Your mother never wanted you to leave for the army. She'd promised you she can handle keeping the both of you alive; there was no need for you to go!

She saw so much potential in you. You were smart, caring, and everything else she would want in a child of hers. Most important of all, you had dreams. You wanted to someday be someone great and beloved. You were already great and beloved to her, though, your poor mother. She loved you so much, and she hoped that—someday—you would be praised and loved by others, too. She just... couldn't handle the idea of you achieving that dream by dying a hero.

The time came when your father died in the war. She was holding you, covering your little eyes as she watches the mangled corpse of her husband pass by on a wooden cart. She was frozen in pain, just holding you—her little baby. All she has left...

...which is why she begged you to stay when you told her you've enlisted. "We don't need to! I don't want to lose you! I promise, I'll work extra at the market so I can finally get you into college, okay?! Just please don't...!"

You didn't listen—only hugging her silently before walking away.

You were the light of her life. You were mammy's hero. She just wishes she didn't feel like that light is flickering in her heart as it threatens to extinguish.

It's been four years, and the war is finally over. She can barely breathe as she pushes past the other families who've come to find their sons as the warship returns to the harbor.

Tears build up in her throat, her hands shaking with fear as one of the men rolls down a cart filled with the fallen.

"Please don't let that be you..." she murmurs, her voice broken by a sob. "God, please... My baby is coming home to me, I- I know it..."