Day 29 – April 29 – Part 1 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – The Last Storm

Day 29 – April 29 – Part 1 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – The Last Storm

The storm I dreaded came at the end of April at four o’clock in the afternoon. I’ve feared the Highveld thunderstorms this year. Not the usual storms, the proper storms with lightning and hail and enough water to flood the streets and stall cars. One part of me hoped for that storm every afternoon of the rain season. Another part wished the storms were over forever and that global warming would see to that. The smallest part wished that winter would come and that it would snow at last. But who was I kidding? It almost never snows here. A few flakes now and then, sure, but not enough to get my uncle to come back. And it’s been nearly thirty years. But at least a good and proper storm would give me a chance to explain to my uncle what had happened to my father.

The day the storm came, I was in the mall on my day off. I sat in a coffee shop with a bottomless mug of the house brand getting cold and staring out of the glass ceiling at the thick clouds. Now and then I’d look at my watch and see the hands creeping towards four o’clock. At five minutes to four I was sure this was the day I’d been waiting for. I slipped a twenty under my mug, catching the waiter’s eye and made my way outside. The parking lot was quite busy and many people made their way into the mall in the hopes of missing the storm we all knew were coming. Lightning already flickered behind the koppie a kilometre or so away. Thunder droned and rolled a warning of the storm coming. Everyone was fleeing inside. Only I was foolish enough to stride out to the parking lot, my umbrella hooked over one arm.

At four o’clock, right on time, the skies opened and I was soaked before I could open my umbrella. But I kept my ground, breathing in the icy, wet air as I waited for the hail to come. The rain came down harder than before and the wind slanted it against me so that I had to turn my back to it to catch my breath. No one else was to be seen in the lot. Even the car guards had fled inside to miss the storm. Then the first sound of ice hitting the tar and parked cars sounded and I waited for the sting of ice on my skin.

 I closed my eyes briefly as the hail came down thicker for a few moments before being replaced by warmer raindrops. He stood before me, bedraggled, wet and still wearing the same clothes my father gave him last year when he visited. We walked back inside the mall and sat down at a table. He wrapped calloused hands around the coffee mug and shivered. Only after the first sip did he speak.

“Your father… is he…?”

I nodded. “Car accident. Over the holidays.” I swallowed. “It was before the rain season, I didn’t know how to contact you.”

He nodded, sadly but sagely and I saw the tears brimming in his eyes. He took another few gulps of coffee.

“I am sorry,” he said and briefly touched my hand. “I really am.” He looked at the sky through the glass. He always knew when the hail would return. “I have to go.” He took a last gulp of coffee.

“Maybe it will snow again this year.”

A brief smile lit his face and he nodded once. “Maybe.” And with that he stood up, placed his battered leather hat on his head and strode out into the rain as the second wave of hail beat down. And I knew he was gone again and I would have to wait for the next storm. 

Day 28 – April 28 – Part 3 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – The House Jan Built

            The House Jan Built

On the corner of the street is a half-finished house. The bedroom, kitchen and bathroom has been built and whitewashed (for the most part), but the front of the house is only crude brick walls, marred by blobs of crumbling cement. The windows are empty, the frames blushing from accumulated rust. The frame where the front door should be is cracked and discoloured from the lack of varnish. A floor of cracked cement stretches to the hall door that has become the front door. The house number – eight six one – is painted in red on the flimsy door. In one corner of the unfinished living room a twenty litre tin of paint stands. It is also red with rust, but the paint inside have never seen a paint brush. That is how far the house was built on the day Jan’s wife died. That is how far the house is still.

The garden has not fared better. Knee-high grass and sticky weeds have taken over the small garden at the front of the house. The thick bushes that once served as a neat hedge, is overgrown or half smothered by weeds and decorated by litter from the street. It too hasn’t been trimmed in years. The one, small bed where a few vegetables were planted had long been forgotten and had disappeared between the weeds and grass. But then, Jan’s wife had been the one with green fingers.

Jan sits on a folding chair in the middle of the empty living room and stares at the clouds drifting closer from the west. A few teenagers walk past and try to see into the half-finished house. They quickly move on when they see the old man with his unshaven face and dark eyes sitting there watching the sky. A lady selling vegetables walks by without stopping at the house. A middle-aged man walks by humming a tune and throws an apple core into the garden without looking at the house or its occupant.

The old man turns his stare to the place where the core had fallen. He noted the bent blades of grass, the rain drops starting to fall and the call of a Hadeda in the distance. He lifts a plastic glass with wine in one hand and toasts his wife. “Five years today,” he murmurs and empties the glass with a few gulps. He gets up with a sigh, shuffles into the finished part of the house, lies down on the bed that has become too big for him, and listens to the rain until he falls asleep.

