He can tell that they are suspecting some change about him as they have mentioned it. He can’t risk it anymore and stays here, he should leave, but he knows he is going to make a grand separation.
As soon as Andrealpus walks out the house, he closes his eyes, taking a moment for himself. He was right that things were quite different and changing direction to something he doesn’t know. His only regret is for not taking actions as early as possible, as Baal mentions his concern about the girl’s power. How can he tell what she really is if he can’t see her in her eyes?
“I shall fly to Sabbat,” he says, speeding on his steps forward. He is speaking to a cloven-footed demon that is walking next him. “Bring that tempting demon that was last sent by Ouza and follow me,” he orders it, as he jumps up high but rested on the back of a horned cloven-footed demon that flies him away.
***
I slowly open my eyes, but my throat is way too dry for me to utter a word and my eyes aren’t exactly giving the pleasure of clear vision.
“Zh…ai…Abebi…” I try my very best to utter in as much as I could. But my voice helps me do nothing more than sounding like injured animal, even to my own ears.
“Baby,” I heard my Mum’s voice.
This can’t be true; I can’t really be home. Or am I dreaming? I simply force my eyes open wide and spring up in the bed. I am too weak and sleepy to sit up immediately as I just did. I mumble to the dream like vision, but then I realise how real it is.
“Mum, Dad!” I don’t know why but I scream as loud as I could. I don’t know why I suddenly believe that screaming could confirm that I am home. But I try to spring up my weak body.
“Yes, love, Adha, my precious.” Even her warm embrace and comforting words couldn’t calm me down. “I’m here, baby, I’m here for you.” Her fingers are dug in my hair, rubbing my head to a comfort but like a person who is running, I am breathing hoarsely as I am holding her tight.
“Mum, Mum, Mama…” I simply sob but I hear the door opening and my dad and uncle storm into the room, perhaps they heard me screaming. “Uncle, Dad, Daddy!” I scream, spreading my arm to him and he takes it and they hug me.
“Enkuye,” I love hearing these words coming out of my father’s lips, calling my diamond in Amharic.
“Daddy!” I scream once again, and I don’t even remember that my throat was hurting not seconds ago. I fear this is a dream and I have to wake up in that world again, I can’t go back to that hell.
“We’re here my love, we are here,” my mum keeps whispering as she weeps with me.
I keep pressing my nose on her shoulder, smelling her scent in; I miss it so much. I miss her dearly; I think I understand being away from her have great deal of effect on me than being away from dad. After all, I was never apart from her and I need her more than ever.
I look around and realise that I am in a hospital.
“You…you’re in a hospital,” Mum is shaking, and I can see it on her face that she herself couldn’t believe it. Her eyes, oh my, her eyes are hurt, I can tell it’s from a lot of crying. I slowly caressed her wrinkled and wet right side of cheek with my left hand; she is still crying, though she has cried more than enough for her to have blubber under her eyes, her skin looks paler and she looks like she lost quite a lot of weight. Pushing my head back to the pillow, Mum is trying to create comfort for me.
“For how long was I…”
“Hello, Miss Adha,” a doctor walks in with two nurses accompanying him. He simply jumps into his work. I am trying to take my time in believing that I am finally home. “Open your mouth,” he says with dry English but quite instructive and I do what he wants me to do. “Good, you should stay hydrated,” he says, and I nod as I take glass of water from the nurse’s hand.
“How long was I out?” I ask him, frowning and he elevates his too-thick eyebrows up.
“Three weeks now, I mean ever since you get here,” he says, and I gasp secretly, seeming like I am inhaling heavy. He is old enough not to play around and know that to beat around the bush isn’t that good. I can even see grey hair strings in his eyebrows, let alone his fully grey hair. If it isn’t for his bitterness, I wouldn’t say it’s his age that turned his hair grey but the responsibility that comes with his job. He is standing, tucking his hands in his white gown pocket and he looks ready to answer if I have any questions for him.
“In general, I would say three months, or more… We were expected to complete things in Jimma,” Mum tries to explain, and I frown. “You were in a comma, in a hospital in Jimma and after we were informed, there was somethings we were supposed to follow up with, just as much there were issues in transportation to get you referred here.”
“Your medical report states that you needed mechanical breathing system support; you were facing difficulties to breathe and under an extreme fatigue,” the Doctor adds more explanation.
“Well, statements with the police station… we were supposed to try and find out who found you, where and when, what happened... there was a lot,” Dad shrugs taking my attention to him. He looks lost and a bit thinner; his facial hair fully grown and his afro longer. I look at him for a while and back to my uncle who isn’t able to hide his sadness on his face, I draw a smile on my lip.
“Oh,” I say as the doctor tries to leave the room for us with the nurses, who were whispering to Mum and Dad, while the doctor was towards the way out. “I’m sorry, Doctor?” I call out for him. And he turns his head only towards me, “What about the girls with me?” I ask him and he frowns, elevating his eyebrows. “Zhai and Abebi?” I turn around, looking at my Mum, who is confused but trying to translate to Dad about what I am talking in English.
“I’m sorry?” the doctor says, walking back to me.
