by Donna White
“She probably will. So nice of you to ask, Sam. Now let’s get going home. I’m exhausted.” He turned toward the front entrance. “We have to leave out the main doors. I locked the back ones already.”
“Sure, but one thing. Can I have the keys to the storage room? I want to show you a box I found in the last crate. I left it on the side table. It’s really cool. And strange thing, there’s no artifact number on it, and it’s not on the list either.”
He yawned. “Sorry. I just gave Jake the keys. It’s going to have to wait until tomorrow. I’m sure it’ll be safe there for now.”
“Crap. Well, I guess it’ll have to. But you’re going to like it. Kind of a mystery thing.”
“Hmm. Now you’ve got me intrigued.” He placed his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Let’s go home and have some hot chocolate. I’m pooped.”
Chapter 16
Advice is a stranger;
if he’s welcome he stays for the night;
if not, he leaves the same day.
~ Malagasy proverb
Sam took a long sip from her cup and made herself comfortable in a pile of cushions on the couch. “Thanks for the hot chocolate, Dad.”
“No problem. You earned it.” He paused for a moment. “It was a good day, huh?”
Sam nodded and took another sip.
“Better than yesterday,” he added.
Sam put her cup on the coffee table and sighed. “I really don’t want to talk about yesterday, if that’s what this is all about. Let’s just enjoy this time right now. I don’t want to ruin a good day.” She grabbed the remote and turned on the TV.
“And when do you think it would be a good time to talk about it, Sam?”
“Never.” She flicked through the channels. “We don’t need to discuss everything.” The tone in her voice revealed her impatience.
He turned the TV off. “I disagree. We need to talk.” He sat on the couch beside her. “Sam, you have a temper, and it’s getting you into trouble. And I’m afraid if you don’t learn how to control it, it’s going to get the better of you and you’ll end up in a lot more trouble than just losing a job.”
She leaned back on the couch, stared at the ceiling, and didn’t respond.
“Well? I’m open. Talk to me. Tell me what’s going on.”
“Tell you what’s going on? Are you totally stupid?”
“No, Sam. It’s tough. I know it is. I’m going through it, too. But—”
“But what?”
“You seem to think you’re in this all on your own. Talk to me. Tell me what you’re thinking.”
Sam drew in a long breath. “Okay, you want to know. Here goes: I met up with Mrs. Peacosh yesterday. She’d been in Arizona for the winter. Said she was catching up on the news, looking through the newspapers, and she came across Mom’s obituary. Said she was sorry and all that crap. And then she had to ask how Mom died.” Sam felt her face tense. “No. She couldn’t leave it alone. She had to know. And you know what I did, Dad?”
He placed his hand on hers.
“I walked away. Yep, just turned ’round and walked away.”
“I’m sorry, Sam. I’m sorry.”
“Sorry ain’t worth shit, Dad.” She turned to go to her bedroom and paused. “And you know what makes it worse? You. If for once you treated me like some spoiled teenage brat who’s not getting her way, you’d be wringing me out. Yelling at me, grounding me for losing my job. But no, you’re not. You’re all nice and sweet and patient ’cause . . . ’cause . . .” She stopped. “Forget it, Dad. It ain’t worth shit.” She ran into her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.
She leaned against the wall and listened to her dad climb the stairs, walk down the hall to his bedroom, and close the door. Moving to her bed, she leaned against the headboard. She took a stuffed green lion from her night table and held it on her lap. The hand-sewn eyes, with their frayed eyelashes, stared back at her. She wiped her tears with her sleeve and held the lion close to her and squeezed.
A jumbled mass of feelings and thoughts tore into her mind, destroying any self-control she possessed. She screamed and threw the lion across the room. It hit a lamp, causing it to crash to the floor. The bulb broke into a thousand pieces, leaving the room in darkness.
