“Pain is not a way of life. Pain is a journey, and like all journeys, it will eventually come to an end.”
Cahira. I had tried to help her, to reach to her but she never saw my hand reaching out of the shadows. That was the only thing worse than not being heard, was being unable to speak to someone who needed to be heard.
I was with her when she silently cried herself to sleep, when she reached her breaking point. I was with her when she flew for the first time, when she developed her love of quotes, when she went to her first library where she spent a great deal of time breathing in the different books. I will be with her when she raises a family, when she loses all those things she loves most, when she grows old, when her heart no longer beats the rhythm of life, but the silence of end. I was and always will be with her.
It was a day that Cahira would have embraced, her favourite sort of day. Warm with a gentle zephyr and a brilliant blue sky, beautiful as the one she had painted on her ceiling. But instead, she just lay there staring at her ceiling, watching her dreams disappear behind the clouds that would never move and when you try to reach behind them you would have to scrub them off along with the abandoned dream.
After what felt like a long time she got up, walked to her second-storey window and watched the sky. I could see the longing in her eyes, the longing I felt for those days we used to spend together laughing in the gentle kisses of the sunshine. She turned around, as if ignoring the call of freedom.
She walked across her room, past the wall of quotes that we had dedicated an entire afternoon to decorating, to the shelf on the opposite side of her room that held everything Cahira cherished, that were her life. Her scrapbook of memories, a gold locket adorned by tiny multi-coloured butterflies that had been the last gift her father had given to her before he went off with his girlfriend to who knows where, and a photograph of us on the day we first met. She stared at these items for a while, as if she were only truly seeing them at this moment.
Then she grabbed hold of the first item within reach-the locket-with a savagery I did not know she possessed and hurled it across the room, where it hit her window and tiny shards of what were once beautiful butterflies, littered the floor beneath. She paused for just a moment, and then she screamed. Her scream was not only of fear, but of pain, of anger, of longing. Tears started flowing down her cheeks as her screams intensified. That’s when I wished that she had never grown up, because when she did she understood everything that people had done to her in her past.
She then picked up her scrapbook and started ripping it. Shreds of wet paper fell like the way a destroyed life would fall to its end. Then she picked up the photograph.
She got up and pocketed the photo and then she ran, to the park where we met and up the tree closest to the sky. When she got to the top, she pulled the photo out of her pocket and she stared up at the sky. In her eyes, I saw that young girl I had met ten years ago, the girl who still wanted to fly. Then her lips formed one word which she whispered as if it were her final breath, “Adyelya.”
Then she launched herself out of the tree and though her body plummeted, her spirit flew.
We were lying on her bed in silence. Not in the silence of awkwardness, but in the silence of thought. We were both staring up at the ceiling which was painted in hues of blue and white clouds. I remember painting the sky on the ceiling with her when she was seven.
Then a question I have never thought to ask occurs to me, “Why the sky?” I ask her.
She immediately knows what I ask of. Her silence stretches on a bit longer, then she answers.
“The sky is infinite, full of infinite possibilities and mysteries. People only gave it a name so that they could seem like they were in control of it, like they know it and understand it, the way people name things they own. But it is much more than facts. I don’t know what it is, no one really does and that’s why it’s so beautiful. You cannot trap the sky, you cannot hold on to it, you cannot own it, but you can share it, so I will, I will share my painted sky and we can fathom it together.”
“Pain is not a way of life. Pain is a journey, and like all journeys, it will eventually come to an end.”
Cahira. I had tried to help her, to reach to her but she never saw my hand reaching out of the shadows. That was the only thing worse than not being heard, was being unable to speak to someone who needed to be heard.
I was with her when she silently cried herself to sleep, when she reached her breaking point. I was with her when she flew for the first time, when she developed her love of quotes, when she went to her first library where she spent a great deal of time breathing in the different books. I will be with her when she raises a family, when she loses all those things she loves most, when she grows old, when her heart no longer beats the rhythm of life, but the silence of end. I was and always will be with her.
It was a day that Cahira would have embraced, her favourite sort of day. Warm with a gentle zephyr and a brilliant blue sky, beautiful as the one she had painted on her ceiling. But instead, she just lay there staring at her ceiling, watching her dreams disappear behind the clouds that would never move and when you try to reach behind them you would have to scrub them off along with the abandoned dream.
After what felt like a long time she got up, walked to her second-storey window and watched the sky. I could see the longing in her eyes, the longing I felt for those days we used to spend together laughing in the gentle kisses of the sunshine. She turned around, as if ignoring the call of freedom.
She walked across her room, past the wall of quotes that we had dedicated an entire afternoon to decorating, to the shelf on the opposite side of her room that held everything Cahira cherished, that were her life. Her scrapbook of memories, a gold locket adorned by tiny multi-coloured butterflies that had been the last gift her father had given to her before he went off with his girlfriend to who knows where, and a photograph of us on the day we first met. She stared at these items for a while, as if she were only truly seeing them at this moment.
Then she grabbed hold of the first item within reach-the locket-with a savagery I did not know she possessed and hurled it across the room, where it hit her window and tiny shards of what were once beautiful butterflies, littered the floor beneath. She paused for just a moment, and then she screamed. Her scream was not only of fear, but of pain, of anger, of longing. Tears started flowing down her cheeks as her screams intensified. That’s when I wished that she had never grown up, because when she did she understood everything that people had done to her in her past.
She then picked up her scrapbook and started ripping it. Shreds of wet paper fell like the way a destroyed life would fall to its end. Then she picked up the photograph.
She got up and pocketed the photo and then she ran, to the park where we met and up the tree closest to the sky. When she got to the top, she pulled the photo out of her pocket and she stared up at the sky. In her eyes, I saw that young girl I had met ten years ago, the girl who still wanted to fly. Then her lips formed one word which she whispered as if it were her final breath, “Adyelya.”
Then she launched herself out of the tree and though her body plummeted, her spirit flew.
We were lying on her bed in silence. Not in the silence of awkwardness, but in the silence of thought. We were both staring up at the ceiling which was painted in hues of blue and white clouds. I remember painting the sky on the ceiling with her when she was seven.
Then a question I have never thought to ask occurs to me, “Why the sky?” I ask her.
She immediately knows what I ask of. Her silence stretches on a bit longer, then she answers.
“The sky is infinite, full of infinite possibilities and mysteries. People only gave it a name so that they could seem like they were in control of it, like they know it and understand it, the way people name things they own. But it is much more than facts. I don’t know what it is, no one really does and that’s why it’s so beautiful. You cannot trap the sky, you cannot hold on to it, you cannot own it, but you can share it, so I will, I will share my painted sky and we can fathom it together.”
H.C.A Agate 