Day 28 – April 28 – Part 2 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – Mercy Unlooked For

This piece, “Mercy Unlooked For”, takes place after the piece written for Day 5 of NaShoStoMo – “A Drink of Water”.

Mercy Unlooked For

Aran pressed his hands to the wound on the man’s chest. He cried and begged for the man to live. As the life in front of him ebbed away, he started apologising. He was only vaguely aware of the two men running towards him. He felt the blood seeping through his fingers. Felt the muddy water seeping through his pants where he knelt next to the man. Felt tears burning his eyes. Felt the blood churning in his ears and blocking out every other sound.

“Leshem! Leshem!” Gabriel shouted as he ran to where his friend had fallen. The dark clad man bending over him was crying and pressing his hands to the death-wound. The knife was lying next to the man. All the water of the water skin had emptied onto the ground to form a scar of deeper red in the dust. As if the very earth where Leshem lay dying was also weeping for his loss.

Gabriel pushed the dark clad Wíkla away so that he fell and took his friend’s head in his hands. But the eyes were dead and the body empty. He had died to give a stranger a drink of water. A Wíkla water. Giving the enemy water without thinking about his own life. He kissed Leshem’s brow and felt the streaks of tears over his cheeks. Migael was next to him in a moment. He laid Leshem’s head down again and looked at the Wíkla.

But the boy – for he must have been about sixteen years old – only knelt next to them. He held his bloodied hands in front of him and stared with large eyes at the dead man. A deep frown rent his sunburned forehead and his cracked lips were bloodied.

“I am so sorry,” the Wíkla said. “I didn’t think – I thought – I...”

“Do you carry any other weapons?” Migael asked and pulled the Wíkla to his feet.

He shook his head. “Messengers carry only a knife.” Still he couldn’t take his eyes from the dead man in front of him. Then his eyes rolled back in his head and the heat overcame him at last.

“He could have been my son,” Gabriel said. “He’s so young.”

“Maybe he’s still young enough to change.” Migael took his water skin from his belt and held it to the boy’s lips. He revived somewhat at the cool touch of the water. “Here, drink some of this.”

The frown on his brow deepened, but he took a few gulps before his eyes strayed to the corpse. “But I just killed him? How can you give me water? You should kill me as well. You have the right.”

“The right to kill a boy delirious with heat and exhaustion? Drink some of the water,” Gabriel urged.

“Where is the rest of the S’wikla?” Migael asked.

Aran took the skin and let some of the water flow into his mouth. He stopped drinking only to answer the man. “I don’t know. I was sent with a message back to Cragorhein, but I got lost. I’ve been travelling for three days and haven’t laid eyes on anyone.”

“We can give you shelter,” Gabriel said. “Perhaps you were sent this way for a reason.”

“No, Gabriel,” Migael said. “We cannot take a Wíkla back to the Ealda.”

“We can,” Gabriel said, helping the boy up again. “If he gives his word that he will never leave the Ealda’s home. Maybe he was sent to us for a reason. If we leave him here, we condemn him to death. And we will be nothing but murderers.”

“Then he must make his own choice. Come with us and leave the Wíkla behind or take your chances in the desert. What is your choice?”

A prisoner, Aran realised. Would he rather die at the hands of these people in their home or would he rather wander this desert land until he dies alone with only vultures knowing where he lies buried by the winds? Even if he did reach Cragorhein, his message would be late and they would have his head. It all depended on the death he preferred. At least if he went with the Ealda he wouldn’t have to face his family for execution. He would not have that shame befall him. He’d rather have strangers taking his life.

“I will go with you.”

Gabriel placed Aran’s knife in his belt and they wrapped Leshem’s body in his light cloak as well as they could after taking a carved stone token from around his neck. They carried him, with Aran following, a little way away to a rock where they laid him down in a shallow grave they dug in the sand. “We cannot carry him all the way back,” Migael explained. “If one of the Aíhla falls, we bury them outside the Ealda lands.” Both men spoke a few words and then sang a song for Leshem’s soul.

They each took another few gulps of water and then started walking towards an old stone arch. “This was once a grand palace,” Migael said. “Before the Sundering of the Lands,” he added. “This was once part of the lands where the Ealda lived.”

“You don’t have to give the boy a whole history lesson,” Gabriel grumbled. “Everyone knows of the Sundering and the marauding that came thereafter.”

“But where did the Ealda go after the Sundering?” Aran asked.

“We were given a safe land to live in,” Gabriel smiled at him. “Come, we are almost there.”

