“I guess,” he shrugs. “I sometimes think if you have swallowed an old lady or something,” he giggles, clearing her hair off her face and she bites her lower lip.
“What I meant was that you would have known that I’m planning on screaming,” she stands suddenly to his surprise, making him gasp in shock, “I love you, Ahmed, but you’re shameless,” she screams and giggles as they start tackling one another playfully to their bed.
“Shut up,” he is still whispering as he tries to muffle her voice behind the lucky palm that gets to do that. This is what he loves about her; her maturity in her youngness and her fearlessness in her innocence. she can make bad situations to feel better and not bad at all.
She has come far enough for things to work; converted her religion, run away from home and accept life of a farmer just like that. He evaluates everything she says and he is willing to give her everything he can.
The feelings are mutual, between their families and that worries him too much, since he fears that might create something in her heart in the future; it’s his ways of thinking bothering him against her comforting matured words. He believes that at a long age, anything seems possible and nothing is impossible, he fears that as they grow older, they might start growing apart; she might realise she missed out on many things while she tries to make their marriage life work.
She’s right, they should leave now because tomorrow isn’t really promised for anyone; focus on what they have today until tomorrow becomes today.
***
“I don’t care! Get out of here!” This is different than any other days for Membere. Her only hope of finding her daughter dies with their last search at her husband’s most sworn enemy.
Unlike another days, she is hurling anything in her way to break it; not that it’s helping but it is helping her calm down in ways and she is sticking to it.
“Please calm down,” her childhood friend is here to support her in the best way she thinks is possible, but everyone in this family seems like they have lost track of themselves while they focus on trying to find Adha; they fight with friends and even family, they don’t communicate in way that seems to be helping to understand one another, let alone someone who’s not sharing their pain and Membere looks sick and no one seems to notice that; she looks older than the usual, her skin looks drier, her eyes heavy all the time; the waterline of her eyes is too red, her eyelids stick to one another as a witness to her tearful nights and days as the inner corner of her eyes appears swollen, her lips drier and ashy and black eyes with her cheek bones showing boldly, as if they are telling that she isn’t eating well for days. “When you find her…”
“If, if I find her…” her sobbing interrupts her words now and then, “A…big, very big IF. I. FIND. HER…” she ceases on her madness action for a moment, only to hit her chest that feels heavy, with her hands in fist.
“Membe,” her friend pleads, shaking her head as she cries with her in sadness. “I can only imagine the pain you’re going through but I will not allow you to lose your hope.” She wipes her tears off her cheeks and holds air in as she closes her eyes; seems like she’s trying to hold herself together in a very best possible way. Taking a step to her, she holds her on her shoulders with her hands and shakes her once and slightly, as if waking her attention to herself to show her that she is standing beside her no matter what. “When we find her, I don’t want her to say I wasn’t looking after you enough,” she utters, pressing a forced smile behind the tears she is fighting not to yield for. “I want her to see how strongly you were fighting waiting for her.”
“Tselot,” Membere cries her friends’ name with tired and low voice, as she looks into her eyes with dying energy. “She is my only daughter.”
“You don’t need to remind me of that, I know that perfectly,” Tselot starts brushing Membere’s messed up hair to her back and slowly starts stroking her. Before they know it, they both kneel down on the ground and Membere rests her drumming head on her friend’s lap so slowly.
“I’m scared,” she whispers, crying. “I’m terrified that there is nothing about her for three years, nothing to lead us to her disappearance.”
“I know, to think of that terrifies me as well,” she adds quietly, but honestly.
“I sometimes can’t breathe,” she breathes air in and closes her eyes as she takes time to listen to herself. Her exhausted body; every bone crying for a momentary rest, her flesh that feels like it’s slowly detaching itself from her bones, her skin that’s praying for merciful posture and her organs that feels like they’re slowly stopping to function as she wishes them to.
Mum…Mum, Oh my God! Can…hear me!
Membere flicks sits up in shock. She can’t believe what pure into her ears.
“What is it?” Tselot holds her hands in the air and in shock. “Membe, are you oka…?”
“Hush,” she stopes her as she tilts to her left and then to her right, trying to hear her daughter’s voice; she is sure it’s a sobbing sound and shock. “Can you hear that?” she whispers, looking at her friend.
Tselot don’t jumps to conclusion to judge Membere like the rest of their friends; she doesn’t want to consider her crazy, but she is doing her best to understand her. So, she takes a moment, trying to listen to what Membere might have heard, but hears nothing at all.
Mum! This can’t be her head. Membere is now sure she heard this calling for sure.
“Adha!” She screams and stands up from the ground.
“Membe, wait,” her friend is trying to catch up with her but Membere is in excitement since she hears her daughters voice after three years. She can’t be mistaken; she is sure she heard her voice and no one can hold her back.
“Adha, my baby, where are you?” she speeds out the bedroom and races out through the corridor that takes to the leaving room. Her husband and her brother and other friends are sitting there and her sudden appearance like a madwoman shocks everyone up to their feet.
“Membere?” her husband utters, unsure of her character.
“Ehtaba, are you okay?” her brother asks in concern. She looks at everyone who are looking at her in shock and concern.
