The Sister(29)

Chapter 21



The funeral was the worst day of his life. A young girl in bright summer clothes approached him. A black hat and veil her only concession to the sobriety of the event.

Milowski couldn’t make out her face clearly, but he knew whom it was. His stomach knotted. Exerting every inch of self-control, he tried not to fall apart in front of her. The control didn’t extend to his voice. It clunked in his throat like a glottal stop. Instead of trying to talk further, he nodded at her.

‘Why didn’t you save him?’ Brookes’ little sister asked him tearfully.

He couldn’t even say he’d tried.

‘He was your best friend, Bruce. What did you do to try to save him?’

I threw him a seashell. The answer seemed so ridiculous now, but at the time, the sheer belief in its power to effect some miraculous turn-around in events had never been stronger. He saw the look on Brookes’ face when he caught it. He almost believed in it, too. If only...

He cleared his throat and it hurt, the lump growing more painful as the tears started in his eyes. He looked at her sincerely. ‘I couldn’t swim, Leanne. I never could. I’m sorry.’

She looked at him contemptuously. ‘You didn’t even try – I hate you!’ she said.

Not as much as I hate myself, Leanne.

She turned sharply on her heel and walked away.





Whether it was by design or accident, he never knew for sure, but when the summer holidays were over and he returned to school, Kirk was his new form master. He renamed him Miller because he either would not, or could not pronounce his surname, and in doing so, he threw a lifeline to a struggling boy, who would use the nickname as a rope to clamber out of his despair. A few of the other boys told him he shouldn’t put up with it, and each gave a reason why. The most bizarre and likeliest – given the teacher’s background – was that he was anti-communist. Milowski defended himself against the implied suggestion. ‘Well, I’m no communist and neither is anyone in my family.’ If he’d told his father, there would have been hell to pay.

When the first day was over, Kirk asked him to stay behind after school.





‘You know something, boy, when I wasn’t so much older than you, I joined the army. I won’t bore you with all the details. I'd always wanted to serve my country, so I signed up with the Gloucestershire Regiment. A few months later, the Korean War started.

‘In late April 1951, for three days from 22nd through to the 25th, a battalion of us managed to hold off not just dozens of Chinese soldiers, but thousands of them.’ He fiddled with a piece of chalk he was holding, looking at it intently as he continued to speak. ‘During that time, I never once doubted I'd come through. You know why?’

He shook his head.

‘I had God on my side, and you know what? I did come through.’ Scratching the back of his neck, he weighed how much to tell the boy. ‘I escaped. Not many did...but I did and I met up with friendly forces a few days later.’

Miller listened with an expression that bordered on interest.

‘It was hell. It changed me. It changed all of us. I was no longer the person I once was, but that was all right because he was still somewhere inside me. Still there, but shell-shocked and a little bit left behind.’ His voice softened. ‘You know, I felt guilty,’ he snapped the chalk in his hands. ‘That I pulled through unscathed, when so many were captured or killed. I felt guilty,’ he said, as he searched Milowski’s face. ‘There was a reason for it. I was lucky, chosen, or whatever it was, I’m still waiting to find out. I might never know, but I’m not going to drive myself crazy dwelling on it.’

Miller contemplated the two pieces of chalk Kirk had laid back on the desk, arranged in the groove. He pushed them back together next to a pencil. Only the faintest crack was visible where they joined.

‘Look at me, boy. In a way, what happened to you is the same. You just have to put yourself back together the best you can.’ He studied him. ‘Do you understand me?’

‘I think so, sir.’

‘Good – before you go, let me show you this poem by Robert Frost, an American. It helped me through some tough times, when I wasn’t able to make sense of it all.’

He handed him the book, open on the page. ‘Read it aloud for me.’

The words seemed to come naturally to Miller as he read them.

‘Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveller, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth...’

He’d almost read the whole thing when, just at the last line, Kirk joined in, saying, ‘I then took the other one.’

Miller frowned. The line didn’t match that in the book.

‘My road, Miller, the line I chose...my life.’ There was a distant look in his eyes. He settled them on the boy in front of him. ‘When I joined the army, I made my choice. I chose my road, but you, you had no choice. You’re stuck on the road you’re travelling now. Follow it – make the best of it. You have your cards; play them as well as you can. Not one of us can undo time. There’s no going back – is that clear to you?’

The tightness in his throat strangled his voice and he couldn’t speak, so he just nodded.