They walked to a rock face of a myriad of different reds and yellows. Migael touched his hand to the rock and part of it moved away like a door. The doorway revealed a part of a narrow staircase and Migael ushered Gabriel and Aran inside. The door slid closed behind them and left them in the dark. From his robe Migael took an orange-red stone and spoke a word alien to Aran. The stone began to glow from inside and spread light enough for the travellers to see where they were going.

They followed the twisting staircase as it wound downwards. Soon they came to a larger chamber lit with lanterns made of green glass. Migael put the orange-red stone away and showed Aran to the side of the chamber. There was a bowl cut into the rock and clear water bubbled to the surface. Migael picked up a beaker, filled it with water and gave it first to Aran to drink. Then he showed him to another bowl where he could wash his hands and face.

Aran felt took the water and washed the grime from his hands and face and wondered whether he would be killed somewhere in these dark chambers or whether they would show him to the Ealda and then have an executioner kill him. He realised that he hadn’t thought coming to the Ealda through very well. But the cool water slaked his thirst and he could feel the pain in his head and body lessen.

They led him down another flight of stairs, this one also lighted with the green lanterns. They came to a door fashioned from the rock and this one also opened at a touch from Migael. It opened into another corridor, broad enough for only one person to walk through. They were outside once more, with sun shining from above and lighting the stone. Friezes were carved into the stone telling of the Sundering of the Lands many centuries ago. But the tales the friezes told of thereafter Aran knew nothing about. He dared not to stretch out his hand to touch it, but looked back at Gabriel’s face. The man seemed to have lost much of his worry and the frown that was etched into his face had lifted. With another few steps they reached the end of the corridor and the land of the Ealda opened splendidly before them.

It was situated in a green valley, an oasis like Aran had never seen. Great houses were carved into all the rock faces and small villages could be seen between the lush grass and trees. He could see two great lakes and many streams flowing from fountains in the stone. A few people turned to look at them, but Aran was too busy taking everything in to notice that he, too, pulled stares of wonder.

“Welcome to the Valley of the Ealda,” Migael smiled. “Come, let us take you to the Elders.”

“Migael,” Aran said, stopping the man. “I do not know how to thank you, Sir.” He looked out over the valley once more. “This is the most beautiful sight I have ever seen. Thank you for showing it to me. I-” his voice faltered, “I can die now, having seen the beauty of Airthai.”

Gabriel frowned and looked at Migael. “We are only taking you to the Elders to tell your story. We are not taking you there to be executed.” He walked ahead along the pathway to one of the large stone houses, for the moment unable to face the boy.

“Why would you spare my life?” Aran asked Migael. “I killed one of your people when he was trying to help me.”

“You did not know at the time that Leshem was attempting to help you. You were delirious with heat and fatigue and thirst.” A sadness came into his eyes. “Gabriel also lost his son about a season ago. He was about your age. He was training to be one of the Aíhla.” Migael walked further. “Just because you have been shown mercy doesn’t mean a wrong wasn’t committed or that we won’t mourn Leshem. But we will look past that in the hope that you can live a better life and give meaning to his death.”

Day 28 – April 28 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – A Kind of Magic

Day 28 – April 28 – NaShoStoMo Challenge – A Kind of Magic

I fondly remember watching my grandmother crochet while she watched TV – a travel program we watched during morning tea. With the yarn on her lap, her hands moved at an incredible speed and lacy cloth formed by magic between her fingers. She barely looked down, but kept her eyes on the screen or even talked to me while her hands did their own thing. At five years old I couldn’t understand how she could just move her hands and the yarn could spin by magic between her fingers. One day I asked her to show me how she did her magic.

That she showed me the ‘secret’ didn’t take away any of the pleasure of watching her. Rather, I wanted to try it out myself. She explained that I will need a bigger needle to start off with, but that she will teach me soon. My grandfather was now secretly charged with going into town to go and buy a crochet hook suitable for a beginner. My grandmother, meanwhile, picked out a ball of yarn in my favourite colour – purple – from her stash in their room and with a huge smile they showed me the surprise gift one afternoon. The hook was made from bright yellow plastic and suited well to my small hand. I learned how to hold the yarn and make chain stitches. Soon I learned how to make trebles and do filet crochet. Then followed working in the round and getting to work with a smaller hook and finer yarn. One month I was even treated with a crochet magazine, and I started to work from ‘grown up’ patterns.

A few years after that, and not long after my grandfather’s death, my grandmother passed away. When we had to start clearing out the cupboards, my mother pointed me towards my grandmother’s cupboards where her yarn stash was kept. “You’re the one that does all the crafting around here,” she said. “You should have her needlework things.” I stared at the cupboards in disbelief. Me? I sat down and opened the first pair of doors. They smelled of my grandma and I had to fight back the tears.

