Breathe.
Breathe.
That single action was the only thing in his mind.
He couldn’t hear, or even see. But he could feel. He felt the back breaking pain along his spine from the cracked concrete he lay on. He could feel the sting in his eyes from dust. He tasted the smoky wind, more filled with grime and dirt than actual air. He could feel the cold trickle of blood rolling down his face like a single cool rain drop. But all he wanted to do was breathe. The pain faded, and he risked cracking open a single eyelid. His sight brought him an image worse than hell itself. He saw the main street of his village, but there were no longer colourful vendors shouting out prices and goods, no, there were only the piercing screams of the wounded and the mourning. His nose couldn’t find the warm aroma of fresh bread. But instead he breathed in the coppery blood that drifted up from the ruins. He sat up, wincing as his sore bones achingly complied.
Amira! Where was she. Suddenly his bleeding cuts and black bruises were nothing, he no longer focused on breathing, he focused on Amira. His eyes flickered from side to side, searching. His breath quickened and he gasped for air. The last he had seen her she was leaning beneath the arch of the garden entrance. He opened his cracked lips and tried to cry out her name.
“Amira!”
Instantly he regretted it, his mouth filling with stinging grime. He coughed and bent over onto the ground. He shakily placed his thin hand onto a block of concrete. He pushed himself up, ignoring the unbelievable pain coming from every bone in his body. He stood and, like a baby horse taking its first steps, he stumbled forward, to the place he supposed to be the garden. While his body was slow and ungainly, his mind had already made a quick recovery. Thoughts raced through his head, too fast to really form into a idea. His ears began to pound and a cool feeling began to spread.
He tentatively pressed his hand against the side of his head. He looked at his shaking fingers to find them marked in fresh blood. He felt it dripping down his ear, crawling down his neck, and over his chest. He stopped for a second, hesitating. Then he remembered, Amira. He must find Amira. So he pushed onward, closer to the rubble that was once a place of refuge and kindness. As he wandered forward he tried yet again to call out for his sister. He began to pull away at the larger blocks of rubble. His shaking muscles tore and screamed at the cruel abuse. Time seemed to speed up, all the pain and confusion building up into one single feeling.
Anger.
Anger ripped through his body like a raging bull. It gave him strength, it gave him direction. He struggled to push over yet another slab of concrete. His quivering legs moaned and finally the slab gave way like the bursting of a dam. It slid away at such speed that Muhammad fell towards the crevice that had been covered. And when he looked, his face became white as a sheet. There, among the rubble and destruction, he kneeled. He could not look away, he felt nothing, absolutely nothing but the hot tears that streaked his dark brown skin.
He woke up with a thud as he fell out of the bed. His whole body drenched in sweat and tears. His teeth ached as he clenched his jaw. He lay on the cold ground for a second, staring at the dawn through a grime covered window. A bottle fell to the ground and shattered in another room. Harim stumbled into the room, Harim’s greasy hands clutched the wall, holding himself up.
“You’re… You’re a little shit, y-ya know that Muhammed? A real shit…” His hot whiskey breath filled the room with a wretched smell.
“Go to bed Harim” replied Muhammad in a quiet voice. “Go to bed”
“I-I hate you, you shitty… Shit.” Mumbled Harim as he hobbled onto his mattress. Mahammad let out a long breath, and walked to the prayer mat. It was the only item that wasn’t covered in grime and marked with age. As he kneeled in prayer he felt a slight of guilt. He knew that what he was going to do wasn’t holy, but it was the only path he had seen. He knew that soon it would be okay, soon the nightmares would stop. Soon the voices of his family would fade to silence, and all would be quiet.
Two weeks later he stood next to Harim, looking onward into the busy town. Harim couldn’t stand still, stepping from side to side like an excited child.
“This one, this one, ooh this is the one! Don't you think?” Harim rasped out the words with a happy tone.
“It makes no difference to me.” Was Muhammad's nonchalant reply.
“Must you be so dreary? You do nothing, you don’t even drink!”
“I don’t have time to drink, I’ve got a place to be.”
“Where is that?” Inquired Harim.
“It’s absolutely nowhere.” And with that he turned and began to walk down the hill, away from the sounds of laughter and the aroma of bread.
Harim stood for a second, confused. He shrugged and jogged to catch up with Muhammed.
Another week passes before Muhammed returns to the village. He enters through the main road, down the dusty trail that was marked by dented steel signs. Harim was not with him, he would be entering later. Such secrecy was not truly needed, but to lone men walking into town was certainly suspicious. Especially with their thick jackets on, in the summer heat. He whistled as he walked into the market place, his shaking hand hidden among the folds of his clothes.
He stood there, among the people. He looked to those around him as if he was lost, and yet did not care. A man, who was not a man. He stared as if he still could not see, could not understand. But Muhammad did have something left. His anger. He looked around at the people around the market place. The children who played, shoeless and fatherless. He looked at the women. They stood and gossiped, and bartered for cheaper prices. He looked among them and found the innocent, the sheep in their green pasture, drinking from their still water. He heard from afar that desecrated cry, that spoiled prayer.
“Allahu Akbar!”
In the distance a cloud of smoke rose up into the sky. The screams followed, those terrible screams. In Muhammad's mind he heard the screams of the present and the past. People ran towards him, away from the danger. Their eyes wide with fear, and their mouths frozen in a scream. One man turned to look at Muhammad. He called to him, telling him to run. Muhammad watched the man, neither speaking nor moving. The man's eyes looked down at the thick jacket, and tears fell from his face as he understood Muhammad's stillness. Muhammad looked away and back into the faceless crowd. His hand, for the first time in a year, was steady. It was steady as it pulled the cord.
And his last thought passed through his mind.
Breathe.
*This was written as part of a school assignment but I thought would be interesting to post*