Paint Me (GXG) ✒️

30

I had woken up on the couch, where we had slept off watching a movie. I tried to stretch, as I was stiff from the position, I had slept in. But, Fareedah was still latched onto my arm. I felt my cheeks heat up at the realization that she didn't run away and then tell me to get out once again. I tried to get up, so I could make something for breakfast before she woke up, but the moment I tried to get up, her grip tightened around my arm. I frowned as I began to hear quiet whispers and tears. "Fareedah?" She didn't reply me as she continued whimpering, making me worry even more. I gently touched her arm with my left hand, rubbing gently as I asked, "Can I see your face?" as I tried to lift her face. But she quickly buried her face in my arm, crying.

"Ni zunubi ne (I am a sin)," she wailed, keeping her face buried in my arm.

I was a bit familiar with what she was saying, because they haunted me for a while. "Uhn?" I asked, getting really worried. I was glad that she was making the serious effort to not let me go again, but that didn't change the fact that her reaction made me worry.

"Please," I begged her as I attempted to look at her again, but she didn't let me. Realizing that her arms weren't as tight as they were, I quickly pulled her into a hug, which only made her cry more. "There there." I kept gently patting her back, which seemed to be working as she began calming down.

We had been there for some minutes, before she sat upright and began wiping her eyes. But, the moment she looked at me, it was like she was reminded of something and went back to crying again. She wailed harder than she was wailing before. "Fareedah, I am a sinner," she told me, burying her face in her palm.

I shook my head, not caring if she was looking at me. "No, you are not."

"But I have sinned," she said between her tears, "doesn't that make me a sinner."

I shook my head again as I asked, "Is the sin in this room with us?"

"We are sinning."

I went silent, not wanting to argue with her, while I sat there, waiting for her to calm down a bit.

It took a while, but she finally did. When she did, I soon asked her, "And, why do you think so?"

"Uba (Father), said it."

I frowned a bit. "Uba?"

"My father."

I sighed, not knowing what to say to her. I couldn't sit there and start preaching about how it wasn't a sin, because I was also taught same. It was something that was often preached against and if it wasn't because I often live in the present, I will also be in a very conflicted state of mind. But, I always try to do what made me happy, and considered how I felt within. "Are you happy?" I asked her, earning a frown from her.

"Uh?"

"Are you happy?" I asked again.

She sighed, looking at her fingers as she played with them. "That is a complex question," she replied, "when I am with you, I am happy. But when you go, I am left with these thoughts and fears." Her eyes begin to water again. "They'd send me back there Celia," she said in a shaking voice, making my heart skip in panic.

"Send you where?" I asked in fright, hoping it wasn't what I thought it was.

She looked at me with her reddened eyes, tears had began to roll down her cheeks as she said, "To a place where I am to be redeemed."

My fears were beginning to be true. "What?"

"The retreat were they deliver people like me," she tried to explain. "I don't want to go back there. It was horror." She began to cry harder, while my mind began to run wild. Who did that to her? Why? I knew why, but who would comfortably do that to a person?