by Arham, First Steps School of Arts & Sciences, Pakistan
A glow darted across her eyes. Not out of hope. Not because of the shimmering sun. Tears. A dark, dull and dreary gloom cast over the hazy sky. The agonizing aura filled with cacophonous concoction of deafening screams, air bombs and wailing sirens. She glanced back one more time towards our home, torn between running to or away from it. As she saw a missile in the air making its way towards our home, I felt her grip tighten around my relatively small palm. A gasp escaped her mouth. Terror…
It had been a day as normal as any other day. I, Max Wellington had woken up at 8 to the mustard dazzling sunlight penetrating from the window and had been exuberantly playing with my robot toy ‘Inori’. In the silence, my mom, dad and Collete, my elder sister, were sound asleep after a late night game of Ludo which was a Saturday night tradition in our household. However, all of a sudden, the scintillating sunlight had started to fade into an unsettling gloom, which unnerved me. Boom! A deafening noise was heard by me which sent a shudder down my spine. My weak and bony body went numb as every single blond hair on my body stood upright with intense fear and disbelief. Attack! I quickly woke my sister up frantically with a trembling voice and her eyes opened wide out of incredulity as she heard the amalgam of horrendous sounds. In a flash, she had gotten up and had carried me on the shoulders out of our home.
She shut her eyes as the missile hit our home, creating a blazing fire as it fell into pieces (along with our dear memories). A sharp pain surged through my bosom as an unsightly image of my parents, my support, my dear mom and dad, getting broiled by the fire, flashed in my mind. They couldn’t escape. Our world dismantled at that instant and my brave sister, Collete suppressed her urge to cry as she carried the mooning me to my school, a safe shelter.
I could see the disbelief in her eyes when we arrived there, but she still didn’t even shed a tear. I could not put trust to my sight as I saw Collete, a teenage girl who just lost her Mama and Papa just moments ago console other families in the shelter, helping the medics carry their equipment and food supplies. After the dissonant sounds stopped, a man showed us a mattress where we would sleep in a room with many other wailing people. I went outside for a while only to find dilapidated buildings and thick columns of smoke, rising into the air before eventually becoming a part of it; it would forever be an evidence of atrocious annihilation of our town.
In this mayhem, people were frantically rushing towards the school when Collete’s sight caught the attention of an innocent infant girl, begging and shouting for help from the window of a burning house. My heartbeat grew quicker and quicker as I felt Collete’s grip loosen around my weak wobbling hands. Collete pounced on top of the building regardless of me forcing her not to do so. Collete made a fierce move as she climbed to the top, grabbed the girl through the thick black smoke, put her on her back and jumped out just before the enormous building turned into ashes.
We decided to return with the orphan girl by our side. However, when we arrived there, a man and a child had already occupied our mattress, which left me in a state of agitation and anxiety. When we complained about this to the senile man in charge, he vociferated, “Then there is no place for you!”. It was too much for me. I felt betrayed as if someone had stabbed me in the back with a sharp poisonous dagger. My heroic sister under torturous circumstances helped the society but the society rewarded her with despair. Crestfallen, Collete wore a sad smile and told me that we will find some other place.
My courageous sister gave me an apple we were given and appearing to be vivacious, she started the search for a safe shelter. I, however, could see through her smile into her glum soul. By then I had come to the realization that Collete was a flawless actor, she knew that if she gave up the chances of my survival were close to none but for my life and my future only, she carried that brilliant wide smile.
Days passed, Collete had endeavored to find us food and a place to reside, but there was an acute shortage of food and we couldn’t find such a place too. I could see fatigue engulf her as she became more and more frail, her figure becoming sleek and her bones prominent. Even if I refused, she would always give me the very less food we found. There was this one gigantic problem, Collete still had not cried, but that melancholic night, I hid behind the supplies to get a view of my sister I wished I had never seen, Collete started to wail and whimper.
I lost control of my emotions and rushed to hug my kind, lion-hearted sister and kissed her wet cheeks. “Did I do a good job, my dear Max?” she murmured to me as we lay on the musty pavement and overcome with sympathy, I nodded in affirmation. I had never been an expressive personality, however this scene made me cry my heart out. I shut my eyes and let my heart speak “I love you Collete, I love you so much. I never imagined in a million years that I would be blessed with such an audacious guardian to take care of me. Mama and Papa departed too soon but they left behind a savior for me. You’re my hero Collete!”. Suddenly, she closed her eyes, forever. Tears gathered in my eyes as I stared at the streetlight on her face.