friends – Curve Balls

A Marriage of Convenience; The Beginning.

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I was sitting in the back of a car, wondering how I’d gotten there. My friend at the time was riding shotgun and our driver could be described as wearing a black turban with his white hair peeking out beneath it; a Sikh. I don’t know how they’d met each other but she’d asked me along, now that I think about it, to bring life to their party. Not a well thought out move on her part. He was very quiet, sure, but I can’t say I’m much better.

Continue reading “A Marriage of Convenience; The Beginning.”

I Still Go There In My Head

I see it as from outside a window,
Myself walking fast, head bowed,
Life happening all around me without sound,
Distanced even then, not sure I know why
The paces of development grow hazy around that line.

My heart was soft,
My head curiously empty,
A balloon floating along,
Not certain where she might belong
Continue reading “I Still Go There In My Head”

Zookeepers Are Perverts – Allegedly.

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Razor’s was pumping. Which was not to say that it wasn’t usually. But tonight seemed way too intense to pass off as a regular Saturday. The air was electric, the bitches eclectic, and in all likelihood, you could swipe alcohol from a table and nobody would look at you twice. Continue reading “Zookeepers Are Perverts – Allegedly.”

Rebel

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“Can you hurry it up, you sloth. They want to close up.”

“I’m coming! Why is it that you don’t give others the same courtesy when they’re waiting for you?” Sam asked as she shoved her half-closed laptop into her bag.

“Because I don’t take half an hour to wait for like you do?” Jacob replied.

“I don’t take half – ”

“I called you an hour ago.” Jacob cut her off, his voice flat.

“Yeah well, you do it too,” she scowled at him.

“No I don’t and you know it. Now move, I want to lock the door.”

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Sometimes It Is What you don’t Have.

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A lot of things are opinion. Subjective. There was a time when a big ol’ line separated facts and feelings. And it was as clear as the neo-colonialism bondage into which Africa is entering with China, where one stopped and the other started. That line’s gotten so blurred and grey, people don’t really differentiate anymore. I like to keep it real. Grey areas offend me. The fact is that feelings and opinions are like souls, everyone has them. But that doesn’t imply value. Or even validity. Mine might even count for less. But since this is the internet, and everyone has a free pass to spout out all the shit they can express in ones and zeros, here’s my load.

Continue reading “Sometimes It Is What you don’t Have.”

Toddlers, Bis and Midgets.

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Liv started from sleep with a grunt as the loud alarm clock let out a shrill beep three times showing five am on the screen. She reached across and pressed snooze. Turning over, she stretched within the delicious warmth of her covers, stilling a bit as sleep seeped into her senses again. She sat up in a slow daze, throwing the covers aside. Why did it always feel like moving a boulder, getting up in the morning? She swung her legs out of the bed and stood up, rubbing her eyes and scratching her hair. Dragging her feet, she went to the bathroom, toothpasted her toothbrush and undressed for the shower. Naked, toothbrush in hand and hair covered, she went under the spray of nearly too hot water, and stood there, brushing her teeth. The water felt like a benediction for leaving the warmth of her bed at this sacrilegious hour. Gazing listlessly at the floor, water slid down her body as she scrubbed them. When she was satisfied she rinsed her mouth and then the brush, then threw that back on the sink. Continue reading “Toddlers, Bis and Midgets.”

Raylin – Part 3

The three of us were very active after school. Meeting in the CBD, going to each other’s
places and hanging out, letting one another know when we got out first personal phones. We kept in touch real good. I even went over to RayRay’s campus one time and slept over.
I can’t, however, tell you when we started to drift. Or how. I had long lost touch with
Constance. She lived the furthest out of the three of us. It was hard to get her to come out. I remember this one time I found her in the CBD, I was so excited I left my family to go talk to her in the middle of the street for more than half an hour. My mom chewed me up and spit me out for days because of that. But that was the last time I ever had a
real conversation with Constance. Continue reading “Raylin – Part 3”

Raylin – Part 2

Acceptance

Time went by and the pressures of school became very familiar burdens. I stopped feeling lonesome, and I knew it was because of the books. I looked forward to each new story with boundless urgency. Everyone who’s ever read a book they enjoyed can tell you how satisfying it is to forget for a moment who and where you are, what you’ve been doing or where you’ve been. And get lost in a completely different time and place.

I don’t really remember how we started talking. I just found us there. We had a mutual friend. The girl on the top bunk next to me. I guess some geekiness was displayed and acknowledged, and we moved from there. This girl we shall call Constance. She was a little tall and spoke very well. Everyone spoke well except me. Dark in complexion with clear brown eyes, but a little on the quiet side too. The three of us became a thing. We even got those old photos they take of Seniors when they are doing the final exams about to finish school. It was pretty. You either found one with the other, or all three of us together at any given moment. Continue reading “Raylin – Part 2”

RAYLIN

We slept in the same dorm room. It was a comfortable little structure, with wooden beams across the open ceiling, supporting the aluminium roof, which was red with rust and housing small birds. There were four double-decker beds on each long side of the wall, and one window fronted with grills. The walls were light blue. So was the door and the one window, as was the wont in high school dormitories. She slept on the left side near the exit, I slept further in, on the right, near the window. She was built squat, with a cheery smile and an open face. Fairly along in physical development. Unlike some of us who looked like we never even heard of that bus. But we didn’t become friends until Form 3.

I was painfully bad at social interactions. It was very difficult for me to carry on a typical one on one with just about anyone. I had crippling social anxiety. One that you couldn’t hide it felt like a built-in warning on my head. I was so quiet even I wondered what was wrong with me. She, on the other hand, was something of a loud mouth. She never ran out of things to say she spoke a mile a minute. As I watched from the side, I used to sigh and think about how I could never feel any pressure to go back and forth in conversation with her. Not with a mouth like that. My role would be to listen. And I had that skill in spades. Could do that without even thinking. Continue reading “RAYLIN”