Haig
Many days elapsed after the greatest crime that I did—or did by my body. But I am still thinking about those things, and I find it difficult to concentrate in school because of that. My grades, my performance, my attitude, my atmosphere, my life, everything were affected by the crime that my hands did.
All these days, I have just staggered to my feet and swayed a little, walking down a quiet street, flabbergasted. Looking at the aligning old structures, that seemed to show sadness too. Sometimes I sit on the riverbank, frowning and shrugging while looking at the sun that is going down on the horizon. The sunlight seemed to be cold instead of scorching rays.
I cannot think well, sleep well, breathe well, speak well, move well, or calm myself. I am going to lose my sanity, but I am still lucky because even though the curse can control my body, I have been thinking normally. I am asking myself why I am thinking about the crime. I am not the one who did it, but the person who cheated me. I have never experienced this kind of thing before, but I don’t worry if whatever happens in this world does. I had peace of mind, because I knew that I was doing no wrong. But now I can not define the difference between right and wrong.
Whatever angle I look at, I cannot say that it was my hand and not me who did the crime. I knew that my hands were both attached to myself, and it was my brain that could only control them. If I only have the courage to cut my hands so that I cannot do wrong anymore, I will do it for the sake of truth. I have been thinking that there are many things that will be affected if I cut my hands.
I cannot say that my hands have their own brains or that I can control the brains of my hands. There is no scientific explanation for it. I am sure that the people will judge me for being a crazy boy. If they ask for any proof, I know that the curse will defend itself.
What should I do to make myself stop from thinking about the crime that I did? First, I make myself busy. Second, never mind about the world. Third, eat three meals a day, even if you are not hungry. Fourth, I get enough sleep, but I am not drowsy. Lastly, stop thinking about anything, though it was difficult to stop. I know that these five steps are easy to say but hard to do. I cannot live in this world without thinking.
I knew that there were too many people that were lamenting the death of their mother or sister. I know that they want to give justice and equitably to their loved ones that I killed. I also know that I don’t want to be imprisoned. If I could only remove my spirit from my body, I already have. Everything was my body’s fault and my spirit is innocent.
I sat on the feeble green grass, grass that had lost its robustness, and I knew the reason. Looking at the wide sky with some dull white foam, but now faded. The high mountains that were standing aloof before now want to lie down. It is difficult to estimate how big the world is, but my world is shrinking. thinking of any place where I can escape from the scourge of problems, problems that I don’t know if they have any solutions to or if they are just nothing but problems themselves.
The sun had already drowned on the horizon. It was not as beautiful as before; everything seemed to have faded. The sunset is not the same anymore. It is nothing but a normal or even an abnormal sunset that does not even show anything cool or color. The dusk is coming slowly towards me, until it passes by quickly above my head and does not want to stay for a while beside me. Everything around me hates me, even myself.
I knew that my parents were now searching for their sinful son, so I got up and walked towards our house. The place is now totally dark and I can see the fireflies that are spreading their intermittent lights everywhere. I want to catch those fireflies and put them inside a small jar to make a lamp that is made of shimmering fireflies, like I did before. But the fireflies seem to be avoiding me now.
After a few minutes, I arrived at our small house. I can see the silhouette of the house on the ground. The moon is shining brightly above. But the stars are too far away and I know that they don’t want to be near me. Saying that having me near them will just make them lose their beauty, because I will just infect them with unforgivable sins.
I went towards the door and noticed that it was locked, so I knocked on it. Tok tok tok! The door was crying when someone opened it.
“Haig, where have you been?” my mother asked in a worried manner. “It was already evening, but you are still outside.”
“Yeah, I know it is already evening, I just came from the grassland,” I replied. I was confused if there was something wrong that they had locked the door to our house. Maybe they had forgotten that they had a handsome son and they did not care or worry about him anymore.
“Come on, just get inside, it is dangerous outside.”
Is it dangerous? What does that even mean? There is a big question mark in my brain. I got inside the house and sat down on the wooden chair beside my mother. My father had been going towards us. He was looking at me. His eyes were lashing like a stormy sea.
“Where did that child go?” my father asked. “Does he not know that there is someone who is causing danger outside while he was still strolling?”
My mother said, “Maybe he just does not know about the recent happenings in our town, but you don’t need to be angry with him. Let’s just tell him in a calm way,” my mother said.
“That’s again, he won’t listen if you just say it gently. You must warn him now, else he will not live longer,” he replied.
My mother said, “Um Haig” (my mother). I looked at her. “Please don’t go outside anymore, especially at night,” she said, seriously.
“Huh? Why?” I queried it. “Is there something wrong?”
“There is someone who is killing people in our town,” she replied.
Motherf*cker, maybe they had heard the news about the death of the two women whom I killed. Another says, “We knew who we were and knew not what we might be.” But now I don’t even know who I really am.
My mother said, “We had heard that there were two women who died in the street. What a terrible death they got.”
“What a merciless person who killed those innocent women,” he said. “Inhuman is one who kills them!”
“Their families were surely lamenting at this time,” she said.
“The person who killed them must be caught earlier, else there will be many innocent people that will experience what happened to those two women,” he said.
“Oh Haig, why are you lulled there? Is there something wrong?” mama asked. She looked at my eyes. “Are you crying?”
“No I am not, it is just a dust that entered in my eyes,” I said while transferring my sight to my pair of rubber blue slippers.
I know that if I hear those words again, I will be totally crazy. “You killed them! You killed them! You killed them!” the words that something or someone screamed beside my ears.
