My father was a soldier. 

In our family, it wasn't all that odd. We certainly all got used to it. He went to work while Mother tended to me and my 256 siblings. It takes a great deal of effort to corral 256 jumping beans before school, and it's a bit more difficult bringing them all home from school. We all knew the sort of business he got into wasn't glamorous, but it did pay the bills. And it certainly paid for the food to fuel 257 beans for them to thrive in this world. But it turned out that Mother wasn’t the best with numbers, and every day our financial situation improved. 

While my father was busy at work, I was busy at school. I studied the books, particularly the ones with words in them. I never quite figured out the meaning to them, but I was drawn to a good story. It turns out, we all tell stories from time to time. I started telling stories of my own, such as when I had to explain where all of my money had come from. 

It started with the books. While I couldn’t get enough, I knew a lot of my classmates, not to mention my siblings, who were voracious readers. Truly - they were insatiable. A lust for absorbing knowledge from the page, they were vicious and devoured the school’s library before long. So, I began to find books. It started slowly, as with any story. A book from a student’s locker, a foray into another school’s library, it came easy. My bag always had space for more books, so I helped out those who also sought more. My 255 siblings had a great deal of time on their hands, mind you, because of all the time spent outside of school (it turns out, school only lasts so long in the day), and, seeing as beans never have to sleep, Mother faltered in any efforts to dissuade my siblings from reading all other hours of the day. 

Not that she tried. Anyway, it all started to deteriorate rather rapidly. One day, my 235 siblings came back from school. They, of course, were ecstatic. A new shipment of books had come into the school, delivered by yours truly, and they had not only excitedly consumed the content of the book, but they, inspired by the books, metrics, measurements, and like the discovery of electricity, decided to instantly put their knowledge into practice. Mother responded positively to this development, and asked what sort of book they had decided to pursue this time. “Lowney’s Cook Book,” they said in unison. 

Mother followed up, as disinterested as usual and already turning to deal with another household task, “that’s great, children. Now go and clean your rooms.”

It only became my problem later when I, as the oldest and most accomplished (read responsible) child of my father and Mother, was asked about why 21 of my siblings hadn’t cleaned their rooms that evening. I thought about it for a moment and did not particularly know either, so I informed my parents that I would take leave to go investigate.

I entered one room after the other, of the 256 other than my own, and decided it did in fact seem like 21 rooms of my siblings hadn’t been cleaned that evening. In fact, one hadn’t been cleaned in quite some time, possibly even days! Of course, that made sense. One of my siblings had run off. Little to the notice of my otherwise preoccupied parents. I suspected he had been slaughtered by dogs, run aground by a bus, or otherwise picked off by some giant-sized pigeon. It was of, certainly, little consequence to myself. I didn’t ever talk to him. Or really, the other 20. My parents did not care for long, as it fixed any temporary issues with money, expenses, and made for some space in the car, at the dinner table, and for an ever-so-slightly degree more of quiet (if not barely perceptible) in the house.

So as it would later turn out, those 20 beans missing had been prepared as food and eaten by a mixture of their siblings and classmates. That cook book, aforementioned, had inextricably been in one of the hauls I brought to our meagre school, duly compensated of course, but with some rather unintended consequences. It was the first time any of them had read a cook book, and, having been poor enough to be hungry between meals, had put knowledge into action so rapidly that 20 beans were less from this world. I confronted my parents once more that day, and mentioned that the 21 of them had gone to college on scholarship, offered by some Rockefeller or some such, and that it was such a fine opportunity and so time sensitive that they failed to check in back home before going off to achieve great things.

I considered my options and decided to flee from home afterward to avoid the cannibals that my siblings had become unleashed upon the world, the aftermath of my greed, and to actually achieve things of my own. From obtaining books to more interesting items. My story is perhaps for a different time. No, today, I am here to think quietly, perhaps aloud, about my father. 

My father was weak. He wasn’t quite the normal type of soldier that fights for nations and freedom, liberty, against some great enemy, and even valiantly triumphs or heroically falters. He was merely a cog in some machine, concealed to the everyday passersby of Detroit, and, to a fault, he served his purpose before faltering. 

It turns out soldiers die in war, even those that don’t see it coming. Perhaps someone is better for it.