The Letter 2020

'Dear son,

By the time you get this letter I believe I will be long gone. The auspices of my frail life is deadened, despite the enormous hope I had cringed at.

You did well son; you did well when you ran away to the city where dreams are tarnished or realized. It might have been those hapless eyes of your family members, or your 'neighbors' in the camp, or the rumbling of your blotted tummy.

It might have been the reeking of the makeshift sewer within the camp compound, the buzzing of flies anywhere everywhere, the biting never-ending cold during the night.

Could have been...

Could have been harassment by the mosquitoes; hundreds and thousands of those irritating phenomena that defies nets, or plain worthlessness of the cause

The true cause

Or just

Or the whirlwind of mental unfathomable of WHY?...

But you went to Nairobi after three months in camp, despite tender edge of twelve. Don't ask me how i knew, but you couldn't keep from telling Mwangi, the second-last born and I don't know if you managed to reach there.'

The son peered in the letter and smiled ruefully. Strong, nauseating memories almost overcame him.
He remembered the flashes of dejection flipping in his brain, his parent's blank stares, the fighting for the yummy morsels dished by Red Cross, the cryings, the fires, more cryings...

And HATRED

Deep, seething hatred from within

Neighbors were kept under constant stares.

Personalities with guzzlers and journalists prowled the camp and paraded the inhabitants like trophies, evoking bitter memories of the blessed past

Of the tarnished present
Due to a worthy cause
For a worthy cause
For a worthless cause

The son perched the metallic-rimmed glasses on his nose and continued reading...

'Your mother died few weeks later after you ran away, leaving me with five siblings, including Jimmy, the two-month-old last born. It quickly died too; no one volunteered to wean it. Njenga and Chege are also no more, they opted the easy way out. It is a pity they held for that long. The other two, like you, ran away too. God bless them. So I've been alone, holding and wishing, praying and cursing until...

They came with HOPE. The TJRC. The Truth and Justice Commission. Taking the truth and letting your heart free, and forgiving and praying...'

The son spat on the ground and grimaced. The journey to Nairobi had been dreadful but necessary. He remembered when the commission had been created. The darning ILLUSIONS! His eyes scanned the last paragraph of the letter...

'I went there last week. The Ambassador and his cronies lowered lowered their specs and nodded their pampered faces. "They struck at me.

They plunged at my goats and cows, burned my granaries and shamba, killed my neighbors. I have no wife, nowhere have I seen my six children." my bony lips creaked.

"Did you strike back?" they asked expectantly. My eyes had no strength to glare ferociously at the unintended remark.

"Not at all. But they is still there. And they still a threat to my conscious." I'se replied. "And am a pauper.
And I have nothing for my mouth." I'se replied, hopefully.

And they looked at me, slightly disappointed."Mzee, you was given 10000/=. The Government has done a lot to you.

You should learn to forgive. Everything will be Ok." Then they shouted, "NEXT!"

So son live and appreciate your life. This world was not meant for me.'

The son removed the spectacles and wiped the flowing tears. He was now twenty-two years, working hard in a Jua-Kali sector. He blew his nose and carefully folded the letter and locked it in an old box.

It was a ritual. This was the 10th year since he had found the letter in his father's belongings.