To the City

The bus moves so fast. It is as though things are flying past me.

I can hear the other passengers grumble among themselves and every so often, one of them finds the courage to shout at the bus driver to slow down. It is useless. He is a man on a mission. I assume he has a reason that is making him drive us like a garbage truck.

These chairs have long done their time, but i do not care. I watched the girl in front of me throw a heavy blanket over her chair before she sat. I assume she uses the bus often and she knows something i don't. She dresses like a city girl. I will soon be like her. I am going to the city, for a better life.

My brother has been asking everyone he knows about life in the city so that he can feel my head with good stories. Sadly, i know even the ones he is not telling me. He is young and hopeful. If i get to the city and make some money, i can send some home for him to go back to school.

Somebody is shouting at the driver to slow down.

It is pretty cold. My home town is in the hills. The bus is going down one of them and when you look down sometimes, you can see the houses of brave men and women who have dared to build in the valley. I am trying hard not to think of the stories i have heard of buses that miss a turn. My father said i should not look down. He said to keep my eyes in front of me and to not think of the dangers of the journey. My mother said i should talk to no one except the people at the bus park in the city.

If it were up to me, i would be back in the hills going about my chores and waiting for Saturday. On Saturdays, i do not have school and i can run into the hills and meet Innocent. He is a boy who likes me. I like him a lot. We sit and talk for hours. I was telling my mother about the dead bats in the cave and i forgot and mentioned him. She told my father and now, here i am on the bus.

I know i should not have mentioned him. It is not like we were doing anything wrong but i know my parents have been very edgy. Most of the girls my age in the village have been getting married and some just have babies. My mother insists that i finish school and make a better life for myself than she had. So they are sending me to the city where i am to find my way to my Aunties house. The directions are on a paper in my bag.

The bus has stopped and people are buying meat, soda and cassava from the men and women who are all but throwing them at us through the open windows. I do not have any money to spare so i shall keep my hands tucked neatly into my old blanket. I have had it since i was a child. I am 12years old now. I wanted a thing from home to remind me of where i come from so that i can keep a feel of the familiar things.

I miss my brother already. He cried a lot when i got on the bus. He has always been so brave. When i told him i was going away, he told me i was going to make us rich. He asked me to send for him.

The bus is moving again and the driver seems upset. He is driving very fast.

I remember my mothers prayers last night. I could hear her pacing all night muttering things under her breath. My father prayed the evening prayer before we went to bed but my mother didn't think it was enough. She woke me up in the wee hours to join her. She did not sleep much. She says the devil lives in the city and as much as she would rather i stay, she wants me to have a good life. She says i am a sensible girl who will do the right thing.

My back is beginning to hurt. I look out the window and realise it must be about 2pm. We have a few more hours on the road, if what they told me is right. I am sitted in the middle of the bus. My mother got in with me and made sure i had a seat with a seatbelt. She says you can never trust these buses.

I do not remember much. I do not know how it happened. One minute the people on the bus were shouting at the same time, the next minute, my hands were reaching out for something to keep me steady. I do not know how long it was but i remember feeling a heavy thing on me and sticky water running down my arm. Someone lifted me and i felt my feet drag along the ground. I opened my eyes and wished i had not.

Death comes with a feeling if you are the one that didn't get into its claws. I feel light and nauseous. I constantly turn my head as though i will see different on the other side. When i turned my head that day, all i saw was blood and metal and people running towards me. I do not know how i got out of the bus. I am in a hospital now.

No one has asked my name, if they have i do not remember, but i have a bed with a thin mattress and my leg is all bandaged up to the thigh. My head too is in a bandage and so is my stomach. I wonder what my mother is thinking. I wonder if she even knows. I wonder if now they will allow me to stay away from the city.

I wonder, as i lie in the hospital, what it would have been like in the city. What i would look like a few months from now, what i would have done with myself, what i would have had to do to become who they want me to be. I wonder if i would have sent for my brother. I feel light headed again. Like everything around me is going round in circles. I want to lift my head and see if the feeling of something flowing under my chest is what i think it is, but i cannot lift my head. When my fingers touch it, i know without a doubt that it is blood.

I think of my brother and i fear that i have crushed his hopes and dreams. Maybe i should ask God that i live and go on to the city. But we prayed with mother yesterday. My father prayed loud and clear too. If God did not hear them, why should he hear me now? I close my eyes and start to think of a happy place i can go to as i wait for what is to come.