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I Wanted to Be a Hero

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Submitted By phil1775
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I wanted to be a hero
- A profile of James Hunt

The white foam sticks to his day old beard, as he takes a sip of his bud light. He suddenly drops the empty bottle so it shatters all over the floor. “Give me one more!” he yells at the terrified bar keeper. It is the fourth of July 2014, and this is James Hunt, a lonely drunk crippling who used to be a first class soldier.

“It is my birthday today,” James tells with a sigh. “It is my birthday and the whole land is celebrating, except me. I have nothing to celebrate.” He looks deeply in to a decayed American flag that is hanging across the bar. Two years ago, James was a tall erect soldier with one thing in his mind and that was to serve his country. “I stepped on a landmine after just a week in Afghanistan, I never even got into a fight. Fucking Taliban’s,” he says with despair in his voice.

The sound of the firecrackers outside nearly makes him jump out of his skin. He slowly bends down and pulls up both his trouser legs, revealing his artificial limbs. “I will never be able to make love to a woman again.” James bursts in to tears and signals the man in the bar for another beer. “I have given my dead swinging dick for America and for what cause?” Before the accident, James lived a life with both wife and kids, but his injury was too much for them to handle, so they left James on his own. “No one wants to deal with a crippling,” he says with his eyes again focusing on the American flag. Now he lives on the streets, and whenever he has begged for enough coins, he goes to Sam´s bar to get a cold refreshing beer. For the first time, he looks me right in the eyes. “I wanted to be a hero, and now I just want to be a man again.”

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