Unshaken I stood there staring at the body of my father….or at least the man who used to be my father, until a few minutes ago. I willed myself back to the room and the activity around me…the lifeless body of my father lay on the bed, with a knife poking out of his chest. The crimson color of his blood gradually taking over the once ash colored pajamas he wore. I had just stabbed my father in the chest…with a force ad precision that left no room for his survival.
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The sound of the bell rang through the long corridors signifying the time for counseling sessions. Reluctantly I got up from my bed, dragging through the process of wearing my flops and throwing my shirt on. Buttoning up with the speed of a movie playing in slow motion, I thought of what to do to occupy myself through the agonizing 30minutes that awaited me now.
It was always annoying listening to the ranting of my colleagues, as they talked about how they had done one bad thing or the other. The problem wasn’t really the ranting, as some had some pretty hilarious tales sometimes, while some actually managed to move us to tears with their tales. My problem was that I couldn’t fathom the rationale behind the telling of these ordeals. It was as if they believed that telling their stories could give them some sort of closure – a school of thought I didn’t subscribe to.
Finally finding my way to the huge hall that seated almost a hundred of us, I found a chair at the far end and braced myself for another long 30minutes. The moderator, a woman in nothing less than thirties came up first as she always did and started the session by imploring us to make “the acknowledgement” …that’s what it was called.
In unison fellow participants started the recital “I am an extraordinary being…” I sunk a little deeper in my chair, as I took in the entire room lingering on the faces of some of the people I associated with - by ‘associated’ I mean the casual “hellos” and “mornings”; I had never been much of a talker. Tracy was my favorite…dark, pretty and very short…I thought of her as ‘shanko’. I never said it to her face though, because she had anger issues and was always quick to flare up at the silliest issues.
“…my life is what I make of it, I walk tall at all times…”,sitting next to Tracy was Dayo. She sat with her back straight, shoulders up and palms neatly clasped on her laps. She was tidy, prim and proper…did what was expected of her at all times. Every time I looked at her I always wondered what a girl like her was doing at a place like this. I secretly wished she would speak up during one of these gatherings and shed light on her own experience…maybe today could be my lucky day.
“… I am the best of me there ever could be” the final drawl of the voices as they completed ‘the acknowledgement’ brought me back from my reverie. A round of applause followed the recital, right after which I saw Agnes get up from her seat and made her way to the front. Gnashing on my teeth I wondered if we had run out of people who were willing to volunteer to talk about themselves and their past. Agnes had become like the pseudo pastor…she always had something to say…one boring tale after the other every other week.
Her first tale had been how she had been involved in some femdom acts with her ex-boyfriend… I had wanted to die that day, it was like listening to porn as opposed to actually watching it – where was the fun in that. It was so gross, I and several others had audibly sighed when she finally returned to her seat. This experience was still so fresh in mind; I could only imagine what she had to say today – probably how she was gang raped by a group of lesbians. I chuckled at the picture that resulted from my thought… shaking my head as I hoped this potent mind of mine wouldn’t land me in trouble one day – if there was a greater trouble than the one I was in already.
TO BE CONTINUED...
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