All her yarn was still there, along with a couple of half-finished doilies and sweaters. From one cupboard came a whole stack of crochet magazines. I couldn’t believe she was never coming back, even though I had lived through her whole illness.

Then, from one cupboard came three bags which I had forgotten about completely. I had been five or six when she had showed them to me. “One day, when you’re grown up, this will be yours,” she said, pointing to one. Now, almost ten years later, I pulled the blanket from the bag. My name, written on a slip of paper, was still pinned on it. The granny squares all had purple in them and I immediately remembered where I had seen the yarn before. It was the same yarn she used to teach me how to crochet with. 

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 3 – Just a Little Technical Flaw

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 3 – Just a Little Technical Flaw

“As I said, Sir, it was meant as a simple experiment for the prototypes. A random office block was chosen. Then a random person within that office block was chosen. The device was installed a week ago after the business had already closed. It was small and could be placed underneath the desk without influencing the computer, printer or other equipment.”

“We understand it was an experiment, Smith, we want to know what went wrong.”

“May I have some water, please?”

“After you have answered our questions.”

“But-”

“After you have answered our questions you can have all the imported spring water you can drink, for all I care. But first you must answer our questions. Now. What went wrong?”

“I am not sure. The device was made by the best brains the government could buy. I installed it myself. It was supposed to work.”

“But it was an experiment.”

“Experiments may work. We were sure that this one would work.”

“Look at these pictures. Do you know these people?”

“I know their faces. Look – I only installed the devices at the desk I was told. I didn’t choose them. The system chose them. I didn’t ask their names. It wasn’t necessary.”

“Not necessary, Smith? O’Brian was a devoted husband. Van der Berg would have become a grandmother yesterday. Kelembe was the only bread winner in the family.”

“The experiment was supposed to work.”

“But it didn’t.”

“No.”

“Where are these people… these… test subjects now, Smith?”

“I – we are not completely sure. You see, we wanted to increase time within the field created by the device. We thought that it would either work or nothing would happen. There would have been enough time in a day for one person to do the work of ten or twenty people!”

“Yes, yes, you’ve said that a million times! Where are they?”

“Technically they are still in the same place, Sir. But I am afraid that, due to an unforeseen technical error we have sent them to another time. Unfortunately and completely by accident. And we have yet to find them or the device that sent them there. May I have some water now, please?”

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 2 – A Lift

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 2 – A Lift

The problem with hitch-hiking in a known ghost spot is that no one particularly wants to give you a lift. I knew this, of course, before I packed a bag and trekked out to the main road to get a lift to the closest metropolis, but I did it anyway. I was dressed in my best jeans (no tears, only a little fraying and a couple of paint spots) and my best shirt. I took my hat off every time a car passed and I threw my thumb into the air. After a couple of hours I started off down the road in what I hoped was the right direction. A couple of trucks passed me, their horns blaring and I even caught a couple of curses as I lifted my thumb and smiled my best “I-just-want-a-ride-to-town-not-to-kill-you” smile. It didn't work.

I camped out that first night underneath a sign proclaiming that the next fast food family restaurant was only 20 miles away. I had no idea we had a family restaurant that close. But it did prove to me that I was going in the right direction. I had only been off the farm a couple of times in my life and then we only went to the local general dealer.

I ate a stale sandwich and waited to fall asleep with my head cradled on my bag. I wondered if I would see one of the hitch-hiking ghosts. Maybe they could give me a pointer or two in getting a ride to the city. It was worth a try. I only had one soggy sandwich left and was not about to turn back home before I had even tried to get a job in the city. I would show the family that I could make a living for myself in the city.

I woke up the next morning when the sun started to glint off the sign above my head. It was nearly nine o’clock and I quickly jumped up to check that I still had all my belongings. Everything was there, including the money hidden inside my hat, and I could feel my whole body relaxing. I put my hat back on, rummaged in my bag for a piece of gum and threw my thumb in the air with each car that passed as I plodded along.

Ahead I came to a bend in the road. On one side was a plain golden with wheat. On the other side the earth plunged away. Right on the bend, where the earth fell away was planted an old wooden cross. The ribbons on it were faded and the flowers long dead. I walked up to it and bent down to better get a look at what was written on it. A flash of light blinded me for a moment.

The problem with hitch-hiking in a known ghost spot is that no one particularly wants to give you a lift. I knew this, of course, before I packed a bag and trekked out to the main road to get a lift to the closest metropolis, but I did it anyway. I was dressed in my best jeans (no tears, only a little fraying and a couple of paint spots) and my best shirt. I took my hat off every time a car passed and I threw my thumb into the air. It didn’t work. It was as if I was completely invisible.

