Today makes it two weeks and five days of my stay in the village.
I thought to myself as mum continued speaking to me.
“Dennis, make sure to get enough sleep tonight. We have a long journey ahead of us tomorrow”. Mom said before walking out the room.
The moment she stepped out, I brought my ipad out from under my pillowcase where I hid it earlier when I heard mom knock on the door.
I clicked resume and went back to controlling the figures on my screen. I lay down and continued to play my game.
Poor mum! Coming all the way here to tell me to get enough sleep tonight whereas, tonight is the night I resolved to become a big boy.
Two weeks ago, I was so excited when mom broke the news that we’ll be traveling over to go see our cousins in the village for the summer break.
This meant I wasn’t going to attend the summer lessons the school usually held for us and I was going to have so many stories to tell when I got back.
Oh, how I hated those lessons where we were forced to go to school in muftis, while the neighbor kids stayed at home, playing all day.
Ever since I got here, I’ve tried playing with my cousin Ken and his annoying group of friends but they seem to have an issue accommodating me.
They say I’m still a kid and can’t play big boy games as they termed it.
They even went as far as calling me names such as ‘mummy’s boy’, ‘daddy’s pet’. One of his friends even called me a ‘Cupcake’.
A grown thirteen years old boy like me, cupcake.
I’ll definitely change this notion of theirs tonight.
Ken has a habit of sneaking out of the compound every night, around nine.
I know that because at that time, I’m usually the only one awake in the room. My sister is always sleeping by then. She took two weeks off work, claiming that her 9-5 job doesn’t give her enough time to rest. But that’s just an excuse. We all know she signed a treaty with sleep when she was born.
So, during the time Ken sneaks off, I’m always the only one in my room who’s aware.
I haven’t confronted him about it though.
I plan to do so tonight and brainwash him into taking me along. After all, we’re both 13year olds.
But mum’s stern warning before we came here, Never to wander around the village once darkness begins to set in, rang in my ears.
I waved it off saying ‘If whatever he is doing is not harmful to him, then it shouldn’t be harmful to me’.
When it was dark outside, I glued myself to the window, waiting for Ken’s passing.
After a while, I see Ken’s outline in the shadow silently making his way to the tree behind me.
I quickly made my way outside.
Luckily, Ken left the back door open so I didn’t bother about the door creaking on my way out.
By the time I got there, He was on the branch that was closest to the fence.
Before he reached for the fence, he looked down.
And that was when he saw me.
“Hey Cupcake, what are you doing?” I cringed at what he called me as I shout-whispered back to him.
“I know you have a habit of sneaking out. You either take me with you tonight or I report this to your mom.”
He sighed and after contemplating for a while, said “ Do you know how to climb a tree?”
“Yes.”
“Now, climb up”. Although I struggled a bit, I climbed and got to where he was.
Up there, I looked down and the ground seemed very near. But I knew it was a just my eyes playing tricks on me.
Things like that are not always what they seem.
Silently, we both climbed down to the other side of the fence where I saw two of his other friends standing.
“Why is Dennis with you? What’s he doing here?”
“He found out and threatened to report me” came ken’s voice, not sparing a glance at either of them.
I followed him.
We walked towards what I knew as the village market. A very wide and open space with the moon shining above it.
Later on did I get to know that that was the village square.
And I have never seen anything like it before.
Kids of different ages stood and sat in different small circles. They seemed to be playing games of different sorts.
Students in my school only gathered like this only during time for P.E.
But still it wasn’t anything like this.
Dazed, I walked forward and stood behind some group of children and I saw one of them standing on one leg inside one of the numerous square boxes drawn on the floor with a chalk.
He bent down and picked up the stone. Turned back and hopped out of the boxes, still on one leg. He threw the stone again and it landed on one of the inner squares drawn on the floor. He hopped towards it and picked it up.
I watched as he kept on repeating the same process and turning back and after he got to the last box, everyone began hailing him.
I guess he won.
I went on to the next group. This was a group of girls.
Although they were standing, the two people in the middle were swinging each of their foots forward and chanting a sort of song.
I couldn’t make out the wordings of the song and my eyes were barely able to keep up with their foot movements.
I wondered how they were able to do that without falling.
“Hey boy, who are you? What are you doing here?" A girl beside me said with a tap on the shoulser.
I didn’t know what to respond to that since apparently, I was the only boy in a group of girls.
I ran off instead, looking to find Ken and his group of friends.
I stumbled upon two grown ups sitting on a bench in front of one of the stalls, hidden away from the moonlit village square.
The boy gave the girl a kiss on her cheek the way mom always did to me then. The only difference being that he appeared scared and the girl kept on grinning foolishly.
I went back towards the open square. I don’t think I could bear to see more of these things these people are doing.
As I began to make my way back, I saw Ken and the two other guys that came with us.
“Where have you been? We’ve been searching the whole place for you?”
“I was just watching the games. Do you guys do this every night? What game did you guys play?” I asked him instead as we began to make our way back home.
“What? Because you followed us out for one day, you think you now know everything about us?”
I smiled at his idea of a response. He was just probably scared that I might report him to his mum.
But I didn’t press further.
“Ken, don’t worry. I’ll keep my part of the deal. I’m not reporting you to your mom or anybody”
“You promise?”
“Yes” I responded and we walked the rest of the journey in silence.
I smiled as I got into bed, recalling the events of the past few hours. Most things aren’t the way they seem.
I’ve been living a very boring life thinking it was fun enough.
But how do you know your life is boring if you’ve never experienced fun?
