August Affliction

Chapter 4: To the End of Oblivion

By Benson Langat.

"Ida, where does your story begin?"

The cold lifeless steel chair on which her buttocks were rested on scraped on the floor as she turned her backside once as if in discomfort. No, she was just deep in thought. The air was filled with tension so alpable, the room so quiet and the students all staring, waiting. She breathed in cold air, felt her lungs fill and chest cavity stretch out. She exhaled heavily.

Staring coldly; as if lifelessly gazing right into oblivion, she could almost feel the hair shafts in her head rise to a zephyr, and dropping back while brushing against her cheeks with the long ends sweeping against her neck in a mellow manner. Her beautiful evenly light skin had turned pale and eyes gray. But her striking allure seemed to have a hard time fading. The hairs through the pores of her skin stood upright amidst the insipidity of their possessor. Her lips made way for words to come out, but got stuck midway leaving her half mum and bewildered. She took a deep breath and recalculated her words. This time, her lips opened up to actual ones.

"My life begins in a baby crib, with a music box playing my favorite childhood jingle, a dream catcher hang up above my head and my little feet waggling in the tiny bed. I get up and my feeble hands try to maintain balance but I helplessly fall on my back. Surprisingly, I find this amusing, so it happens over and over again. I see a young woman, my mother presumably smiling broadly up across the room as she walks on with the muscles on her face stretching all the more to expose her beautiful teeth. How she makes me throw my hands up and sideways as I try with all failing efforts to get out of my little baby cage and reach to her loving arms. Without question, she picks me up and warms my tiny face with a memorable peck which draws cute little sounds from my baby mouth. The love of a mother.

"My story progresses in turns, as events of extreme love turn to extreme betrayal. Time flashes on to a later time when the young lady, the very one I presume to be my mother takes me out for a walk. Her beauty is so evident; she is so full of life and gusto. We laugh a lot as the seven-year-old me capers about before her glowing eyes, every single time coming back to her hands and attempting but failing at pulling her down to the ground with me. My life is full of laughter and bliss, and so is hers.

"In the sudden split of a second, everything stops. The birds in flight pause mid-air and the humidified air freezes at a point. The chirps cease and the clouds halt in movement. The trees sway one last time then seem to get stuck and inclined to either one or both halves of either direction. It would be a shocker were it not for the somewhat comforting fact that we both notice this. No, we are not dead. At least not yet.

"The morning peace and excitement turns drab and topsy-turvy until a gunshot tears into the air and makes everything clear. This was a painful memory. The fast-moving piece of metal so honorably named a bullet with the make of lead and a shell, casing up the pernicious powder; speeds on across and past us, missing mother's left cheek by a whisker. It is to be noted that I was beside this beautiful woman as this happened.

"My story turns from fear and confusion to utter betrayal. I see the woman I so loved with the whole of my heart drag me into a bush, asks me to hide and takes off in flight. I place my faith in her, but little did I know that was going to be the second last time I ever set my eyes on her. The last is when she returns to bury my father in yells for claims that he endangered our lives in every chance he got. She forces one last smile on me as she turns away with tears filled in her eyes. Utters the words "I love you" but doesn't even look back to ensure I heard her right. Betrayal. Betrayal is where my story ends."

Half of the class had their faces dressed in crestfallen looks. The ladies were drowning in a sea of commiseration and pity, half of them feeling sorry while the other half trying to fit their soles into her shoes. Ida herself was covered in unseeable tears, with her outside still looking pale while she crumbled inside like a house of cards. Mrs. Wayne walked across the room to shut the door, cleared her throat then called the class to order.