Jerzy awoke from a fitful sleep, <br />his body aching from head to toe. <br />He focused his gummed up eyes <br />on the bedside clock - it was 9am. <br /> <br />He felt more tired than when he <br />went to bed some ten hours earlier. <br />Pulling the curtains aside filled the <br />room with pale winter sunlight. <br />Sensing it was crisply cold outside <br />a shiver ran through him. <br /> <br />It had to be today, he decided. <br />He'd put it off for too long. <br />His check-list of fors and againsts <br />comfirmed it, and he felt relieved. <br /> <br />Pulling his track suit over his T-shirt <br />and pyjama bottoms, Jerzy slid his feet <br />into his slippers, stood up and walked <br />stiffly up the stairs into his study. <br /> <br />The room was cold, but he didn't turn <br />the heater on. Sitting at his desk he <br />unlocked the big bottom drawer. At the <br />back, carefully wrapped in chamois, was <br />the souvenir he brough back from the war. <br /> <br />As Jerzy unwrapped the pistol, he realised <br />it hadn't been fired in 50 years. He checked <br />the ammunition clip and it was still filled with <br />bullets. His mind flashed back to the the day <br />he retrieved it from a dying German officer. <br />He'd be about my age now, Jerzy reckoned. <br /> <br />'Now... ' Jerzy thought aloud. Placing the <br />pistol to his temple he curled a finger around <br />the trigger and squeezed. The very last sound <br />he heard was the click of the hammer.<br /><br />jerry hughes<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/jerzy/