“My…Adha!” She races out the door to the compound and everyone follows her.
“My beautiful, queen. What is it?” her husband asks her as he holds her with her brother. She is fidgeting the best way trying to listen to her daughters’ voice one more time, though it is now a complete silence.
“Etaba, please…”
“Calm down and talk to me?” her husband utters through his teeth.
“Let me go, I heard her voice. Bamlak!” she screams, looking at him as she ceases on her fight to free herself from her husbands and brother’s grip. “Bamlak, I heard her voice, she called out for me. Me,” she hits her chest hard with her right hand’s palm. “She is here, I heard her. Why can’t you…”
“Please, calm down,” Bamlakfekad holds her tight in his embrace and closer to himself. Not even his manhood can hold his tears back any longer than this. Everything is too much for him; losing his daughter and then suspecting every of his friends for an enemy, the fights he has to undergo while searching for her and now this is not his type of fight, not something he can face in bravery. It’s too much for him to manage.
“You’re not understanding me, you’re not.” She starts sobbing as she understands the fact that she is understood in diversed manner. She looks at everyone, looking at her in Bamlakfekad’s arms; their eyes say it all and she can see it clearly. “I swear I heard her,” she adds as she meets Tselot’s worried gaze, with her palm behind her right hand’s palm.
“I believe you, but her voice is gone now,” Bamlackfekad says. “I believe you,” he adds quietly.
“Let’s get you inside now,” Tselot quickens to her and helps her up and starts walking her in. Everyone is sucking their teeth in sadness as they send her off into the house with their eyes. Bamlakfekad follows her in from behind her with her brother.
What can he do to make her feel better? He has gone and checked to her everywhere and no sign of Adha. The Tv an radio stations are already tired of the news. His only hope now is Sergeant Befekadu and he can understand he is not God to perform miracle.
Chapter Nine
When she says she will show me time, I didn’t expect this room of air or whatever it is that I am looking at; and here I am, thinking that I have seen everything that may surprise me and that nothing will anymore. It’s filled with what seems like a mist, something that seems like cloud; it looks snug and comfortable for it seems like a floating cotton ball here and there.
Before we entered, everything looks quite snug and normal. From outside, the house looks like a simple but luxurious lake house. We walked in and it felt as if we were suddenly in a whole lot different world. I guess, everything is not what it seems.
It’s like I already said it, it’s too bright in here and like we just stepped into another world, abandoning the one we were into behind, the feeling and the light in this house is mesmerising. I can’t win off my foolish smile off from my face. I don’t know how everything is happening or everything is the way it is, but I think I am falling in love with the beauty of this world just as much as I hate and fear it.
“You be fine if you follow my footsteps,” Zhai says, smiling innocently and takes the lead forwards and closer into the cloud-like structure.
As soon as the six feet curved mahogany wood flooring ends, it looks like a dead end; open space to fall down into another world, but Zhai is mumbling in a tongue I don’t know, nor recognise as she take steps in what seems like a path but that’s made as we walk down to where she is leading me to.
How come something so bright feels so dark? I wonder as I walk fearfully through the clouds, jumpy and terrified of everything around me. I am carefully following Zhai’s steps as she leads the way; her hands forward as she works on a mantra, in a tongue, and the cloud like structure opens a way for us to walk, forward, as it closes on both our sides. There is this distressing sounds, faint whisperer, coming from every direction and as if something is trying to touch us, through the cloud, I can feel a reach out behind me and from every direction.
“Who’s there?” I flip and yelp turn to look behind me. There is nothing but the mist and not even the path that’s formed so we would walk on. Looking at the absence of everything, I feel like crying in fear of losing our way back out. After all, Zhai seems to come here quite a lot of time that she seems to know what she is doing but that is not making me feel like calming down. I simply stand still as I try to breathe to fight off my shock.
“Calm down and keep following my steps,” Zhai utters, patting me on my right shoulder and I turn to face her.
“How can we get out of here?” I ask her, doing my best not to look down to where we are standing by.
“Ask how we see time,” she presses her lips into a hard line as she stares back into my eyes.
“I’m scared…” I swallow nothing, with my lips slowly drying up. “I…I’m terrified.”
“Me too,” she says coldly, deadpan expression on her lips. “When I was here for the first time, I was too. I still am.”
“Then what are we doing here?”
“Because,” she says, taking a while to shake her head as she shrugs with her hands spread sideways. I think that’s her thinking…perhaps sorting her thoughts into proper lines. I can tell she is trying to be as honourable as she can to explain herself and what we are doing here. As I also think she knows I am doing my very best to deny the very luminous truth right before me as I am willingly letting whatever it is that I think I am feeling for him to cloud my judgement. “Because,” she repeats herself and closes her eyes for a moment, “this is impotan, you will understand how bad this place is fo us,” she opens her eyes and meets my sad gaze.