“I have my friends who helped me out…”
“Honey,” Mum walks to me and holds me on my shoulder. “You were found on the road by the locals,” she explains but the way they are eyeing me is like I am crazy.
Why am I so sure that there were Zhal and Abebi…or maybe someone else? I wonder, frowning. Shaking my right hand in the air, I show my disagreement.
“No, I’m sure.” I get out of bed, but I snatch the IV tube out my left arm and start to walk staggering. I felt great before I stand, but doing this actually helps me come to the actualisation that I am not physically fit for anything.
“Nurse!” the doctor screams and a nurse run to a door and as if she knows what to do, she simply runs back.
“No, no, I’m fine, stop!” I scream as my uncle holds me. The only person who is helping me cry is my mother and she is in my father’s arm. “Mum, Dad…!” I call out for them.
“You should calm down,” the doctor says as he takes over the preparation on a dosage, he is supposed to medicate me, the nurse is already back with.
“Doctor,” Mum is louder in her tears as she holds dad tighter.
“Don’t let him…Dad… Mum…I should go out,” I said to the doctor as he holds me on my right shoulder, trying to give me the medication, which I assume will send me to sleep. “I need to find my friends. They need my help,” I said to him, holding his sleeve with my hands. I am trying as I fight to leave the room, the hospital that I am in.
“Sure thing,” he answers me, but he eyes my uncle, winking to him, and he holds my hands tighter and I couldn’t move as I please any more. “For now, rest,” he says, as he injects me.
“I don’t want to sleep, I can’t…I…I want…I shou…” I can feel my eyelids feeling heavier from each passing minute and my tongue as if it’s swelling. “I…neee…da…wa…” I close my eyes and feel my head resting on my uncle’s right shoulder.
How impure everything feels. No one is believing me, and I fear I am starting to believe myself less and less every day. The only thing that’s making me think that I am right is the fact that I don’t feel okay; I am hating mornings because I can’t help but to throw up. It’s almost as if I escaped hell to be back into another one. It must be true that we l
eave both hell and heaven on earth.
Two months ever since I wake up in the hospital, but I don’t seem to be able to leave it any time soon as my wish. Everyone thinks I have lost my mind and not even my showing belly is convincing them. They are considering that my brain is replacing memories in representation to escape a horrible happening. It was horrible indeed, but I highly doubt I would forget about it that easy and play mad girl all of a sudden. I can’t be mad; all those memories can’t be just forgotten or an imagination.
What makes everything worst is my nightmares that have been keeping me awake. I found out that I am pregnant after a month in a hospital; seems like everyone was preoccupied trying to calm me down or keep me still; I have been trying to escape. It appears I can’t make an abortion, I wasted too much time in hospital bed, in comma, but after seeing it in the screen and hearing the heartbeat, I couldn’t find the courage, I can’t kill a baby even if I can. That’s not the case but the truth is my nightmare is all about giving birth to a baby monster and damning our world. One or the other way, because of my pregnancy, I am secluded from other patients and always under close surveillance so I won’t be harmed by others or even from myself.
Yet again, would you believe anyone who would claim to be impregnated by the devil and that person disappeared for more than three years?
It’s all a torment for me and I hate it all, but I think I have finally found my way out of this place. I have to play with their rules; pretend like I lost my mind for a while and cede to the thoughts they have been trying to put in my mind. At this time, I gave up in ever being able to find Abebi and Zhai. If they survived, I hope they manage it to their own home, and if not, I hope they would rest in peace. I should win this fight I am in to in order to think for others; and with the pregnancy, everything is hard and more complicated; I still can’t decide on whether to give it up for an adoption or not.
Of course, it’s impossible to believe what I have been through. Even I am having a hard time to understand it let alone to explain it. I should get out of here and I have come to a conclusion that I should be reasonable; I need to start talking about things that makes sense and so far, as I understand it, things seem to fall in the right place. It’s been almost a month since I start playing their games. I’ve been telling them that I am confused and there are things I am not able to remember. I talk a lot about my child, unborn child. How I want to prepare myself to offer it a life of comfort and how undecided I feel towards that. My doctor thinks its normal that I feel that way so she is making it feel easier. She is so nice to me just as much as she is understanding; well, in her ways.
Really though, despite I have that fear of giving birth to a monster, against what I have seen in the tv screen; something normal; I expect something beautiful; I can feel this connection to my child I can’t explain. I feel like I have purpose and all that belongs to this life in me, like I breathe, eat, drink, act and talk for it. I can feel this beautiful and calming connection with it. I think I am even starting getting addicted to the kicks as well.
How odd, am I not supposed to hate this life in me? Does this mean that I still have feelings for that thing from that world…that demon or broken angel? Shemyaza, you turn me in to a mother and you don’t know it. Do you even exist or did I simply created you in my mind to get rid of the thought of what really happened?
Closing my eyes, I slowly touch my lips with my right hand as I remember his lips on mine, then I slowly send my hand down to my neck, where he once kissed me and then my chest, to feel my heart beat to the memory, then all the way down to my belly, where his blood runs through me. “Do I really love you?” I utter in whisperer. After all I can’t control this urge I feel, I crave for him and I miss him.
