Prompt 192: Write about a recurring dream you've had./Theatrical Muse Challenge

Dreams? More like nightmares. I've had them as my constant companions ever since that day I lost my wife and children to the missile that destroyed our apartment in Vukovar over fifteen years ago. When they first began they were always the same, I would hear their screams, their voices calling to me, pleading for me to help them, to save them, and always I would arrive too late. Over and over I have replayed the scene of finding my young son buried beneath his crib, his tiny hand reaching up through the bars, pleading for the help that never came.

I can't tell you how many nights I found myself forced to relive the hours that followed, trying to comfort my wife while doing cpr on our young daughter in the hopes of keeping her alive. There were nights I thought I would never wake from the nightmare, and others where I prayed I wouldn't because on those I could keep them alive just that much longer.

As the years pass, I can't help but hope that the dreams will one day fade, but that same hope is also my fear because those moments are all I have left of the family I've lost.