Entry #40

Restless Dawn
by Navatha Rakeesh


Megan walked listlessly into the night. She was dressed in white and her hands clenched something - also in white. She knew no one would come looking for her. The big maple tree invited her with open arms. She squatted low as her thighs touched her chest, her back resting against the trunk. Her palms slowly unfolded and revealed a slender paper-roll. Paper-roll? At least that was her first impression. Double her finger’s length and a brown skirting at the bottom. Her grandma always said, white is the symbol of ‘purity’. Somehow, this thing seemed anything but pure.

How she longed to have a normal mother like all her friends? Sometimes she wished for a life as short as that paper roll. Her mother however, seemed much more calmer and apologetic after her smoke. Sometimes she hugged her, but always went on to inhale more of that cancer. Megan hated her mother, and hated herself for hating her. She knew she was not doing the right thing, considering her age. But who cared? Not her mother.

She did not remember when she fell asleep, almost as if unconscious. When she opened her eyes next, an amazing blend of colours in the sky unveiled in front of her; as though God was dabbling with his newly bought crayons on the canvas of a dawn. So many colours, yet forming a rigid pattern! They were trying to say something to her. Her mother will quit smoking today or she will die. Maybe..