“You bitch!” Sam yelled. “You bitch!” She punched her mattress. The anger refused to be quelled. She slammed the wall with her fists. It became a punching bag as she hit it over and over. Her knuckles bled as tears filled her eyes and flowed down her cheeks. The wall became a blur as her breath came to her in shallow, short pants. Her knees buckled and she collapsed to the floor. She held her fists to her chest and leaned against the wall and sobbed.
“Sam! Sam! Let me in!” Her dad pounded on her bedroom door.
She stared at the blood on her fists. “Go away, Dad. Go away and leave me alone.” Her voice shook, but the tone was firm and full of hate. She drew in a long, deep breath and then another.
“Sam? Please, let me in.”
She didn’t respond.
“Please.”
Another long pause. “Go away!” she yelled. “I don’t want to talk!” Sam inhaled sharply. Finally, she spoke, her words measured, controlled. “I’m okay, Dad. Just leave me. I’m fine.”
“Are you sure? You don’t sound fine.”
“I am. Just leave me to think. Okay?”
There was silence on the other side of the door until he said, “All right. All right. But if you need me, you know where I am.”
She listened to the silence that followed and her dad’s footfalls as he turned and walked away.
She went to the opposite wall, turned on another light, picked up her lion, and stroked its woolen coat. She grabbed a fistful of tissues and dabbed at the blood on her hands, then sat on the floor next to her trunk. Its lid was closed, beckoning her, inviting her to open it and revisit the treasures inside.
More emotions stirred in Sam’s heart. Treasures revisited only brought more pain, and yet they offered the only comfort she could find: things from the past that shared traces of good days filled with bitter sweetness. It was like a dull toothache after gorging on a candied apple. She opened the lid.
Next to her book lay a small stone. She picked it up and felt its cool touch. It was an ordinary piece of gravel: gray, nothing pretty. But yet it held something special.
“Here. I’ve got something for your treasure trunk.”
Sam’s mom pulled a rock out from her pocket. “I don’t think you’ll remember it, but you gave it to me when you were just a little girl. We were walking through the park one day and you picked it up from the pathway and gave it to me. You told me to keep it forever because it was a very special rock. It’s been in my pocket ever since. Never took it out.”
“Why are you taking it out now, then?”
“’Cause I thought you’d take better care of it now.”
She turned and walked out of the room. Sam placed the stone in the trunk.
Under the stone lay a faded baby blanket. Sam held it to her nose and sniffed it. It still held the smell of the soap her mom had used when she was a young girl. A corsage stuck in the corner of the trunk caught her attention next. She ran her fingers over the silver ribbon that was tied around the pink rose, now faded and dried.
“What’s this all about, Mom?”
“Your dad gave it to me on our first date. A dance at the school. I thought you might like it. It’s a treasure too.”
Sam put the corsage back and pulled out a gold-colored medal. A large paintball gun was embossed in the center over top of a splattered blue paintball. The words “Most Valuable Player” were written on the bottom.
Sam’s mom took one look at the medal hanging around Sam’s neck. “Hmph. So did everyone get one of these?”
“No, just one member from each team, Mom.”
“How many people in each team, then?”
“Five.”
“Well, there’s not much competition then, is there?”
<
br /> “No. I guess not.” Sam took the medal off her neck and stuck it into her pocket.
She ran her fingers over the lettering and dropped the medal into the trunk. The tip of a brown envelope caught her attention. She pulled it out and opened it. A sketch she had drawn back in elementary school fell out. She looked at a picture of a dog leaping up into the air to catch a ball and smiled. As she placed the sketch back into the envelope, she noticed a scrap of paper stuck inside. She pulled it out. “My artist extraordinaire” was scribbled in her mother’s handwriting.
Sam stared at the medal and then at the picture. If she could describe her life using two objects, these would do just fine. Life with her mother was like being on a bumpy roller coaster ride full of highs and lows. She could never tell what each day would bring. Compliments, hugs, “I love you,” or stares into space and hurtful words: “Get out of here. Leave me alone.”
