Chapter five

FIVE

 This city never sleeps. I can relate to its insomnia because I am still awake past midnight. Everyone is still out here chasing dreams or running from nightmares. I still feel like a close look at me would give me away - that I don't belong to this free world, that this level of owning myself is new to me. But for now, I'm not dodging in between buildings. I am like a traveler attempting to inconspicuously pass through a strange land.

 I found an empty room in another ancient building on the next street. I was there before some people began to flood inside like it was their home. Well, it is. One woman approached me with two kids. ‘’ my children sleep here’’ she said. From the dirty oversized slippers that adorned her feet, I let my eyes run to her forehead then I grudgingly rise to my feet.

 Now I am standing at the door as a guard watching them sleep. I do not know if it is the consciousness that she could be looking for me that keeps my eyes wide open and my senses alert two times over. Still standing, I fish out a foil wrap of the beef I bought. I unwrap it with minimal noise then I raise my head and look around the room as I put one in my mouth.

A little boy is stretching his hand towards me. What, why is he calling me?

I look away from him and bring out the second meat from the wrap. People are littered on the floor close to the window. It restricts me from going there to get a view of the outside. I know that we are stronger as a pack so I decided not to step outside till morning.

My eyes meet with the boy again. Tears are rolling down his eyes. I wonder if he has peed on himself and of course it must have reached the others sharing a blanket with him. He is pointing at me, inaudibly accusing me of a crime I do not know yet. I sigh as I stare at him realizing he has been begging all along.

‘’It’s little,’’ I mouth to him, putting the last piece into my mouth then I crumple the foil and let it fall.

His sniff gets louder. He is at a window not so close but I can hear him crying from the door. He is still sitting with his hand stretched out toward me.

‘’ Go back to sleep,’’ I said.

‘’Yall stop that noise’’ someone sleepily mumbles.

I smile as the boy lies back snuggling closer to his mother.

I settle down facing the door with my back to the rest of my roommates as I begin to go through the weapons stuffed inside the teddy bear. I place the gun on my flat palm.

 Like anyone gets used to a new acquaintance, I let my body’s warmth get used to its cold feeling and the unsuspecting weight of the small object. I let it up in the air and it falls back in my palm. My fingers explore its parts, learning every inch of it the way a lover's body is learnt. 

I wish it was as easy as in the movies where a total novice learns how to use a gun by survival instincts. I return the gun while looking back to see if someone was awake. The snoring majority have increased their volume like they are attempting to reach a crescendo. 

These people in this room, I do not know what they do for a living but I know they can sleep through a storm. The men were just three and they easily blended with the women- none was stronger.

I lay out the knives in the bag on the ground before me. I twirl the pen knife in my hand. If I had an underwear on, I would have easily strapped it underneath my dress and no one would ever suspect the power; a harmless woman in a big flowery gown having a knife, having a level of security beneath the weakness that is her identity.

I decide to do a last patrol before I leave. I guarded them throughout the night. I deserve a pay. I decide to start from the woman that displaced me with her kids. She had made a bed for her kids with torn pillows and a carton while she lay on the bare floor close to them. They were all covered in the type of blanket I have been seeing around; old, torn and dirty.

Her small bag of money is strapped around her neck looking like she wanted to die in her sleep with her money. I approach her and adjust her blanket while trying to run my hand along the bag to feel the zip. I have been no different from the men that have stolen one thing or the other from me. They were always kind before taking from me.

The lock of the bag is buttons. What? I pull the blanket to give her a false sense of comfort.

Then she turns and lies supine with her eyes trained on me without a blink. I do not think she is wide awake yet. I restrain myself from taking chances as I step away. Her eyes move with me and suddenly my senses are alert.

‘’ A thief! ’’

The shout is an intrusion in the very quiet room and an order rousing the occupants of the room from sleep. I also obey and race out of the room into the hallway. I do not know if I should run or hide. My heart keeps hypertrophying to the extent it has become a burden I would rather leave to run. I have seen how they handle thieves here and I would not live to tell the story. 

This was how I felt that day while I tried to sneak out of the garage with Kent. We had just stolen bottles of cooking oil, socks, boxes of chocolates and round plates of cookies. It was not the first time but it was the first time in that supermarket like it is my first time today trying to steal from a sleeping woman.

I keep running not out of the building but within. Their noises are getting closer and getting louder. Someone needed to inform them that I did not steal anything. Now I don't know if I made a mistake by running just like Kent did.

