Some Words

He couldn't contain it any longer.

"It's not fair," he enunciated vehemently. "You try so hard every day to be good and then along comes Mother's Day and you have to try even harder." The seven year old boy turned to look out the window of the SUV but paused to add, "And there's Christmas and Easter."

"And Father's Day," his dad interjected.

"There's Father's Day, too?" he asked incredulously. "I forgot Father's Day."

I'm not exactly sure how the conversation continued. They were on their way to Grandma Plett's house to wish her a happy Mother's Day. I do know this. The boy's mother sat pondering for a while. Zack really did try hard every day. And those tantrums weren't signs of lack of effort but frustration at trying so hard and wanting so much and not getting it all right. How hard it is, even at seven, to live true to oneself and still try to please those around you.

---

"No!" she screamed. "I will not let you take me back there." Her hands were bound and in actuality her mouth was gagged. The words she longed to scream went unuttered. The fight she wished to demonstrate, the rebellion she wished to exert were futile expenditures of energy against a futile cause. She was. Once again. In their hands. She knew exactly where they were headed as she lay bound and gagged in the back of the utility-sized van. At least she could see, but oh, how she wished she couldn't. She didn't want to know what lay ahead. She didn't want a repeat performance. Not today. Not yesterday. Not ever.

---

It was over. That. Was over. She leaned over the tin two-gallon pail and let the vomit come in heaves. Let it come. Let her body clean her of this evil. She was wet and cold, clammy and feverish. She looked at her body in between vomits. Her clothes. She was completely naked. She'd have to get home somehow. A bus maybe. She'd need clothes. She wondered if she could find them. Probably where it all started. Did she really want to go back there? As far as she could tell, they'd left her all alone now that they'd completed their ritualistic pleasure. Pleasure. Degradation and humiliations was more like it. She'd never look at humanity the same, she knew that. She would always wonder. She'd meet good people, famous people, well-known and respected neighbourly people people... she'd meet them and wonder if there were in the habit of having sex with children in demeaning positions. She'd wonder how much pain they caused during their satanic ritual and how much pleasure they took in inflicting it. Never again would she shake hands with someone in the church foyer without wondering, "And what are the dark secrets you carry?" As for herself, tonight she was simply too numb to care. If she could find her clothes, find a way home... maybe take a hot bath... Would anything ever be the same?

 ---

The cross seemed out of place. This was Zimbabwe, her land of solace, her chance to get away from it all, her chance to be fully, deliciously herself.

Who was it that had given her the strength and courage to travel here on her own? Who taught her to listen to her feelings? Who brought healing to those wounds? Jesus, her Jesus, her precious Jesus. But it still seemed strange to see the cross erected in the middle of the grasslands. Strange or was it oddly free of contamination? Could Christ's cross offer her more here than it could at home? Was this trip of a lifetime a spiritual gift as well?

---

It wasn't so much that she felt safe sitting with him there on the park bench, his arm haphazardly around her shoulders. In fact, she thought she knew what her psychologist would call this - flirting with danger in an effort to make contact with her younger, more violated self. Psychologist, shmychologist. She was going to have fun.

"Tell me about something you did as a child. Something you played."

At first he resisted, pretending not to understand the question.

"Well, in Togo it's different," he started. She nodded, so glad to be hearing this story.

"We don't have toys like kids do out here. We used to play with tires. Empty tires. Sometimes we'd roll them along, running behind them. Sometimes we'd climb into a tire and roll it down a hill. We had a lot of fun. It's hard to describe..."