would like a martini, shaken, not stirred, please.” I replied. Turning his back to me he got a somewhat clean glass and began mixing my drink. The man that Sal had been talking to earlier came and plopped down next to me.

“Hullo, my name is Bob Carey. I haven’t seen you around here before… I’m sorry, Mr.-?” he was a tall and skinny man with dark hair that hung down to his shoulders, and had icy blue eyes.

“Chandal, Michael Chandal. I haven’t been in town for more than a few hours.”

“Well Michael, are you in town for business, or pleasure?” he said the word ‘pleasure’ sneeringly. I was not really liking this guy at the moment. As if he knew that I was uncomfortable, Sal gave me my martini and glared at Bob.

“Business of course.” I replied taking a sip from my drink. “I’m a journalist.” The more I talked to Bob, the more I distrusted him. He seemed almost happy that there was a war going on. He too, was a journalist, as were many others in this bar. Bob told me that when he gets back home, he is sure to be given a promotion. Thankfully, he left not long after my second drink. Looking around the room, I could see more men had come inside the bar, and sat down at one of the round tables. A group of them waved me over, and asked me to join them; they were combat pilots from Brooklyn. They told me what it was like flying above the desolate grounds that were once brilliant cities. After talking more to them, I found out that they were Jewish, I don’t know why, but for some reason, that seems odd to me. Almost unnatural. By eleven, I was completely wiped out, and David (one of the pilots) had to help me back to the hotel. The bed was cold and hard, and it's sheets were annoyingly stiff.

The next morning, my hip felt much better, so I went around the whole day without my cane. I spent much of the day walking around the town, talking to the people, and writing down some notes. The town was in need of some real help. House's were falling down, and the ones that weren't in so bad of shape were being used as hospitals. These so called 'hospitals' were dirty and rat infested. There was almost no clean gauze, no painkillers, and it seemed that everywhere you looked, there was a dead body. The smell was nauseating! As I walked around, I could hear some of the nurses gossiping about some Canadian doctor. As I got closer, I could hear clearly hear what they were saying. They said that he had perfected giving blood transfusions, on the battlefield! ‘That sounds like a great story. I'll have to keep a lookout for this guy.’

Over the next few days I saw many people passing through the city. I actually happened to meet some of Teresa's family. I met her aunt and younger cousin. Unfortunately, it was hard for her to understand me, because my Spanish is a little rusty, so we didn’t talk very long. Her aunt looked very rundown. She had a huge gash on her leg, from what I'm guessing was a flyaway piece of bombshell. Her son was worse. He had a deep cut across his stomach, one on his chest and some small cuts and bruises on his legs and arms.

As the days passed by, the war got worse and worse. The weather had changed from extremely cold to warm, the air had become heavy with dust and humidity. My hip had been doing extremely well by this time, so I had given my cane to a survivor who had a bad limp. Jakob Daw came by my hotel and decided to stay with me for a few days, until we got his visa problem under wraps. Together we checked out a few hospitals, and walked along the edges of the battlefield. Strewn across the land were pieces of arms and legs, corpses of horses and people. Cities were alight with fire; people were running around crying and screaming. Bombs falling like rain from the sky. A terrible, horrifying sight. ‘I am glad that my family is not here to see such chaos.’

During the night, I find myself haunted by my past. I dream of Centralia. I see Everest’s form suspended by a long piece of twine. His body, soaked in blood, swings gently from side to side as he claws savagely at the noose around his neck, gasping for air. I stand there, and I stare at him. For some reason, no matter how much I want to, I cannot bring myself to move and help him. The fear I felt was unbelievable! How could I not be able to help this poor fellow?

That is when I woke up, in a cold sweat, and shaking uncontrollably. I had fought so hard to suppress those images! But because of this goddamn war they are becoming more and more vivid. I feel like the whole world is crashing down around me! ‘Why do people do this? How can they kill and destroy their neighbor? They think it is a war over who is right, and who is wrong! Fools! All of them! There is no right in this world, the only thing humans are capable of IS wrong! We fight, we kill, we hurt one another, and for what?! For our own selfish, twisted sense of satisfaction!’ With these thoughts racing through my head, I drifted back into a restless sleep.

I fell ill that night. I began hallucinating. I saw Everest's hanging, I saw Hitler smiling down at me - mocking me, I saw people being slaughtered, along with other terrible images. It took me about two full days to get myself back together. During that time, I wrote long letters to my family. Jacob's visa was ready for him in Lisbon and he would soon be leaving Bilbao. My paper wanted me to do a background story on the Basque culture. The top two points I needed to check out were a six hundred-year-old tree, and the Parish Church of Santa Maria. Once Jakob Daw had left for America, I began doing some research. I went out to bars, or other 'safe' places asking people how I could find these things. It seemed that every person that I asked, had a different route to get there. ‘Doesn't this place have any maps for Christ's sake?!’

I had been sitting in my stuffy room, looking over the many different ways (about a dozen) to get to the tree alone. ‘Forget this!’ I stormed outside, and down a few blocks to the 'Dancing Horse' bar. That was the bar that I had gone to my first day in town. I sat down on one of the soft barstools and asked Sal for a martini.

"Shaken, right?" He asked. I smiled and nodded my head in reply. A triumphant grin spread across his face. "So, where you been? Bob didn't scare you away did he?" He chuckled as he gave me my drink.

"No, I've just been busy. Hey, do you know where I can find that six hundred-year-old tree you guys have got around here someplace? I keep getting all these different directions, they're confusing the hell out of me." I exclaimed taking a giant swallow of the musty concoction in front of me.

