Anne-Marie Edwards sat in the dining room listening to the radio, waiting for a war article to come on. Four years ago Anne-Marie and her five children had farewelled Mathew Edwards (Anne-Marie’s husband and the children’s father) off to war. The past four years had been a worrying, frightening time and every once and a while Anne-Marie would burst into seas of tears, her usually pretty, brown face, swollen from crying. Her gleaming brown eyes would go a scary shade of red and her gracefully gentle smile would turn into a heavily pronounced frown.
Anne-Marie sat in her tattered but strikingly clean dining room, still focussed on the radio article. There was nothing too facsinating on the radio.
She stood up and found her eldest son David staring at pictures of his father with tears in his eyes.
“He will come back, won’t he?” sobbed David.
“Well, the war has been going on for four years. It can’t go on much longer,” answered Anne-Marie.
“But he will come back, right?” demanded David.
Anne-Marie hesitated, “Yes he will come back. And even if he doesn’t, we’ll cope.”
“So Dad’s coming back!” squealed David with delight.
“Yes he will, I know he will.” Anne-Marie now had faith - something she hadn’t had in the past four years.
Loimata, Year 6, Room 11, 2010
