“Those heart hammering
nightmares that start to lose coherence even as you are waking up from them,
but that still manage to leave their mouldering fingerprints all across your
day” Mike Carey
Shekira stop! Shekira stop!! Shekira stop!!!
Was that her name or a chant, she couldn't tell. She was running, running like her life depended on it, and at that moment it did.
Things got serious so fast she couldn't tell the exact moment it happened, one minute she had her little nephew Dagogo on her laps listening to his ridiculous tales from school, the next minute she was crying over a broken bottle of perfume, and the very next minute she was in the race of her life.
Shekira! His voice again. Was that actually her name? She kept running, three blocks ahead she saw a lady seated on a bench between two houses, and somehow although she wasn't close enough she saw that the numbers were 87 and 89. How she spotted the numbers was nothing short of a miracle because the street was unusually dark, and everything seemed surreal at that moment.
She ran to the woman who sat between 87 and 89, sat on the bench with her and tried to catch her breath, in a flash the young man who was after her in hot pursuit; the same one who had been screaming the name, he also stopped. He gave her the briefest of glances, and immediately walked past her into 89, when he came out he was accompanied by a fierce looking cutlass, from the looks of it, it had recently been sharpened.
A shrill sound so evil pierced the air, it was like nothing she had ever heard; it was a laugh, his laughter. The look on his face was so grotesque, it could only be described as “pure evil”, and as she looked closely into his face she could also dictate a smirk of satisfaction. She took in the rest of his diminutive frame, and half-naked body made decent with briefs that had undoubtedly seen better days.
She sat transfixed as he inched closer, an involuntary move forward brought her leg in contact with an object beneath the bench, and she quickly picked it up and discovered it was a knife.
All the while the fat lady on the bench had a knowing smile on her face.
‘Shekira come to us’ he said with the cutlass aimed at her heart, she moved suddenly, and he narrowly missed, she tried to fight back with the knife and managed to give him a cut on his hand before she knew what was happening she was ceased in a death grip by the fat lady. Her aggressor repeated the sound he made earlier, even as she struggled against the lady some part of her noted that that was the ugliest laughter she had ever had the misfortune to hear.
Her aggressor, Mr Diminutive frame and ugly laughter, started digging the floor, right in front of 89, she pleaded subtly with the fat lady, ensuring to keep all the fear out of her voice.
“Please Ma let me go, please I beg you in the name of God”
The fat lady gave a laugh that was devoid of any mirth and somehow filled her with more dread than either of the earlier ones had done.
The fat lady said, “My dear girl, this is what I do, I hold the girls while he digs up their graves”
She felt like a cornered animal at that moment, her heart was in her mouth all of a sudden, she struggled with all her might, wriggling from side to side. Like a miracle she found herself free from that vice-like grip of the fat woman, she made a mad dash for the road ahead, after a few blocks she discovered that no one was after her, but she didn't break her run.
Freedom, at last, that was what came to her mind when she saw some other people only a few blocks ahead in the street. It wasn't to be. She realized there was a clay pot in the middle of the street with fire coming out of it and human figures in white and red dancing around it, she could also hear they were singing, but she had never heard any song like it.
She was stuck in that place; between the devil and the deep blue sea. She couldn’t go forward for what seemed like a cultist celebration and behind were people after her life for some unknown reason.
Fortunately, as was the way of humans when stuck in a nightmare they are determined not to endure further, she forced her eyes open.
She was on her bed, and the clock, by her bedside, said she had only been asleep for 3hours.
Was that her name or a chant, she couldn't tell. She was running, running like her life depended on it, and at that moment it did.
Things got serious so fast she couldn't tell the exact moment it happened, one minute she had her little nephew Dagogo on her laps listening to his ridiculous tales from school, the next minute she was crying over a broken bottle of perfume, and the very next minute she was in the race of her life.
Shekira! His voice again. Was that actually her name? She kept running, three blocks ahead she saw a lady seated on a bench between two houses, and somehow although she wasn't close enough she saw that the numbers were 87 and 89. How she spotted the numbers was nothing short of a miracle because the street was unusually dark, and everything seemed surreal at that moment.
She ran to the woman who sat between 87 and 89, sat on the bench with her and tried to catch her breath, in a flash the young man who was after her in hot pursuit; the same one who had been screaming the name, he also stopped. He gave her the briefest of glances, and immediately walked past her into 89, when he came out he was accompanied by a fierce looking cutlass, from the looks of it, it had recently been sharpened.
A shrill sound so evil pierced the air, it was like nothing she had ever heard; it was a laugh, his laughter. The look on his face was so grotesque, it could only be described as “pure evil”, and as she looked closely into his face she could also dictate a smirk of satisfaction. She took in the rest of his diminutive frame, and half-naked body made decent with briefs that had undoubtedly seen better days.
She sat transfixed as he inched closer, an involuntary move forward brought her leg in contact with an object beneath the bench, and she quickly picked it up and discovered it was a knife.
All the while the fat lady on the bench had a knowing smile on her face.
‘Shekira come to us’ he said with the cutlass aimed at her heart, she moved suddenly, and he narrowly missed, she tried to fight back with the knife and managed to give him a cut on his hand before she knew what was happening she was ceased in a death grip by the fat lady. Her aggressor repeated the sound he made earlier, even as she struggled against the lady some part of her noted that that was the ugliest laughter she had ever had the misfortune to hear.
Her aggressor, Mr Diminutive frame and ugly laughter, started digging the floor, right in front of 89, she pleaded subtly with the fat lady, ensuring to keep all the fear out of her voice.
“Please Ma let me go, please I beg you in the name of God”
The fat lady gave a laugh that was devoid of any mirth and somehow filled her with more dread than either of the earlier ones had done.
The fat lady said, “My dear girl, this is what I do, I hold the girls while he digs up their graves”
She felt like a cornered animal at that moment, her heart was in her mouth all of a sudden, she struggled with all her might, wriggling from side to side. Like a miracle she found herself free from that vice-like grip of the fat woman, she made a mad dash for the road ahead, after a few blocks she discovered that no one was after her, but she didn't break her run.
Freedom, at last, that was what came to her mind when she saw some other people only a few blocks ahead in the street. It wasn't to be. She realized there was a clay pot in the middle of the street with fire coming out of it and human figures in white and red dancing around it, she could also hear they were singing, but she had never heard any song like it.
She was stuck in that place; between the devil and the deep blue sea. She couldn’t go forward for what seemed like a cultist celebration and behind were people after her life for some unknown reason.
Fortunately, as was the way of humans when stuck in a nightmare they are determined not to endure further, she forced her eyes open.
She was on her bed, and the clock, by her bedside, said she had only been asleep for 3hours.
***
“My sleep wasn’t
peaceful, though. I had the sense of emerging from a world of dark, haunted
places where I travelled alone” Suzanne Collins