"Michael, my boy!" He laughed, his tubby stomach giggling slightly. I smiled to myself, thinking that ‘this man reminds me of a battered old Saint Nick.’ "Just call a taxi, and have the driver take you!" ‘Of course! Why hadn't I thought of that?!’ I slapped myself inwardly, sometimes I embarrass myself. By this time I had finished my first drink. "Need another?" I shook my head,

"I don't need one, but I sure as hell want it!" I replied slamming my fist down on the table. I spent the rest of the night making friends with other journalists and fighter pilots. By midnight, we were leaning on each other singing show tunes. Somehow I made it back to my room without passing out. ‘Man, what a night!’ The next morning I woke up with a splitting headache. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any painkillers with me, so instead of going out to find that dumb tree, I stayed in bed and slept.

The next day was a Sunday. ‘Perfect day to go and visit that church.’ I thought to myself as I got up and changed. It took me about an hour to find a willing driver. The sun was out and shining brightly. The sky was a clear and vibrant blue. It would have been a magnificent day, had the world been at peace. We drove past many ‘hospitals’ and run down houses. Some children were playing a game of ‘kick the can’. There was a slight breeze, which swirled gently around trees, and ran across the ground, lifting fallen leaves slightly in the air, and taking them for a short ride.

The only things that broke this picture perfect image, was that air smelled of decomposing flesh, bodily waste, and of course there was the stream of bombs falling beyond the hills ahead of us. When we flew down the hills, the most disturbing thing was not the sight, but the sound. All was quiet, except for the wiz made by the bombs, which descending at an alarming rate. The car veered right, away from the danger zone.

Moments later we reached a tall timeworn tree. I stepped out of the car, and took a few snapshots of it. Walking back over to the car I asked the taxi driver if he would take me to the Parish Church of Santa Maria. He shook his head no, and told me that he would not go any farther. We began arguing, and another taxicab drove up. The driver got out and asked us what was the matter. We told him, and he told my driver to get out, and let me use the car on my own. He said that he would take my driver back the way we had come.

That was all well and nice, but I didn’t know where the hell I was going! Quickly, my driver got out of the car and gave me hurried directions. Then, in a flash got in the other mans taxi and they sped off. ‘Great.’ Taking up my camera again, I snapped a few more pictures of the tree. In the middle of one of my pictures, a young boy had jumped out of the surrounding brush, and stood by the tree. At first I was confused. ‘Did he want his picture taken?’ No, ‘boy could I have been any more wrong?’ He shot me a wicked smile, then produced a match from his pocket. It all happened so fast, I couldn’t stop him! He lit the match, and held it to the tree. Instantly, it burst into flames!

“Holy Shit!” I yelled, running back to the car. I jumped into the drivers seat, shut my door, and started the engine. I sped off in the direction of the church. It took me a good twenty minutes to get there. It was incredible! It had many stained glass windows, which sent color cascading down onto the white marble flooring. A church service was not being held at that moment. But I wish there had been. ‘That would have been amazing to see.’ As I walked further into the church, I realized that I was not alone. Down a corridor to my left I could hear people cough, and others whispering to each other.
As I approached a small archway, I could see people lain out on stretchers. Some were playing cards; others were sleeping, and most were dead. As I walked further and further into the room, it just became a sea of bodies. Everyone in that room had some sort of bandage on them, around their leg, head, arm, stomach, fingers. Many of the nurses, all of whom were nuns, had something wrong with them.

I took a few snapshots of the room, and then drifted away, looking at the other rooms. ‘If there had been a church half as magnificent as this one by my home, I would have made sure that I went to it every Sunday.’ I walked around for about an hour longer, then left. I walked carefully back to the car. My hip was bothering me a little today. I have no idea why, but it’s like a sharp pain in my leg.

As I drove slowly in the taxicab, I could hear that the air raids had picked up again. Looking out of my rearview mirror, I could see a plane following me.

“Shit!” I stopped the car and jumped out. I was by a paved bridge that rested on some metal beams and cement pillars. It looked like it would serve as good protection. As I took a few steps toward it, the plane that had been following me unleashed it’s machine-gun. Some bullets hit my taxi, causing it to explode. The force from the blast sent me forward. To my left, I could see an elderly nun that had been hit. I scrambled to my feet and ran over to her. I lifted her carefully into my arms and made a brake for the bridge.

“Leave me. God will take care of me.” She whispered. Her voice was raspy. Her delicate form shook as she coughed. She had white hair, which was falling out of the habit she wore. I focused my gaze toward the bridge. Underneath it stood a priest who waved at me, encouraging me onward. Shaking my head, I replied to the woman,

“I don’t believe in god.” She gasped, causing her to cough more violently. By now the planes had began dropping bombs. As the first one hit the ground, my hip gave out. I crashed against the hard cement, the nun flew out of my arms and landed a little in front of me. The man who had been waiting under the bridge began walking towards us. Another bomb fell, knocking him off his feet. More bombs fell, I tried my hardest to get up, but my hip wasn’t responding. I just felt a dull pain. The nun, who I had been carrying, still lay in front of me, unmoving. She must have been knocked unconscious. I lifted my face towards the sky. Another bomb was on its way down, headed right at me. My chest got tight, I couldn’t breath. Images of my family ran through my mind. ‘My family, oh how I would miss them. Annie, my beloved wife, always encouraging me. Davita, my darling child, always so inquisitive, so thirsty for knowledge. What will they do while I am away? Will I ever see them again?’

“Why?” my voice was swallowed by the hissing sound of the bomb as it came ever closer. “Why?” I choked out again. My body felt like it was on fire, and being slowly ripped apart. Why?