Deep in a state of grief, this mother angrily dug her soldier son’s grave. As soon as she opened the coffin, she screamed when she realized a dreadful secret that would change her life for good.
As Pamela Ree worked in her garden, a feeling of foreboding suddenly crept over her, making her stop and stare at the beautiful flowers she was tending to. For some reason, their vibrant colors seemed dark and bleak to her, as if they were lifeless on the inside—just like her. She snapped out of her daze, intending to continue her initial task, but a chill ran down her spine. Something terrible was looming over the 56-year-old mother of two; she could feel it in her bones.
Just as she feared, her worst nightmare had come to pass. In her crouched state on the porch, the shadow of two figures loomed over her, hovering like a dark cloud, similar to the ominous aura she sensed from their presence. The two men, dressed in military uniforms, stood before her with sad pity.
“Mrs. Ree,” one of them began, his voice soft yet firm, “I’m afraid we have bad news.”
Pamela’s heart sank as she rose to her feet. As much as she hoped it wasn’t what she feared, she knew all too well what their presence and that somber expression signified. Instantly, the rest of the interaction became a blur—from the moment they struggled to break Liam’s passing to her, to the part where they gave her his dog tag. Everything seemed to fade into a hazy memory. Only the words “Liam is gone” played in her head like a mantra, ushering her into a dark path she never suspected would lead to grim and unimaginable discoveries.
A month from now, her life would be completely different from what she was used to. After all, Pamela had been a lucky woman with a loving husband, two beautiful sons, and a fulfilling career as a nurse. Her eldest son, Roland, led a successful life as a lawyer, and her husband, Rory, was a travel agent passionate about exploring new destinations across the continent. However, Pamela’s youngest son, Liam, was nothing like his father or brother. He was the wildcard of the family, who chased his dreams and lived life on his own terms.
In line with his impulsive nature, he had joined the military to make a meaningful difference in the world—a decision that surprised many of his peers. Although she was not in total support of his decision, Pamela embraced it regardless, swelling with pride at the thought of her son becoming one of the nation’s heroes. Liam was her pride and joy.
She loved his spontaneous attributes and his unwillingness to conform to norms. From a young age, he showed strong empathy and care for his friends, family, and even random strangers. Pamela admired this part of her son, so it didn’t take too much persuasion for her to accept the path he was creating for himself. If only she knew how this moment of support would flip her life upside down years later.
Things were relatively comfortable for the Ree family for the first two years after Liam got drafted. Pamela soaked in the peace and tranquility, never once suspecting that fate had other plans—and for the record, it truly did.
Her husband, Rory, was soon diagnosed with cancer. Pamela dedicated her time and energy to his care, putting her life on hold. As a nurse, she knew how to cater to his needs best. However, there was only so much her level of expertise could do to help. Rory eventually succumbed to his illness, passing away after months of failed chemotherapy.
Following her husband’s death, Pamela became distraught. It felt as if her world had collapsed right before her eyes. Rory was her confidant and best friend, and a huge hole formed in her heart with him gone. This was a dark period for the middle-aged woman.
Just months before Rory’s passing, their eldest son, Roland, tied the knot with his high school sweetheart before relocating thousands of miles away from home. At the same time, Liam remained in the military, only keeping in touch when time and circumstances permitted him, which was a rare occurrence.
As time passed, Pamela grew lonely despite being surrounded by friends and distant relatives. She constantly fought the feeling of loneliness. Additionally, her walk towards old age did little to ease her growing anticipation.
The middle-aged woman craved the connection she once shared with her family. Rory’s death and years of seclusion pushed her to this point, making her wish for quality time with her boys. Her urges worsened when retirement came to her doorstep, and she stopped connecting with the patients and colleagues that made living worthwhile.
Gradually, Pamela slipped into a state of helplessness, which slowly gravitated towards depression. Over time, the gaping hole Rory’s death had created still took shape within her heart, ripping her apart as she tried eagerly to live on.
With neither of her sons by her side, she sought solace in other activities. Eventually, her quest for inner peace led her to the church, where she would spend more time praying and meditating. But just as she was filling the deep wound Rory’s absence in her life had created, something began to jab at it, threatening to make an even bigger wound.
When Pamela prayed in the church one fateful day, a feeling of foreboding suddenly plagued her. Not understanding the reason for her rising anxiety, she shrugged it off as mere paranoia, which was something that hit her occasionally shortly after Rory died. However, the feeling persisted for weeks, and with time, it became a nagging feeling she couldn’t ignore anymore.
For some reason, her eyes kept drifting to her 29-year-old son Liam’s pictures. Her heart wished for a semblance of calm as the days passed, yet to her immense displeasure, nothing of that sort seemed to happen. When the feeling ate at her, she took the bold step of reaching out to Liam. Although an arduous task, she prayed for just one chance to speak to her son.
