Atonement

In the novel/movie Atonement, authored by Ian McKewan, a most interesting device was employed; one I might be interested in pursuing. It was 1935 England when a young, thirteen-year old girl, who has a crush on her sister's boyfriend witnesses a couple of events between them that, coupled with a jealousy she feels, but cannot perceive on a conscious level, reports him as the rapist of another young girl.

The consequences of her action led to the young man being imprisoned and eventually released to fight with the British forces in Normandy. The young girl's sister was eventually killed during the bombing raids on London, and the young man died in France. Their love never requited.

The young girl was a writer, and according to the story, she lived into old age and authored twenty-one novels, the last being entitled, Atonement. In the novel the character wrote, the two lovers each survived the war; and the younger sister, at the age of eighteen now carrying the guilt of her actions of five years prior, and having witnessed the ravages of war as a nurse, found her sister living in a flat in London. She also found the young man there with her. His rage, powerfully demonstrated, led him to tell her to go home, tell her parents what had actually happened, then find a solicitor (lawyer) and make a full report to him regarding her story, and to write him and give him all the details as to why she had done what she had done.

What it got me to thinking was my friend, John, and the dreams and guilt I have carried for now close to forty years for his death. In a story, I could bring him back to a life filled with all the hope and glory that life brings: something long ago denied him. In this story I could weave some of the dreams I've had over the years that told me the whole event had occured, John had survived and lived elsewhere; dreams where my dad got angry with John because he saw John "mistreating" me and I defended John; dreams where he was still alive. Maybe through such a story, John could live on.