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 1 – Sleeping Beauty

Day 26 – April 26 – Part 1 – Sleeping Beauty

No one was completely sure where Josephine Grim had gone. She had lived in the same house on the same street for 87 years. She was out pottering in the garden nearly every day before the paper was even delivered. Then, one day, she didn’t collect the paper where it fell by her gate. No one noticed the first few days. All the neighbours swore that she kept to herself most of the time and were usually on her way back in the house by the time anyone ventured outside for their papers or to go to work. After about a week someone noticed the pile of newspapers at her gate. Like a good neighbour, they left a note at the gate asking her to please remove the papers as it is an eyesore to the rest of the neighbourhood. After almost two weeks, when the growing pile of newspapers caught someone’s eye again, the neighbours started to argue who should be the one to climb over the gate and either knock on the door and have a word with her or look through the windows and call an ambulance if the worst had happened.

At last Abe drew the short straw and he huffed and puffed over the gate. Luckily he had a proper pile of soggy newspapers to break his fall. He straightened his tie and walked up to the door. A bell hung there along with a bronze knocker in the shape of a lion’s head. He rang the bell, waited a while and then tried the knocker. There was still no answer after the third knock, so he went over to the windows to check if he could see Josephine. He didn’t want to ad “or what was left of her”.

He made his way around the house, knocking on windows and looking through the slits between the curtains. Still nothing. By this time a few of the other neighbours had picked the lock on the gate and also made their way to the house, unsure whether they wanted to find her or not. Soon everyone was whispering about the myriad of deaths they had seen on television shows and which one would be applicable to this situation.

Then Gregory, a teenager strangely adept at picking locks, picked the lock on the back door and stepped inside, a hand over his nose and mouth. The other adults left him to go in alone as they “didn’t want too many people spoiling the crime scene”.

He took a shallow breath. The house smelled… musty but homely. The kind of smell you get when fresh baked cookies are carried through a dusty library filled with old books. But there was another smell underneath it all. The smell of wet earth and new leaves. He took his hand from his face and took a deep breath. Behind him one of the neighbours quickly closed the door before any unwanted smells could drift outside.

Gregory picked his way through the house. The kitchen was empty, so was the living room, corridor, bathrooms (for that he was especially thankful), as well as the first three bedrooms he looked into. At last he came to the end of the corridor and what he surmised was Josephine’s bedroom. The door was closed and he knocked, calling out her name.

“Ma’am?” he tried again after a few seconds. “Ma’am? I am going to open the door.” He took a few steps back and rammed the door with his shoulder as he had seen so many times on the TV. The door didn’t budge and he bounced away with a throbbing shoulder. He used his less heroic – but far less painful – way of entering and picked this lock as well. He hoped no one would ask why he could so easily pick locks, but if he saved Mrs Grim’s life he was sure no one would care. He wondered if he cared enough to give an old lady mouth-to-mouth. He pushed the picture from his mind and opened the bedroom door.

He stepped into the room and felt something give away beneath his foot. With a shudder he looked down. The floor was covered in dirt. Not dust or dirty clothes, papers and plates (like his room), but ground. He pushed the door open farther and realised where the wet-ground-and-leaves smell came from. The room was alive. Or rather, the stuff inside the room.

The dressed was made from living trees, the four poster bed was four living trees, the wardrobes were criss-crossing branches and had actual green, growing leaves on them. Gregory ventured deeper into the room and saw a figure lying in the shadows on the bed.

He switched the bed lamp on and saw that it was a woman – sleeping, by the looks of it. He bent over her.

“Excuse me?” he tried and touched her shoulder. She didn’t stir, so he felt her neck for a pulse. It was there, though it was faint. He watched her for a while and saw that she was breathing very slowly. He looked at her face. She must be about his age, he surmised. And surely, one little kiss wouldn’t hurt…

He bent over and kissed her. And she opened her eyes.

“Gregory!” she said a little sleepy. “Didn’t think you’d be the one to come and wake me.” She sat up and stretched. “Just took a little beauty rest. How long was I asleep? Did anyone worry? How did you get in?”

“I – uh – two weeks – uh,” he stuttered. “Who are you?”

“I’m Josephine Grim, Dear,” she said and picked up a hand mirror. “Oh dear,” she frowned and touched her face. “I think I forgot to set the alarm. How silly of me. That’s the problem with fairy genes, you never quite know how it’s going to turn out. Well, lucky for me I don’t look too old for my Prince Charming, hey?”