Pamela dialed the numbers she knew by heart and contacted offices she believed would help connect her with her son. After two days of trying, a bright light finally shone at the end of the tunnel for her. The middle-aged mother beamed joyfully when one of Liam’s corporals got him on the line.
Pamela’s aching heart healed when the voice belonging to her son reached her eager ears. At that moment, she was unsure what the fuss was all about—here she was, talking to her son who was alive and breathing. Suddenly, she didn’t know how to react, which was ironic considering the urgency she had used to search for him for the past two days.
Pamela engaged in a little conversation with him, satisfied with the hint of happiness that laced his voice upon hearing her excited tone. The mother and son caught up on lost time, not caring that they had limited time to spend on the phone call. Everything was going swell for the first few minutes, but that was until Liam said something that caught his mother off guard—something that ushered in the earlier feelings of dread that had overcome Pamela.
“I got drafted to the Middle East, Mom, so this year’s Christmas might not be on the table for me,” he said gently, unaware of how true the latter part would prove to be months later.
Pamela’s stomach squeezed with more fear and anxiety. Stunned and frightened, she maintained a deafening silence on the phone, her mind racing a mile a second with many intrusive thoughts. A part of her wanted to wish her son luck, which she had always done in the past. However, a bigger part ached to tell him to reject it and come home so her mind could finally be at ease. Even though she knew how impossible the latter was, the terrified mother still went for it. After all, there was no harm in trying.
“Liam, please don’t go. Come home,” she urged in a low yet firm tone, despite knowing the obvious answer.
As expected, her son chuckled mildly, believing this to be one of her usual harmless motherly gestures. Liam gently reassured Pamela that he would do great and make her proud, adding that he would steer out of trouble if he could, for her sake.
It took a lot of willpower and strength for Pamela to keep her tears at bay and not break down on that phone. But the worried mother steeled her outpouring of emotions so that she wouldn’t discourage or scare her little boy. Then, to her disappointment, he quickly informed her that he had to leave and hung up, but not without leaving her one final message: “See you after Christmas. I love you.”
Pamela broke down as she remembered those words. She recalled running to the church and losing herself to prayer whenever the dreadful feeling overwhelmed her. However, it all proved futile whenever her thoughts drifted to him. In fact, the growing sense of unease only worsened whenever she tuned into international news on her television.
More deaths kept rolling in from the Middle East following a series of attacks. Ultimately, the worst had happened, and the military just broke the sad news to her—her poor Liam was among those multiple deaths they spoke about on the news.
Pamela didn’t even have the energy to cry. It seemed as if she had shed everything she had in her during all those months she worried about his safety. As if news of his death wasn’t heartbreaking enough, the mother received more troubling news: Liam’s body was not recognizable. Only his dog tag served as the means of identification the military could work with. His body was so disfigured that the coroner advised against Pamela taking a look at it, fearing for her declining mental state.
Notwithstanding, the heartbroken mother requested to see her baby. After all, she was never going to get another chance after his funeral. The officers hesitated a bit before giving in to her request. Pamela took a deep breath, her heart heavy with grief
, as she approached her son’s unrecognizable body on the cool slab. She gently lifted the sheet, her hands trembling as she anticipated the shocking sight she would meet. Then it finally came—the sight that unleashed a whirlwind of emotions within her.
As the mother gazed upon the body, her eyes roving around the damaged flesh, searching for any familiar feature, she found that nothing about what she was looking at reminded her of her son. One would even wonder how that was ever a human being. Only his right arm remained intact, while the rest of the body was covered in charred, scarred, and discolored flesh. Pamela felt bile rise to her throat. The sight was like a punch to her gut, knocking the air right out of her.
Suddenly, the tears she had swallowed all this while rushed out of her eyes. Her Liam, who had once walked into the military hail and hearty, had returned to her as a messy heap. The realization was too hard to swallow. Her legs, weak with emotions, gave out underneath her as she allowed herself space to grieve. At that moment, Pamela wanted nothing more than to join Rory and her beloved Liam in the afterlife.
Her heart had barely healed from the pain of losing her first love, and now it had to deal with this torture. She could not overcome the bitterness and anger that enveloped her. Had she not agreed to her son’s dream of throwing his life away in such a manner, he would have probably been alive at this point.
Pamela wailed heavily, her feelings switching from pain to disappointment and then anger. Roland arrived in time to hold his mother in one piece. Subsequently, Pamela fell into a state of depression. Seeing how badly she was handling the situation, Roland had to admit her into the hospital, where she received treatment while he partook in the funeral arrangements. When the day finally arrived, Pamela watched on with dull, apathetic eyes as they laid her dear son to rest. Shockingly, she did not cry like before, only looking on as the ceremony unfolded before her.
