ᴰᴼ ᵞᴼᵁ ᵂᴬᴺᵀ ᵀᴼ ᴷᴺᴼᵂ ᴹᵞ ˢᵀᴼᴿᵞ?
"Kenneth."
He kept pacing.
"...and I met you. You weren't okay and it just broke my heart for some reason. How much can one person take? And I keep feeling this tug towards you, to check up on you but you're so stubborn...
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You're watching right? Or have you cast your eyes away from me. Have my deeds cost me so much, and if so what are my deeds? Being born seems so cruel a thing to do because it wasn't consented. If I knew this would be my fate would I have ever desired to exist? And yet your word says you never do a thing without a thought. What then did you think of before getting up to make me and place me in this world? What am I to achieve with a drunkard of a father and a silent mother? What am I to achieve if I'm to lose my sister in the process? I ask of you to relieve me of my sufferings, O Lord.
If I was to exist far back in the time of King David would I have written a book like David or cried out to the Lord as Job did for my misfortune? Each page will be filled with my sorrows until the Lord delivers me. Or maybe my words would be lost to the ages. Either way my thoughts resemble that of a person who is about to give up, if not already has.
Our drive to the hospital was quick despite the traffic we met on the way. Ikenna manoeuvered carelessly around slow kekes, hasty motorbike drivers and big lorries. Although it was quick it felt like forever, looking out the window at the hawkers on the street, wondering what misfortune landed them there or if it was just to earn extra cash. Picking on my nails as my eyes accessed the messy state of the car which contained the remains of whatever late night adventure my dad went on.
Yet nothing could undo the knots folding in my tummy, anxiety overclouding my sense of reasoning slowly.
“These are the prescribed drugs to buy for her. The Pharmacy is just next to this main hospital building,"said the doctor. He tore out a paper with jumbled up words written lazily on it before giving it to my brother.
Ikenna sniffed silently again as he collected it. “Is she awake? How is she doing? Are you sure…are you sure it was…”
“Attempted suicide?” The doctor offered. He set his pen down. “Most people refuse to understand the extremity of willingly trying to unalive oneself but I'll ask that you let the fact sink in so that we can progress to aiding her effectively. She's a young adolescent whom I presume was pressured or thought to herself this was her next option. Not to pry.”
I sat silently, my uniform shirt feeling a bit too tight around my neck with my hands picking on the edge of my skirt that was fraying. I just want to see my sister.
“And you can see her later, miss…?”
“Huh?”
“You said something.”
It was then I realized that I voiced my desires out loud. Immediately my eyes casted down to watch the tiles instead. “Never mind.”
Ikenna held my hand on our way out of the doctor's office where we met many others sitting patiently to see the doctor.
