The Void Between Hearts ~~ongoing~~

ⓈⓅⒾⓇⒶⓁ

ℬᎾℳᎯ

I CLOSE THE DOOR and enter into the bathroom. Quick shower.

Why do I feel so wrong?

I don't think it's because we've joined the forty eight percent of Nigerian teens who have engaged in unprotected premarital sex.

I turn to the mirror and remove my white robe.

You lost yourself again.

No. I didn't. 

What's wrong with me today?

I sigh and walk to the white ceramic tub. My reflection looks back at me in the slow rippling water. 

Still skinny. Eyes are still a blue lagoon. He said they are beautiful but my breasts are still limes. I'm a little sore and sticky between my thighs, but I'm still me. Just Boma. Right?

Okay, my mouth tastes like his shower gel but that doesn't change anything.

Maybe, we shouldn't have. I'll die soon and this would all be for nothing, I would have put him through this for nothing. I have sinned, I'll go to hell, and burn for eternity, then both my life and death would be torture.

No. Don't cry. There's nothing to cry about.

I squeeze my eyelids shut.

Try. Just try. Lord forgive me my sins, forgive us. At least I'm not dead yet. Okay, breathe.

Open your eyes.

My reflection opens her eyes too. It's slow, but urgent—the tears—I feel so wrong. He said it's not a fault.

It's not a fault. IT IS NOT A FAULT BOMA, YOU HEAR?

Right foot first; then a gasp escapes my lips when the hot water flows over my body. I rest my head slowly on the ceramic rim of the tub.

I didn't think I would feel this way, I didn't think I would feel deader. Maybe this is what I get for trying to escape. There's no escaping for me, no escaping from myself.

I'm stuck being a living dead, until. . .

A time will come, might be today or tomorrow or next week, maybe next month. On that day, I'll be surrounded by an army of love. My breathing will sound just like that crappy Riverside ventilator, while everyone waits for the last one—my last breath.

I'll look away from Mom and cry, because I always cry, or maybe I won't have control over anything, for a change, not even my tears.

They'll say more than a few good words and tell me it's okay to go, even though all they really want to do is keep me from facing the scythe. But aren't we all so helpless at making the most defining choices of our lives?

After a few minutes, even the raspy breath would become a rattle. My lungs will fill up with the fluid that has tried to drown me all my life, and I'll struggle internally for just one more breath.

Mom wouldn't know, she'll only see her daughter lying still in bed with a distant gaze. Ivan will think I'm passing peacefully because he can't hear my internal screams. Chinny won't be able to stand it anymore so she'll run out, crying, looking for anyone, anyone to bury her face into and fall apart into a million little pieces that will never be put back together.

I'll hear the last beat of my heart and I'll feel every tiny hair on my body salute as I close my eyes forever.

Mom will scream when the heart monitor flatlines. Ivan will hold my lifeless body as if he can shake or kiss me back to life, back to health. Chinny will hear mom's scream and run back inside to watch my already pale body grow cold, colder. Tee would begin to wonder if this was what he signed up for.