War Through My Eyes #13: Burger

#13. Same Burger, Different Values

“Oh, to return to the classroom right about now,” said the graying, short-haired soldier with a disheveled beard. The man reminded me of Robinson Crusoe, once he’d already been found on the island, his hair hastily trimmed, but somehow missing the beard. 

“And what would you do there?” I smiled. “Annoy the teacher with your beard?”  

“Look at your own,” he frowned. “Your beard is not much shorter than mine. Soon you’ll be able to braid it. But about school—I would happily return to learning, and catch up with what I missed in those years. Tell me, why are children allowed in school, but adults don’t have a way back to the classroom? I would be far more patient, and I would never be upset at bad grades.” 

“Children are always more reactive in these situations, but they are also more quick to learn.” I ran my hands through my pockets to see if I could feel anything edible. My fingers felt something promising, but the excitement was premature – it was only a half-eaten Snickers. I was craving something sweet, but because of my sensitive teeth, candy became a luxury that I could not afford, or else I’d have an endless toothache. I looked at this candy bar and remembered the children with whom fate brought me together when I was involved in the volunteer center in Odesa.

“I know, children are an especially painful topic for you,” the soldier straightened the mat and sat on it. He pulled his backpack closer to him, rummaged through the mixed up items, and pulled out a protein bar and handed it to me. “Here, take this. You can eat this, no problem. The volunteers sent these over to me. It’s sugarfree, but still tastes good, if you need a snack.” 

I thanked him, tore open the package, and bit gingerly into it, waiting for signs of pain. My teeth remained curiously placid. I continued to chew, still on edge that the nerve would suddenly attack me. The nearest dentist technically wasn’t very far—but it felt like a distance of half a planet away. 

“Tell me about those children,” the soldier asked.

“It was in the late spring or early summer of the first year of the full-scale invasion,” I spoke up, still cautiously nibbling on the bar. “At that time, I worked from morning to night in a volunteer center located in one of the Odesa schools. Every day, endless streams of people were drawn to the entrance, leaving the territories occupied by the orcs, as well as those cities that suffered from shelling. Katsapnya* hit residential areas, regardless of whether our military was nearby or not. They only wanted to instill fear and panic among civilians. You know their intimidation tactics.”

Robinson* shot me a barely perceptible nod. Yes, he knew it well because his elderly parents died at home when their house was destroyed at point-blank-range by a katsap tank. 

“Once we arranged a holiday for the children,” I continued, not wanting to overextend the pause and give my brother in arms too much time to recall the dark memories. “I think it was on the Day of Children. Thanks to the energy of the leaders of our center, several other organizations joined our initiative. The holiday turned out bright, and the children, even for a while, forgot about all the horrors of the war. My daughter and some other girls did face painting on the children’s faces. It was fun: spider-men, hulks, characters from some cartoons and comics were jumping around, and some asked to draw Ukrainian flags on their cheeks.

“I still had a small number of copies of my book left unsold before the war, and we organized contests where these books were the prizes. Children sang, read poems, and danced. All around there was fun and laughter – a very rare phenomenon for that time, because for children it was more common to feel fear from constant explosions from the arrival of rockets or despair and tears from the loss of loved ones who perished under the ruins of destroyed buildings.”

“It’s terrifying,” Robinson’s thick eyebrows drew together on the bridge of his nose. “Terrifying to see all this suffering day after day. Those cursed orcs.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “But at that moment they turned into carefree children once again. And the fact that war went on was reminded only by their choice of songs for competitions. Almost everyone wanted to sing ‘Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow.’ All of a sudden, everyone turned their attention to the other side of the celebration site – someone brought out food and drinks. The goodies for this event were brought by girls and guys from the World Central Kitchen, a non-governmental, non-profit organization that helps victims with food. The children immediately lined up at the tables where burgers, sandwiches, and cookies were stacked in pyramids. Juice bottles were arranged in neat rows.”

“​​How much happiness must have been in those eyes when they saw all this,” smiled Robinson.

“The children who had been evacuated from the cities destroyed by the orcs really enjoyed every sandwich,” I continued. “How carefully they handled that food, so that, God forbid, they did not drop even a tiny bit of bread or bun on the ground. They even bit into it with caution, even though they were hungry. But I remember how one local boy took a bite of his burger, grimaced and threw it at my feet. ‘Ew, there’s some salad in here. I only wanted the meat!’ he exclaimed and ran away. 

At that moment, I noticed a little girl who just froze in place at this scene. She looked after the boy, then at the burger he had thrown, and there were tears in her eyes. I went up to her to find out what happened. She looked at me with her huge blue-blue eyes, from which pea-sized teardrops trailed, and said almost in a whisper ‘How can this happen? How can you throw food on the ground? Someone somewhere is dying of hunger, and another is scattering this food.’ 

I was at a loss for words. I didn’t know what to say to her. Fortunately, her mother, a petite and very thin woman, approached us. She took a few quick glances at her daughter and the discarded burger and immediately understood. At my questioning look, she just shook her head ‘We are from Mariupol. We hid in basements, were completely without food for a long time, and survived by some miracle. We got out of there only thanks to the fact that some people helped with the evacuation. So don’t be surprised that my little one reacts like that.’”

My comrade pursed his lips and quickly blinked his eyes, holding back tears.

“The woman hugged her daughter and whispered something in her ear. The child held out her hand to her mother, holding a chicken sandwich and asked ‘Mommy, how much can I eat at once? Should it be divided up so that it can last for more days?’ The woman stroked her head and gently whispered ‘Eat, my daughter, eat the whole thing. Now you don’t have to divvy it up.’ I couldn’t stand it and stepped aside to catch my breath. It was as if a huge stone lay on my chest. A burden from my own inability to change the situation, you know?”

“I know, brother. We can’t change anything in the past, but every one of us can influence the present and the future,” said the soldier hoarsely. “Now I understand why you are so careful about putting away any leftovers after dinner.”

“Yes,” I agreed, “and I think that until the end of my days I will see that girl in front of my eyes, and in my ears will be her questions about whether it is necessary to divide each portion of food so that there will be enough for several days.”