My Name, My Pride

She is just a little girl, innocent to the wickedness of the world;

Her birthday is in two months, 

She’ll finally be 12.

As she skips down the deserted path,

She notices two boys.

They are sitting with cigarettes and alcohol bottles in their hands;

“What do they see in all of that?”, she wonders.

But she doesn’t have time to stand around and ask,

Mama is waiting for the rice, and it was best if she hurried because daddy would be back soon.

 

As she passes by them, she wiggles her nose in disgust.

The smell of the cigarettes is obnoxious.

One of the boys brings his head up as she passes.

When she walks a few steps in front, he calls out to her “Small lay geh”.

She hears him.

He’s loud with it, but she continues walking.

He calls out to her again, but she ignores him and continues walking.

Getting annoyed at the fact that she is ignoring him, he gets up and walks quickly behind her.

He is already feeling light-headed from the alcohol.

“What kind of rude girl here so?” he calls out after her.

“You can’t hear me calling you?”.

 

She knows he is walking behind her, and she is determined to keep ignoring him.

Mama always told her not to talk to strangers, especially if they smoked and drank.

He takes huge steps behind her and in no time, he’s in contact with her back.

He taps her shoulders, “I calling you, you can’t hear me?”.

“But my name na ‘small lay girl’” she replies.

Now that he was up close to her, she actually feels scared.

But she isn’t letting him see it.

“So what your name?” he asks.

“I na telling you” she replies.

He seems shocked.

“What kinda rude lay girl here so?”

He’s so angry that she’s being difficult, he slaps her hard across her face.

The rice in the plastic drops to the ground, along with her tiny little body.

She holds her face.

It’s hot.

 

It’s so hot she feels a drop of tear roll down.

She looks down at the rice that has spilled on the ground;

Mama would be mad at her.

“Who you giving cheek, your ma and pa na train you?” he asks, shouting at her.

He’s so angry he slaps her again.

This time his friend runs there, “My man what you doing?”.

The friend looks at the little girl weeping on the ground and instantly feels sorry for her.

The left side of her face has the prints of his hand.

“Lay small stupid one come gimme cheek just na oh.

Soon lay children start doing Man business, they think they and errbody equal”

She looks up at him, barely able to open her left eye.

 

Why had he hit her?

It was her name, she was entitled to it.

She has the right to choose who she wants to identify her.

At least that was what her teacher said.

 

The other guy stands looking at her and she pleads with her eyes so that he could tell his friend to stop.

He was hurting her.

“Since she want be rude because she fucking, she will fuck today”, he says as he unbuttons his pants.

His friend looks at him questionably.

“My man, what you doing?

Close your button,” 

He looks at his friend while removing his pants.

He reaches down for the little girl and starts to drag her.

She’s screaming and yelling but no one is around.

That’s why they chose this place to smoke; there are hardly any people here.

She continues crying and screaming as she’s being dragged.

The friend feels sorry for her.

That could be his little sister.

The friend looks around and sees the empty alcohol bottle.

 

He drags the girl behind an old truck, dirt is all over her body.

As he’s stretching her legs to penetrate her, the hard bottle comes in contact with the back of his head.

He instantly falls and goes unconscious.

The friend looks at the little girl, her face has started to swell. 

She looks at him with fear in her eyes.

“I won’t hurt you, can you walk?”

She nods still crying.

“Get up and run out of here; don’t look back.”

She nods again.

As she gets up she notices blood coming from his head.

She doesn’t care, she silently wishes he was dead.

He had hurt her just ‘cause she didn’t give him her name.

 

Authored by: Sabrina Clay

Featured Image by: Raphael Lovaski on Unsplash