“Okay,” I utter quietly, nodding but hardly. What is going on to me? It appears I am stuck in between thoughts; I am gravely disappointed at him but I am also hoping to understand his ways, I like what he said to me about making him see himself and that he doesn’t want to lose it... I am confused and I don’t know how to sort out my thoughts as well. Why me? Why also Zhai? I think my mind is trying to keep me busy as I follow her so I don’t have to think about what’s around us. Maybe it’s the effect of this house, in addition to the fear, that from the way Zhai, said it, I might see something worst. I think she is obdurate on showing me worst things every time.
Pressing her lips, she once again starts leading the way, mumbling in a tongue I don’t recognise; her hands in the air parallel to her face…well, actually her right hand is parallel to her face, with her fingers spread and her left hand a little lower, with her fingers in the same position as her right.
“What is that?” I ask, concerned. I can tell she knows what she is doing but then again, I am scared and I don’t know why…perhaps considering all the creepy noises, whispers that are pouring into my ears, I still don’t want to take any risks.
“Don worry,” she says quietly.
“Too late for that.”
“I mean we are here,” she smiles sarcastically as she looks at me and then turns her attention to the left only to stare back at…nothing. I simply frown, shrugging.
“Okay,” I utter sarcastically, magnifying the fact that I think she has lost her mind. “So, where exactly is your time itself?”
“Here,” she smiles, and I deepens my furrow lines, biting my lower lip hard as I tilt my head to the right. Lifting her right hand, she uses her index finger to knock on something, something that sounds like glass and I gasp in surprise. “Come,” she says simply, and she doesn’t have to say it since I am already approaching.
“Is it everywhere?” I ask her whispering, but not really looking for an answer.
“Yes, bu every tim needs it’s calling,” she says, I look at her quizzically. “You have to know to summon a given time,” she adds. “You can’t just see every time all at once or you will get lost, in here,” she clears it for me as she slowly speaks with a clear and refined accent.
“The mantra you were working on is the summoning,” I whisper loudly and look back at her and she nods, pressing a smile. “What would happen if we simply walk in with no calling…or whatever it is you were doing to get here.”
“We fail in tim, and we might fail in the wron tim.”
“No fucking way,” I gasp as I place my right hand’s palm on the glass before us. “Oh my God, this really is time, I mean time machine…”
“Not exactly,” she whispers. “The whole house is time itslef.”
“Can’t we use this to escape out of this place…or world?” Like I just have the greatest idea coming to my mind, I smile from ear to ear. As I turn to face her in excitement.
“I say we might fall into the wron tim,” I think she is disappointed…or something. “Not only tim we be wron at, bu also we might fall out of nature,” she adds, trying to be clearer.
“Okay,” I say quietly and perplexed. I doubt if I understand what she is talking about. “Out of nature how?” I heard her blowing air out long and loud. Her exasperation in her tone is too obvious, I’m sorry I can’t help but to be curious, I have a lot to ask to understand everything in this world. “Look, I’m only trying to understand,” I say, in an equally exasperated tone but over the fact that there will be a lot for me to know, and unfortunately, I have to ask though it might make her tired.
“Sorry, I know,” she says and approaches me and stands right next to me on my right side. “I just remembered how I was when I was here, the first tim,” she adds quietly, and I turn to look at her. I can’t help but to notice the fact that she is undergoing pain. “It was painful, eprey thing,” she rolls her eyes as if pointing to the entire situation.
“How did you get here?”
“I was asleep and I heard a call, my name.”
“You leave with your family?”
“Seven sisters, eight with me,” she presses her left hand on he
r chest. “I was the oldest and about to get married with a boy; reach, handsome and chosen for me by my parents.”
“I was about to get married, too,” she looks at me smiling and I clear my throat hard. “I mean, a man of my choice, well somehow,” I breath a smile.
“Most of us are,” she presses her lips and looks at me. “I walk out my room in the middle of the night and I... out the main door and there was he standing and watin fo me,” she adds, and I frown, looking back at the glass before us. “Our neighbourhood was filled with houses; I remember there was seven houses befo my parent’s place in a row like the ones on our side of row.” I think the more she talks, the more she improves on her pronunciation, but to be honest, it’s beautiful to listen to her speaking because of the childlike tone in her voice. “Bu tha night was diffren; there was no house, no neighbourhood. I walked ou and it was green…too green grass land…” she looks at me for confirmation.
“Grass field,” I try to help her find the word I think she is looking for and she nods.
“Yes,” she says, pressing her lips as she swallows hard. “Too green and bright that it looked like broad day light, but the sky was…negative?” she looks at me quizzically.
“It contradicts your explanation of daylight?” I ask her and she nods. “Why, was the sky dark?” I don’t mean to ask her, seeking an answer.
“Not really. But there was no sun,” she waves her hands in the air. “The sky was blue, but I can’t forget how blue it was; beautiful a little like purple but blue.”
“Indigo blue,” I utter, and she looks at me, frowning. “That’s the colour, it looks like a really dark purple but then again it is blue to name it purple.”
“Indigo blue, yes,” she smiles, delighted. “It was beautiful night and he was waiting for me, alone. Though, he wasn’t actually calling, I was hearing my name called oper and oper again. You know, I don’t think if it was epen him calling my name, but I walked and straight to him.” She pauses and her smile fades slowly, her cheeks change colour and she part her lips slightly.
Hell Again Page 15