It’s a cold freezing night the day death comes knocking. The rain beats mercilessly against the window pane,even as it goes patter-patter on the roof. The winds howl dejectedly on being denied to get in, screaming all the more furiously around the house and in the trees outside as if they too, like death, have come to claim me. Inside my bed, I am dressed like one going mountain climbing with layer upon layer of clothing beneath a pile of blankets.
And yet I shiver. Not the kind elicited by external cold from the elements, but the slow-burning chill emanating from the bone marrow, down my back into my knees and toes. Then backs up again and heads to my head at full blast and staying lodged there like an air compressor building up pressure. Even in this dire state I dare not lose my humor, and I acknowledge that I now know what it feels like to be a balloon.
The house and its inhabitants are dead asleep. I keep thinking that if I silently leave without too much hustle, I will leave them to have at least a few more hours of sleep before I rain sadness around their ears. Am not too full of myself as to think they wouldn’t go on without me; neither am I fickle to think that they wouldn’t sigh in sadness; but I have measured my worth with something akin to realism and I have come to the conclusion that no one and nothing is indispensable. Nothing lasts forever.
My skin is clammy to the touch, evidently I must be sweating. Maybe I have a burning fever even but I am so cold. Eerily, in the midst of all this physical agony, my mind is very clear and my thoughts turn even now to you Julian. I wonder where you are and long for you at this time when am at my weakest and most vulnerable. I know that even though the glow of youthful beauty and sensual strength has been replaced by the sickly, musty smell and pallor of ill-health,even now, you would be at your most charming self. Your clear eyes would be filled with concern and your hand at my brow would be soft with love. Your voice would roll over me in encouragement,and occasionally you would emit a muffled chuckle at our silly exchanges, or at a phrase in the book you would be reading as you watch over me.
‘Oh, Julian!’ Your name is a soft sob on my breath and though I say nothing out loud as my throat is burning, my cry is mournful all the more.
In my mind’s eye, I battle to reach out across the chasm that separates us; a divide of our own making, entrenched in us by the cultures and stereotypes in our society. I wish now that I could see you once more, just to be able to tell you how I feel,and all the dreams and hopes and fears of this young girl- not so young anymore I guess,life has me jaded and cynical.
The wind blows hard as ever outside and the tornado in my head is issuing blood-curdling screams in startling proportions. I turn over on my side.
I wonder much what it would feel like to live with you, to share my life in close proximity with you. I long to experience your being, to know you more, falling deeper in love with you the more I got to know you. But all this is wishful thinking, so I concentrate more on the memories of you that I have stored. I laugh at the remembered easy humor, I recall your moments of magnanimity in the face of utter despair. I marvel at your wisdom and temerity. My heart aches for the loss of your mother and bleeds the more at your difficult childhood thereafter.
My cheeks burn in shame at the way my parents treated you; all the more because I didn’t stand up and defy them in your favor. But we both know you wouldn’t have let me do that; such is your honor, that you wouldn’t be a ‘thief’ as you termed it ; that you would only marry me with my parents consent according to the customs of my people.
I wish now that I had something of yours to remember you by. A child would be nice, I muse whimsically. But the farthest we went down that road was when you kissed me; that one time when you hadn’t seen me in forever when you took me by surprise at the arts festival. I wonder if you still taste as sweet.
The pain dips lower and pools at the base of my spine. My knees somehow curl up towards my chest and I fancy am in a womb as I lay in the fetal position.
Disjointed pictures run through my head and I struggle to make sense of it all. I see a house on fire,burning, and I marvel that the columns and struts that hold the structure together are always the last ones to give out. Maybe there’s a lesson here, I just don’t see it yet. Is it because am burning up? But this is no time for rhetorics- or maybe it is!
Among some African communities, it is common to hear people greeting each-other saying, ‘May you live forever!’. Is this irony, sarcasm or knowledge of a deeper truth? Is it possible that one may live forever?
As I simmer in my agony, my joints aching and back recoiling like a troubled eel, I get my epiphany. There was no bright light neither was there trumpet sounds. Rather it poured into me luxuriously like thick warm honey, flowing over me gently and pooling cozily in my soul, settling into every crevice of doubt and I accepted it.
The body is a house. A familiar residence in which a soul or spirit resides so we may recognize each other. But bodies, like houses, can be rented out, or occupied by other spirits so that in madness, you stare into the eyes that are the windows of the soul but you recognize not the resident.
Oh Julian, this house of mine easily besets me. Now I know how to breach the chasm and end this misery. In the hazy world of tumultuous emotions and feverish wisdom between waking in agony and floating in delusion, anything is possible. It occurs to me that when houses are left vacant, they rot away from disuse.
Resilience. The heart beats constantly from the moment of conception till death. Though we rarely notice it, it laboriously but faithful executes its duties day and night to keep us in smooth working order. Its amazing that a person is only declared dead once the heart stops beating and not a moment before. You may be brain-damaged, effectively making you a vegetable, and hence clinically dead but until that tiny little bundle of muscle calls it quits-you are still not dead. Resilience!
I am free, free to be with you. The pain is gone, and the laughter comes easily to my lips. I see you now coming towards me and my heart soars in gladness, grateful for the gift of you and the banishment of fear.
“Julian!!” your name escapes from me like a prayer.
As you open your arms to me, calling me softly in a whisper, I know that I am home. Your kiss is sweeter than I remember, and the gentle firmness of your hand in mine is all the assurance I need.
