I sat down and cried. Not just a few tears—real, chest-aching sobs. I couldn’t believe I wouldn’t get the chance to learn in the same school as my friends. JK, EK, and MA had all been accepted to OWASS, while Frank was off to Prempeh. And me? I had been thrown into ADASS. ADASS! A school I hadn’t even heard of before.
Shame washed over me. I couldn’t bring myself to tell anyone. I didn’t want to lie either, so I chose silence. I locked myself in my room and refused to speak to anyone—not my mum, not Frank, not EK or MA, and not even my pastor. I felt cheated. Yes, cheated.
Frank and I had the same grades, so why did he get into Prempeh while I was pushed into a school I didn’t even know? To make things worse, I hadn’t been placed in Science, the program I had chosen. Instead, I’d been dumped into General Arts.
My mum was worried. I heard her outside making calls, probably summoning another person to come talk to me. Meanwhile, I stayed inside, crying over everything I had lost. Not just the school of my choice, but also the only girl I had ever loved, the chance to talk to that beautiful girl who had helped me find my post office key, and now, the closeness of my friends. Our bond—our mischief, our laughter—would be scattered. I would have to start all over again in a mixed school when all I had ever wanted was a single-sex environment. If that wasn’t an invisible hand trying to make my life miserable, then I didn’t know what was.
Just then, I heard a knock on the door. Someone called my name. It wasn’t my mum. The voice belonged to someone else.
At first, I ignored it, but the knocking grew persistent. Finally, I opened the door just a little—and froze.
It was her. The last person I expected to see. My mum must have been truly desperate to convince her to come. I hadn’t even known she was back in the country. This was the first time I had seen her since the day I spotted her in a car months ago.
Why was she here? What was her motivation for showing up at my door now, especially after sending Lucy abroad to continue her education? Wait—was Lucy back in Ghana? Had she come with her?
The thought made me fling the door open wider. She stepped inside, smiling warmly, as if she was genuinely happy to see me.
I wanted to ask if Lucy had returned, but the words stuck in my throat. She sat on my bed, while I stood there awkwardly in my boxer shorts and singlet, wishing she were Lucy herself and not Lucy’s mum.
“When your mum told me you’ve been acting strange because you didn’t get into your school of choice, I became worried,” she began. “I couldn’t even finish my food. You know, Lucy used to do the same thing—lock herself in her room for days. It took so much pleading to get her to open the door. Honestly, I’m glad her dad came for her. She was becoming uncontrollable.”
I sat beside her, listening quietly. Her words were meant to comfort, and in a way, they did. She convinced me that going to a mixed school wasn’t the end of the world. But the part I didn’t like was when she mentioned I’d have the chance to make both male and female friends.
If only she knew what I had vowed. I had promised myself never to fall in love again. Not after Lucy. No one else could ever compare.
What I really wished was for her to bring Lucy back to Ghana. But from what she said, it would take nothing short of a miracle.
A miracle? Yes.
The question was—how do I make a miracle happen to get Lucy back?
No comments:
Post a Comment