In March of 2020, my flash fiction (1500 words or less) story The Road Home was a finalist in Crystal Lake Publishing‘s monthly flash fiction competition, and published in It went on to be included in their huge Shallow Waters horror Flash Fiction Anthology (the top 100 selections from the entire series, over 350 pages trade paperback!).
The theme for the competition was “war”, and so I decided to sit down and write a war story, starting from scratch. The Road Home is the result.
I think it did well…so I thought I’d share it here…enjoy!
The Road Home
by Rand Eastwood
Turns out it was just an old country road, narrow and crumbling; somehow it looked bigger on the map, and upon reaching it after days of marching overland, Dan and the rest of his platoon were surprised.
Nevertheless, it marked the northern boundary of the town the enemy had besieged and occupied, and were now using as a base of operations to expand their conquest. The south side of the town was surrounded by hilly terrain—difficult to traverse and easily defended—so Command had decided they should attack from the north.
But when they launched their assault, the enemy was ready; there was no element of surprise, as hoped.
The battle was intense, the enemy fervently holding the line, ensconced and nearly invisible, camouflaged among the shrubs and overgrowth in the field beyond the road. But their military had been spread thin as they had advanced from town to town, and they were incrementally driven back.
What Dan’s platoon had lost in surprise, they had made up for in sheer numbers.
Becoming overwhelmed, the enemy slowly retreated, then regrouped just inside the woods that stood behind the field, which was now veiled in smoke and strewn with corpses.
Ordered forward, Dan’s platoon marched confidently toward the tree line, accompanied by rebel yells and brisk firing. But as they drew closer, the enemy soldiers all abruptly turned and dashed farther into the woods with reckless abandon, apparently in full, panicked retreat.
This prompted Dan’s platoon to give chase, their yelling escalating as they bounded through the high weeds and brush and into the woods.
But as they entered the woods, the enemy soldiers ahead suddenly dropped to the ground, and several large machine guns opened fire in the distance. Mounted on tripods, giving them an open, elevated line of sight, their hail of bullets raked the entire area, ripping the oncoming soldiers to sheds, leaves and branches blown into the air along with blood and flesh.
It was a trap—and they had walked right into it.
Glancing to his right, Dan saw his comrades exploding into bloody tatters, one by one—their mangled bodies landing in the underbrush, brief anguished screams ending abruptly as they went down—and realized with horror that the torrent of bullets ripping through the line of soldiers was fast approaching him. As his buddy not six feet from him was shredded into screams and blood, he glanced to his left and saw an old log, a fallen tree from ages ago, lying across the ground, rotted and laden with moss. As the bullets tore through the tree branches hanging near his head, he turned and dove behind the log.
He struck his helmet hard on his way down, the impact wrenching it from his head. It rolled away, coming to rest in a pile of dead leaves.
As he landed in the mud behind the rotted tree, the machine gun spray ripped across its top, sending bark and wood chips raining down on him before continuing on, his comrades farther down the line now screaming and falling.
Tears welling in his eyes, heart beating in his ears, lungs heaving hotly, he thrust his muddy hand into his shirt pocket and yanked out the old, tattered black and white photo he had kept there since leaving boot camp. In it, a pretty girl—blonde hair, bright shining eyes—smiled beautifully at the camera, a tiny baby girl in her arms, swaddled in a pink blanket: his wife Jenny, and their newborn daughter Kaylie.
He hadn’t yet laid eyes on Kaylie, nor held her in his arms. But he was living for the day he could return home to do so.
As the screams faded and the machine gun fire died down, he contemplated his options: he obviously couldn’t advance any farther, he would be cut in half just like the rest of his platoon; and he couldn’t stay here, either—they would eventually find him, and that thought frightened him even more than being shredded by machine gun fire.
Staring at the photo, he made his decision: he was going home, to his wife and daughter, to all that he loved in the world.
Resolved, he stood and walked back toward the edge of the woods.
Miraculously, no bullets struck him from behind as he made his way out of the woods. The gunfire had subsided, along with the dying cries of his comrades. Calmly, purposefully, he crossed the field, ignoring the bodies strewn about until he reached the road. There he stopped and looked up into the sky, orienting himself by the sun.
East. Home was east of here. He sensed it.
Turning right, he stepped out onto the road and headed east.
As he walked, the horrible sounds of war faded, and the serene sounds of nature took over.
Soon the sun set behind him, bringing first twilight, then darkness, until the moon rose above the trees and bathed the dark earth in its pale nightlight.
As the sound of nocturnal creatures emerged from the darkness, he walked.
As the moon watched from the cloudless night sky, he walked.
Holding the picture up before him, he stared at it with his left eye—his one remaining eye—and didn’t notice that his right eye was gone; he also didn’t notice the stream of blood running down his arm and dripping from his knuckles as he gripped the tiny photograph. And he didn’t notice that his helmet was gone, or that a bloody mass of brain matter now hung from what remained of his skull, speckled with bits of shattered cranial bone.
No, all he noticed was Jenny and Kaylie.
And the road.
The road that would take him home, to his wife and his daughter, to all that he loved in the world.
The road that stretched out for miles before him, fading into the distant darkness.
The road that looked as if it might just go on forever.
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