Sam placed the medal and the picture back into the trunk and closed the lid. She stood and sighed as she placed her green lion on the end of her bed. As she opened her door to walk to the washroom, she spied her cup of hot chocolate on the coffee table in the living room. A hot cup would do quite nicely right now, she thought. She carried her cup to the kitchen and set it in the microwave to warm up. Her dad’s snoring came from the other end of the hallway. It comforted her as she took a sip of the creamy liquid and let it settle in her stomach. She stared at the clock on the kitchen wall: 2:35 a.m. Late. But there wasn’t a tired bone in her body. Sam carried her hot chocolate downstairs and stopped in the foyer. Her dad’s briefcase leaned against the wall beside the door.
She opened the case and sifted through the papers until she found what she was looking for: the paper she had written on while looking at the coffin. As she pulled it out, something dropped to the bottom of the briefcase—not a file folder, but heavier. She reached in and her hand brushed against something hard and solid. She pulled out the wooden box she had left on the table at the museum.
“How the hell did this get here?” she asked.
She tucked the box under her arm as she walked into her bedroom. Then she closed the door behind her and sat on her bed. “Now let’s see what we can do here.”
Again, she traced her fingers over the short wavy lines and turned the box over and over. “This has got to be the most complicated piece of woodwork I’ve ever seen. There must be some way to figure it out.”
She took a piece of paper from her desk, held it over the box, and lightly rubbed a pencil over each side and the top and bottom until she had a complete template of the box. The paper looked like a Grade 5 geometry assignment, with instructions to cut, fold, and tape together to make a 3D prism.
Sam stared at the paper. She followed the paths of the pieces, glancing from one part of the rubbing to the other.
“If I was to push this piece, then this piece would push this one . . .” Sam’s brow furrowed and she rubbed her hand across her forehead. “But then this piece would hold it here and then . . . No, that won’t work.” She turned the paper around and looked at it from a different angle. “But . . . if I push this one here, it will move this one, and then . . .”
Sam picked up the box and pushed a small piece of wood in the corner and pulled at a piece on the opposite side. The box fell apart and lay in pieces on the floor. A little leather sack sat in the middle of the pile.
“What the hell is this?” she asked, picking up the sack and pulling the leather tie that wrapped it closed. She opened it and looked inside. A pile of green stones lay nestled in the bottom.
She dumped the stones onto her bed and picked one up. A faint thread of silver passed over its polished green surface as she turned it over and over.
“Pretty, but . . . not what I was hoping for.” She ran her finger over the stone and felt its coolness. “Diamonds, rubies, even a few gold nuggets or a ring would have been nice.”
She yawned and looked at the clock on her nightstand. It read 3:17. “Maybe I am tired,” she said, laying her head on her pillow and pulling her blanket over her body. “I’ll change my clothes tomorrow.” She took one last look at the stone as she held it tightly in her hand. “Tomorrow will be another day, Sam. Tomorrow will be another day.”
A girl’s quiet voice came from the darkness: “If there is a tomorrow.”
Chapter 17
Where a woman rules, streams run uphill.
~ Ethiopian proverb
Sam caught her breath. She glanced back and forth as she twisted her head from side to side. The surrounding air, the stench, and the heat were stifling. Her eyes adjusted to make out a clay wall, about shoulder height, almost surrounding her in a large circle. Atop the wall, huge logs rose above her head, meeting at the center. Long leaves and stems of grass covered the roof. Small gaps between the roof and the wall allowed the sunlight to pour in, bringing into focus a young girl standing near the center post.
The girl, her eyes closed and head hanging down, lifted her hand to her face and wiped away the beads of sweat that covered her brow. Sam’s eyes widened as she took in the whole picture: the girl’s long white dress, which contrasted with her dark skin, was ripped and soiled, clinging to her body. Her arms were wrapped around the post, almost hugging it, while her wrists were tied securely with a rope. Her feet were bound to the bottom of the post, making any movement impossible.
