By Daniel Nyaga
Thumbnail Photo Courtesy of citylifephilly.com
It’s been four hours since I retired to bed. Why can’t I sleep? I am exhausted… engulfed by the endless thoughts running through my mind. I should be knocked out by now.
TRUST! That word pops up in my mind again.
“Hello friend, why don’t you come around often?”
“I am always here watching your every move. I don’t say much but I speak when I have to do so. If you pay attention you will always hear me. However, I need you to do something for me.”
“What’s that?” I ask.
“I need you to TRUST.”
With that, I snap back to reality. I find myself wondering, “Who was talking to me?” I should probably get some sleep.
As I turn and shut my eyes, I find myself sitting in a room. There’s a child curled up in the corner.
It is adorned with torn clothes and blood is dripping from its hands.
Fixated on the wall, it seems to be writing something.
As I attempt to see what it’s writing, my attention gets shifted to the other side of the room.
A man is sitting in the opposite corner.
He is broad–shouldered and has a charming smile. His brown almond-shaped eyes illuminate the room. “Where did he come from?” I wonder.
My train of thought gets interrupted as I notice something.
The man sitting in the corner has stood up.
His charming smile has now turned into a blank cold stare as he approaches the child with a gun in his hands.
I try to raise an alarm but I get no reaction from the child or the man. Can’t they hear me? Am I invisible? Why are they not reacting to me?
As the man gets closer, the child turns and I see something scribbled on the wall with its bloody hands.
I squint to read the words; they are not only perplexing but also as vivid as the ink used to pen them.
“When silence can only come through peace, when fear grips like a baby holding the mother’s thumb, savor it but above all TRUST!”