“I used to do that too.” I open my eyes to my mother who is walking to my direction. She is smiling and looks better though my father, who is following her doesn’t seem to be pleased about my pregnancy. After all, he is a man of pride and don’t expect him to even force a smile about it let alone accept it. “I used to close my eyes and place my hand on my belly. I used to love feeling you, just like that; my hands on my belly,” Mum adds closing her eyes as she touches her belly. I smile and she opens her eyes and takes a seat next me on the bench in the hospital compound. “Your every move was so seldom and I used to worry a lot.”
“How are you?” my father asks me in Amharic, after clearing his throat roughly. He isn’t even willing to sit next me, let alone converse with me about anything else.
“I’m good,” I answer quietly and I press a smile. “Dehna negn, Aba,” he steals a glimpse towards me as I answer in Amharic.
“Astawesh?” The only thing he keeps asking me, on every of his rare visits, is if I remember. I know if I would mention a name he knows, he would simply march over to that person’s house to start a fight that would only end if one of them are dead. I know he wouldn’t even think twice about it.
Oh! how I wish he was from this world. I close my eyes, resisting not to roll them at my father and shake my head sadly.
“That’s not important, but you know your father,” Mum says, pressing her lips into a smile, but I squeeze her hands tighter; in ways as if I am saying, ‘I understand’.
It’s funny that it happens to be Tarik who has come twice to visit me but the rest of them never cared at all. I was preoccupied about Zhai and Abebi to realise that until this very moment.
“How come I never see Kate and Meron?” I ask and Mum looks to Dad gasping as if it is a question, she was hoping I would never ask.
“Um…”
“Ask me about Teddy and you will get all the answer?” Dad technically barks at me as he takes Mum’s explanation away from her. I know he was looking for a reason to do so.
“Alchilim,” I answer to him in bad Amharic. I really can’t ask anyone about him. They told me it’s been three years and seven months since I was missing. How would I expect him to wait for me? Ted is handsome to wait that long for a girl who disappeared days before her wedding. He probably slept with someone when he heard I was missing on our wedding day in the name of anger. I simply look down to my growing belly that start showing and Dad shakes his head and turns away from me. But truth is I know he is holding his thoughts back because Mum, who is staring at him in a ‘calm down’ stare down manner. “What is it, Mum?” I ask her and she blows air long, through her mouth.
“I wish you never ask, but…” she swallows hard and wets her lower lip.
“I can handle it,” I said to her as she looks back at me. “After what I’ve been through, I doubt if anything would sound unpleasant.”
“I don’t know how you would react to this, but it’s been really long and they have started lives,” she says and I know my mum rambling. She does that when she lies and or there is something she dearly hoped to hide. I simply raise my eyebrows and smile, arching my forehead at her. “Well, I mean it, they started life already,” she shrugs.
“Mum, starting life wouldn’t hold you back. Besides, Tarik has to fly all the way down here and she was pregnant,” I add to her.
“Well,” she says and sucks her lips in. “Meron married someone Kate supports her on and now they feel like they can’t really see you,” she says and takes her hands away from me.
“Oh,” I utter coldly. It’s loud and clear now, but I swear I didn’t expect this. Not that I should care about it at all but there is something called ‘friend code,’ and I guess it’s broken; whether I wanted to be with him or not doesn’t really matter. “Well, um.” I shake my head. Dad technically runs off to a doctor he just sees and I can tell he is already tired of this conversation. “You know what,” I press my palms on my face. “Even I would consider myself dead if it were me in their shoes,” I shrug, smiling.
“We clearly dislike it, but your father shows it, up to going to Meron’s house and beating up her father for letting it happen,” she says, smiling and I burst out in laughter.
“Oh no,” I bite my lower lip and lo
ok at her. “Let me guess you pretended to stop him.” I couldn’t stop laughing.
“Oh my God,” she says, whispering, as she laughs, mixed with tears of sadness. I know it because her face is turning red as all the blood vessels on her neck and forehead are all alarmed of what seems like her stress for standing in between laughter and weeping. “Ye…” she says, stuck between her emotional struggle. She is pressing on her chest with her right hand as her left hand once again reaches out for my right. “Yes, I put on quite a show, but guilty of enjoying it.” Our laughter fades away slowly and we both stay still, looking at each other.
“I can’t wait till I get home,” I said, and she nods as she keeps patting me on my hand. “I mean home. I don’t want to stay here. I want to get back home.” I clear myself to her, but I am hoping to be away from all the drama in what I might be facing with dad. I should start from zero if I am to mother this child. It takes her a while, but she nods in agreement to my wish.
***
Sabbat is different and filled with deceiving images that the witches are creating. The witches are all busy practicing their dark magic. They are all in their real skin; most of them old and out of the ordinary looks to the point that they appear hideous. They are enjoying their conversation that they are laughing the hardest and louder with piercing voices. Most of them have longer nails and are filthy; those with nails seems older than the others, more loathsome and respected by the other, since they are leaders. All seven of them are sitting on black thorn-like chairs that seem to have its own life; appearing like the chairs are breathing.
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