The girl opened one eyelid and looked at Sam. Faded white diamonds painted around her eyes gave an ominous glow. She gasped when she noticed Sam’s camouflage shirt and pants. “You have to get out of here,” she whispered. “They will be coming back soon soon.”
Sam shook her head in confusion. “Who? What are you talking about? Where am I?”
“You are in Kony camp, girl. Now get out of here. Otti is coming back.”
“What?” Sam stepped back. She didn’t understand what this girl was talking about. She didn’t know where she was. She didn’t understand anything but the cold fear that sent the hairs on the back of her neck standing on end.
The girl turned her ear toward the door, a space in the wall where a thin piece of cloth hung from a stick resting on the top.
“They are here. Hide. Get behind those sack and throw the blanket over you. Do something, girl. They do not like soldier coming here uninvited.”
“Soldier?” Sam looked at the girl and then at the camouflage shirt and pants she was still wearing after her paintball game with her dad. “I’m not a—”
“Hide!” the girl commanded.
Sam dived behind the sacks and pulled the blanket over her head, attempting to cover every inch of her shaking body. Tightening herself into a ball, she held her breath and stayed absolutely still. Footfalls drew nearer until she heard a sheet being pushed aside as someone stepped into the hut.
“Lovely Eseza. You have been waiting for me. My heart is so happy to find you here.” A man’s voice came from behind the center post. Sam’s heart pounded against her chest. She closed her eyes as tightly as possible, wishing she could make herself disappear.
“Take your hand off me. When Kony come back he is not going to be happy with you. You wait. I will ask him to tie you to this very post and leave your body to rot.”
Despite the confidence the girl tried to muster, Sam detected a tremble in her voice.
“Eeh, what is this you say? Now I think you are mistaken here, dear Eseza. Joseph does not take too kindly to one of his wife taking off. It has been four month since he held his child. Where have you been, precious Eseza? Sharing a hut with the soldier of the UPDF? With all the enemy in the government army? I think this is what I will tell Kony. He will not be happy. No, beautiful Eseza, it is you who should be afraid.”
Sam listened. She could have sworn she heard the girl spit.
“Ha ha ha! You are a strong woman, Eseza!”
Sam heard a loud slap and then a gasp.
“Come with me, whore. I will give you a taste of what Joseph will do to you when he return.”
Sam list
ened to the faint sound of ropes being untied and the dragging of feet across the dirt floor and out the door.
“Untie me now, Two-Victor.” The girl’s voice sounded more confident. “Untie me, or Joseph will learn how you are part of Otti group. And have been trying to gain the support of all the soldier and replace him as their leader.”
“Hmf! You speak all lie, whore!” Another vicious slap followed.
“You know exactly what I am talking about. Do not take me for a fool. I have seen you giving special favor to the soldier. Extra ration, letting them help themself to more of the spoil from all the village we attack. Joseph has been suspecting it for some time. I only need to say what is the truth and he will place you in front of a firing squad.”
The man laughed. “You may be a strong woman, but you are stupid. Who do you think stand before you now? All of these men here are under my command. All of them are faithful to me. Me, and only me. No one here will listen to you because you are a wife to Kony.”
There was silence. Sam shifted her weight as her legs began to cramp. Voices came from a different direction.
“Hey di da!” a new voice called out. “Look at what I see.”
Sam tried to figure out how many more people had arrived. By the sound of the footfalls, three, perhaps four. It was hard to tell.
“Itye nining, Eseza. You have come back to us.” The voice was very deep and had the same effect on Sam’s ears as the pounding of a bass drum.
The voice continued. “Now why do you have her tied, Two-Victor? This is not the way you treat a wife of Kony.”
“You know as well as I do, Kokas, that the girl escaped. And she did not take too kindly to our finding her and bringing her back.”
“Of course she did not. She still had much work to do. Do you not know that Kony sent her out as a spy to the lower area? He has suspicion of UPDF sympathizer banding together and planning to attack our camp. A young girl and her child is perfect cover for this. No one would suspect a thing. You did not.”