These walls are all too familiar. I get up and sit on the edge of my bed and see a small, fragile body sleeping across the room.  She is like me in every way, but I will never let her go through what I did.

I shudder as I feel the ground rumble and shake. They are bombing closer and closer to the orphanage every day, and I fear the day they will reach us. Ms. Bronson tells us not to worry about it; that our orphanage has two underground levels where we will be safe. Yet I wonder if living down there, where one cannot find a single flicker of light, is just as good as being in hell and dead.
No, I must stop myself; I am not the person I once was. I look over at the jagged broken mirror glass on my bed side and remember what it what it used to reflect.
***
I see a red reflection on the mirror’s surface. My own blood. Ms. Bronson runs into the room as I throw the mirror and watch it slide into the darkness under my bed. She starts screaming words I cannot comprehend and drags me out of the room.
My wrists are bandaged by the doctor and I am taken to the psychologist, whom I encounter almost every week. This week, again, I have no answer to her question: “Why?”
What can I say that she doesn’t already know? My parents are dead, killed by two enemy soldiers. I am an orphan. I miss my parents. I miss being loved. Is it not that simple?
I go back to my room and Ms. Bronson brings me my lunch and sits down next to me. I look at her face and see a small smile on her thin lips.
“Somebody would like to adopt you. A family, actually. They are very loving folks and have a young daughter,” Ms. Bronson whispers and continues, “You can leave this evening.”
I nod my head silently and Ms. Bronson hurriedly leaves the room. I wonder who would want to take on the burden of another child, especially when rumor has it that a war is beginning soon. I look around the gray walls of my room, and say a silent good bye to this horrible prison that I’ve been confined in for the past two years. I pack up and as I am about to put the picture of my parents in my bag, I kiss their faces, and tell them I am going to be a son again.
Ms. Bronson walks me out of my room and we go into the lobby where I see three people waiting. The woman has soft brown eyes and night black hair in a ponytail. She looks very similar to my own mother, except slightly taller and slimmer. She is holding the hand of a girl who looks to be about ten years old. A man, dressed in light brown pants and a blue shirt smiles and walks over to me to introduce himself and the family. My new mother’s name is Loretta, my new father’s name is Isaac, and my sister’s name is Mika.
I walk out of the orphanage, surrounded by warmth and protection of my new family, and leave behind the world of war and hatred.

It’s been about three months since I have left the orphanage and my arms are no longer full of scars. My new parents treat me just like my mother and father did. We go out on family picnics every weekend near the lake and watch the ducks eat our food. My new parents smile a lot when they see Mika and me running after the ducks, so this makes us run even more. O
My new parents work very important jobs, or so I’m told. Our mother knows how to use the typewriter so she often writes important papers for important people. Our father is some kind of official that works for the government, but he never tells Mika or me anything about his work. He comes home each day with a big smile on his face, laughing as he picks Mika and me up.
The longer I live with them, the more they remind me of my birth parents. It feels like I am living in my own paradise, and I no longer have a sad past. I am flourishing on their love, and growing stronger each day. I am changing: I smile, laugh, and see how even in the midst of a world so ugly, people and life can be beautiful.

Today war was officially declared, but nothing seems to have changed drastically for us. We go out on picnics less, but Mika and I don’t seem to mind; we are perfectly happy with indoor picnics in our house.
One thing does change, however. I see father coming home with a smile that gradually becomes smaller and fainter every day. Even mother seems reluctant to go to work and takes more sick days at home taking care of us. And then one day, something changes.
A few days after war is declared, my father goes to work after giving everyone kisses as usual, and then my mother leaves for work as well. Mother comes back home around three in the afternoon, and tells us that our father may be a little late today. I do not notice the wetness in her eyes and her red nose. She brings us downstairs in the basement, a place in the house we rarely wander, and brings Mika and me in front of a wall. She moves tensely and pushes the wall at an angle to reveal a small crawlspace. “This is where you will be safe tonight” she speaks holding back any emotion. I am confused at why she is not coming in with us, and when I ask her, she simply states, “They just want me and your father, not our children. Both you and Mika will be safe, and promise me if anything ever happens to me or your father, you will take care of each other and never abandon one another.”
She closes the wall-door and a about half an hour later, I feel the ground rumble with the bombs razing the surface. I hear a loud crash from upstairs and foreign footsteps entering our home. My mother shouts. She is silenced.
It’s not fair. When the rumbling stops and everything is quiet, I walk upstairs with Mika to find our mother, just as I had found my mother three years ago, with bullets through her selfless and caring heart. I am going back to the orphanage. The piece of mirror under the bed is waiting for me. I am once again, loved no more.
***
It has been four years since I lost my second mother, and I am back as these stone walls surround me. Mika came back to the orphanage with me, and I saw my former self in her: delicate, wounded, and depressed.
I was wrong about not being loved any more. Mika loves me. I see a blend of both my mothers in her, and I will love her till the day I die.
I will turn eighteen next month. I will take Mika with me and we will travel out of this horrible, war-torn country. I will start a new life for both Mika and me, and perhaps I will dedicate my life to loving others, just like both my parents did.
I hear a cough coming from the small body on the other bed. She is waking up now. I walk over and sit down on her bed. She will not suffer like I did. Maybe I am not meant to be loved, but at least I can love others.