Unbeknownst to everyone, the aggrieved mother had unconsciously slipped into a phase that would lead to a life-changing surprise in a few days. Pamela never showed signs of recovery following Liam’s funeral. Instead, she became a shell of her former self. She refused to eat regularly, engage in discussions with family and friends, or even leave her house. In addition, the distraught mother resigned from her habit of visiting the church like usual, choosing instead to give in to the confines of her inner thoughts.
Worried about her faltering mental state, Roland made arrangements to take her along with him to his home in the big city. However, she adamantly refused, offering fake promises and reassurances that she was coping just fine. When his pleas kept falling on deaf ears, Roland settled for appointing a caretaker for his mother so he could return to his business at home. The arrangement was good for a while, but that was until something shocking and unexpected occurred—Pamela suddenly started spreading word that her son Liam wasn’t dead yet.
Of course, everyone believed this was absurd—they had buried him just two days ago. However, his mother begged to differ. She took her case to the corporals and officers she knew in the military, begging them over the phone to exhume her son’s body from the grave for proper evaluation. Naturally, they ignored the request, believing that the mother was still somewhere in the stages of grief. Yet Pamela was unrelenting in her newfound quest. Something didn’t seem right, and she needed answers immediately—and unfortunately, those answers lay where she couldn’t reach, about six feet beneath the ground.
Other than that, she had other problems to face. News of her inquiries spread quickly within the vicinity, and Roland caught wind of it soon after. Debates on whether to confine Pamela in an old people’s home or a mental institute became the order of the day.
The strange discussions broke her beyond measure. Her urgent pleas that she was not crazy, but only needed confirmation, only went further in proving the mounting case they had against her. Sooner or later, Pamela feared she would wake up in an unknown place if care were not taken. This possibility didn’t scare her, though—but what frightened her was the thought of being confined without getting to the bottom of her gut feeling.
So when nobody listened to her pleas, she took matters into her own hands and made a drastic move. Pamela enlisted the help of a local to dig up Liam’s grave. Her heart rammed in her chest as she thought about the gravity of her actions. However, her conscience—the voice of calm in her head—urged her to continue without reservations.
When the coffin was finally in sight, the desperate mother leaped into the open space and sat on the lid, her hands clearing more dirt out of the way. Finally, the moment she had desperately waited for had arrived. With trembling hands, she lifted the coffin open, her face contorting in mild disgust at the smell of damp dirt and decay that wafted to her nose. She searched for what her mind had been bugging her about, and seconds later, she saw it.
“I knew it!” she exclaimed as she peered at the object of her inspection. Beside the knuckle of the body’s right hand, she saw a symbol she never knew her son to have before, and inside it was the name “Kstar” tatted in tiny italicized letters. Quickly, she called the corporals, informing them of her findings and asking for further investigation into the case. For one, they were deeply concerned about the extent to which she had gone to prove this point to them—so much so that they put her in a psychiatric ward for evaluation. But at the same time, they couldn’t completely ignore the desperate mother. The name “Kstar” rang a bell among the officers, and based on their records, it belonged to a man who had gone missing in action.
This discrepancy led to an immediate investigation into Liam’s case. Officers in the Middle East received direct orders to gather information on the displaced soldiers as well as their last notable whereabouts. Due to the tense atmosphere in the region, there were multiple strains during the investigation. However, after a few days, the officers made a shocking discovery—the man they had buried was indeed another officer, one who had died in the conflict. Meanwhile, Liam survived and was recuperating in an enemy shelter they never knew existed.
When news reached the Ree family, their eyes widened in shock and disbelief. Never would they have imagined such a bizarre twist, and to think that Pamela’s instincts had led to this discovery shocked them beyond reason. Without hesitation, Liam was medevaced back to the U.S., where he received proper medical attention. Pamela, who had been released from her confinement following her amazing discovery, waited with bated breath for the moment she would set eyes on her little boy. Little did she know she was unprepared for the sight she was about to meet—Liam had lost one of his arms.
As he lay on the hospital bed, he recounted tales of his experience in the war. Thinking he was on the verge of death, he handed his tag to his trusted friend to take it back home to his family. However, by some stroke of luck, some people in the enemy camp were generous enough to treat his wounds and hide him away until his colleagues found him. Tears streamed down Pamela’s face as she listened on, her heart aching from the intense pain it had endured all the while.
Subsequently, the military arranged a proper funeral for Liam’s colleague, whom they had initially buried in his place. And the Rees gradually regained their sense of livelihood. It took a while, but the family scaled through the harsh ordeal they faced during that period. Liam struggled to come to terms with his new normal now that he had a missing limb. However, Pamela didn’t mind. She was perfectly content with the unexpected turn of events and was grateful to the forces that had played a decisive role in getting her to this point.