We were still in the building when the alarm was raised. Someone shouted ‘’ thief!’’ in the distance. It could not have been us; we were still in the shop but Kent started to run. He ran through the restricted area, past the storage room, past the toilets and I kept running after him on impulse.

That day, Kent had no plan just like I have no plan today but to run from these mad women and men. It is still dark. I run to the extreme of the hallway and climb down the window. Now what?

Kent got to the garage and froze like a deer before headlights. I dodged behind a car as one huge man joined us. Before he was convicted, my stupid boyfriend raised his hands in surrender. I groaned just watching the display of foolishness and cowardice. The huge man made some incessant threats about cops and the rest. It was boring.

Taking advantage of two cars there and darkness, I picked a stone used to wedge a car. When the man passed by holding Kent by the neck, I threw the stone at him. It hit him on the head and he staggered with his eyes everywhere. Kent took that time to give him a blow. 

I rushed over and hit him on the head with the stone one more time. That man was big for nothing; he could not fight. He just collapsed but I hit him on the head some more so he will take time waking up.

‘’Imani, you'll kill him,’’ Kent said, pulling me away.

I was angry. I sputtered some words at him that made him look down in shame. ‘’ We should get him an ambulance.’’

I ignore him and when I get to the toilet window, I wait to make sure he is not making a mistake. He climbed after me. Outside, He looked at me for a while before walking off in the opposite direction.

‘’Now where are you going?’’ I asked.

‘’ I need to breathe!’’

Now hanging from a window in this strange city, I test if the pipe is strong enough to hold me before I transfer my whole weight to it. Without me, I am sure Kent has had enough time to breathe. I hope he knows I did everything I did for us.

Without having much choice, I climb to the window on the first floor below. It seems those people are not going to give up. The children are positioned in the hallway with sticks. I continue my journey down not trusting these broken pipes for a minute. It is tempting to knock on the window of one of the rooms that people are residing in and beg or threaten them to give me clothes and some pants.

There are shouts everywhere. I think they are mobilizing more people. Stupid canivores. 

I wish I actually stole from the woman so this hunt could be justified. Brightness is beginning to bless the day. Soon all in the street can easily look up and see me - and see that I'm naked underneath.

I climb back into the building through the window on the first floor. It is where the kids were. They are not angry. They seem excited, holding their sticks in their little hands like prison wardens.

They begin to approach slowly in the manner a lion approaches a rabbit. I fumble with the teddy and pull out the revolver. ‘’ If you near me, I'll blow out your heads.’’

One of the boys laughs. ‘’Try it.’’

I move brushing my shoulder against the wall looking at all their faces. The boys and the girls in front of me do not seem afraid. They look like people that had an extra life they hid somewhere.

‘’All of you, your sticks on the ground.’’

Some obey the command while warily accessing me. One boy who looks like the leader of the pack folds his arms and shouts alerting the rest of the pack wherever they are.

Before I can move, a woman runs down. ‘’Here!’’ she shouts to the others.

Now I'm surrounded like a sacrifice. I do not know how there is no civilized person living behind these closed doors that can save me from this horrendous group. 

I raise my hands in surrender suddenly feeling like Kent must have felt that day. But I am not like him. I rush and grab a kid. She is almost so weightless that I can lift her, holding her against my stomach with a hand. I point the gun to her neck while struggling to retrieve a knife with the other hand holding the kid. I place the knife on her clavicle and smile at them. ‘’Your weapons on the floor.’’

The hesitant obedience makes me smile more as I begin to move down by the wall carrying the child like a shield. 

‘’ Please,’’ a woman too fat to belong to this group of hungry people says.

Like wolves they follow steadily on the lookout for a chance to attack. It makes me smile more because I will definitely slit this girl's throat before I die today.

The girl's sobbing gets louder and louder, irritating my ears. I reach the stairs and hurry down the stairs. I let her frail self fall to the ground then without a pause for thought, I race across the street. I stop running and hasten my steps. I do not want to ask questions so I do attract attention to myself. I keep walking and running for a short mile.

 The sun is already peeping out. I pause at a second hand shop handled by a man. I pick out the clothes that suit me. His eyes never leave me. It is as if he expects me to steal something.

‘’I'll try them on,’’ I say.

He nods but does not look away. I raise an eyebrow and he shrugs. I put on the trousers underneath my gown before pulling the gown over my head to put on the shirt. The man keeps staring at me as I button up. There is no hunger, no lust. Just the way a painter would watch his work. He smiles and moves his gaze to a new customer.

Back in the street, I dispose of the gown in one of the overflowing dumpsters. I cover it using my hand to raise more waste to hide it.