Avoiding the eyes of people, avoiding gossip, and avoiding the things that make me remember the wrong things that I did. Avoiding the attack of conscience, though it was unavoidable.
The gossipers seemed to outpace the market, the news outpaced the virus when it spreads, people’s eyes outpaced the juries when judging, and everything outpaced the one being pursued by death when avoiding me.
However, everything is avoiding me. Nothing can outpace my family. Because even if the greatest and strongest hurricane came, they would never leave me behind, and I know that I would be loved. I am grateful that there are some people like my parents that can sacrifice their happiness for someone they love. Maybe it’s love that made them sacrifice for the others and those who don’t care about the world don’t have even a little love.
Sitting on my chair inside our classroom and looking at the door, but I had slipped into a reverie when I saw someone. Someone who has made me fall in love since the first day of school.
Jayne Salvador is our beautiful teacher. She had just entered our classroom. She is now wearing a white shirt with a collar and a bluish-white skirt. Well, she was still beautiful in whatever clothes she wore, even if she was wearing undergarments. Starts with her face: a high nose, white skin, kissable lips, high eyelashes, and thin eyebrows. Add her long banded hair, lovely form with high, rounded, firm young breasts, a small waist, trim curving hips, and shapely legs. No man will not fall in love with her. The painful part that everyone knew and broke every man’s heart and also my heart. It is impossible that my beautiful teacher doesn’t have any boyfriends, or that she has many boyfriends.
It’s been many months since I started to fall in love with my teacher. I hope that I can woo her soon. I was always showing her my flirty smile, but she was always avoiding making eye-to-eye contact with me. Though she’s not showing any sign that she loves me too, I am content with what I can get. Whatever it is, broken heart will heal. The most important thing is, I am happy with what I am doing, and I can lose anything for love rather than live an arid, sad, cynical, skeptic, and irritable life in this world.
I remembered the text that I had read and memorized. I am always reading this book in our house, in school, on the riverbank, on grassland, or anywhere. We are just poor and I can’t buy any other books. That’s why I am always reading the one and only book that is always in my blue backpack and I bring it wherever I go. Because of that, I had memorized some of its text.
“Because the more our life is one of love, the more it is sweet, poetic and painless, or else it is accompanied by sacrifices which increase the love and make one experience the delight of weeping in peace.”
“The life of love is an interlacing, a poetic crown of sweet sorrow, of sad beauty, of poetry of sorrow and of sacrifice, and this succeeds in being dear, almost sighed for.”
“Of all your loves, seek those that are more noble. The more sublime the object loved, the nobler the love itself. The more noble the faculty from which love emanates, the sweeter the love.”
“Oh, how hateful is a life without love. The earth and men seem ungrateful… the sun cold, and death… oh, death seems to be the only good that ends all pain.”
“Therefore, love is the most sublime object.”
My beautiful teacher, Jayne Salvador, sat down on the chair and put her things on the table that was made of varnished wood and covered with a tablecloth. She started checking our attendance. While she was mentioning the names of my classmates, I noticed that France is not here now, but our said teacher said that she already knew the reason why France was absent.
“Everyone, please keep quiet and listen to me. I will tell you why France is absent today,” teacher Jayne Salvador said.
My other classmates started talking about their sulking, though our teacher had not yet told them the reason why my friend was absent. My classmates are saying that our teacher was so unfair because she excused France, though even if they were absent, our teacher would really mark them as absent.
“Shhhhhh… keep quiet everyone, give me a second to explain why France Lim is absent and I am sure that you will understand everything better.” Because our teacher said those words in a begging manner, my classmates stopped talking and listened intently to what teacher Jayne had to say. They wanted to take note of every word that she wanted to say.
“How can I start this?” She thinks about where to start. “Your classmate, Mr. France Lim, was absent today because—”
I was surprised when I heard our teacher say that France’s mother was dead! Dead! Dead, many times that the words echoed in my brain.
“Dead, dead, dead?” is the sound made by my classmates.
“So what kind of excuse is more eligible to be marked as an excused and not an absent in our class?” The teacher asked “If you are not believing me, then let us go there tonight to convey our condolences to your classmate, Mr. France Lim.”
Motherf*cker, please don’t make my inference to be real. France Lim is my only best friend. I will be empty if he’s gone. I will be more alone in this world. What kind of life is this? Why would you get everything from me? What did I do wrong? Forgive my sins! I want to live a peaceful life.
Calm yourself, there is still a big chance that your inference is not real. Maybe I can visit my friend after the class, to convey my condolences and to prove that my inference is not true. I cannot get peace of mind if I don’t make sure of something, and my conscience won’t let me sleep if my inference was real. But it is better to make sure of everything than to live every day with a baffled mind.
Our teacher, Miss Jayne Salvador, continued checking our attendance. Instead of a cold ‘present’ when she mentioned my name, I can’t smile in a flirty way anymore.
“Mr. Haig Zschech, are you just okay?” my teacher asked.
I just replied with a cold ‘okay’, which made everyone in the classroom look at me. Maybe they noticed that I was frail this time. They only knew that I was a robust boy since the first day of school. Well, I am not doing anything wrong to them. It defends on me if I do what I want to do, as long as I am not stepping on them.
Many hours have passed, and I am still sitting on my chair, thinking about my friend, whom I knew was bereaved by the death of his mother. Another hour elapsed, and the class was over. As usual, my classmates were congested at the door of the classroom. It had been a month, but they had not been learning to be gentle. I had been hoping that everything could be done in a slow way so that we could not hurt anyone because of our haste.