I am alone now. A sweet respite from all the years I have spent feeling the flecks that I come with spitting, crass words. God, I've had almost thirty of them and each one has felt like an up-hill battle. I'd never imagined a life where each bite of happiness kept falling down the wrong tube. Yet here I am, in pure ecstasy that happiness has found the correct passageway.
The dirt is so cold, the perfect antidote for someone who feels as though they've been burning their entire life. The soil makes its way into my clothes and hair, a peace offering to the stones. I settle with the ebb and flow of the earth's gravity. My body: a worn accessory.
I force my chin upwards to the light of afternoon. Weeping willow trees explode from the absinthe green sky. Using their branches as shovels to pile more dirt on me.
A ghastly sound plunges me back into my childhood. The weeping trees are vocalising my name.
"Lucy, my baby!" a version of my mother's voice spews down the hollowed walls, filling my carved bed in a pool of muddy mess. My stepfather walks out of the shadows. With a scrunched face he tries to comfort her- this is his first attempt at it. He looks tired and embarrassed, nudging her foot with his own.
"I know, but it's time." A man of few words, this was his signal for her to get up. She sits for a second longer, screwing her face in one last moment of agony before joining the crowd.
The pulley system lowers me further into the ground. I am treated like a precious feather being placed by children told to be 'gentle, she's fragile'. I wish my childhood had consisted of such gentle children. I conformed to a few hard years of bullying in primary school. A geographer could stand in front of the class and point to the coordinates of Africa through the awful mole stuck on my face.
This is not an open casket but I feel the ambience of emptiness. There are not many people here to see me go.
"Well – I guess this means more cake for your father and I" mother had said after no one had showed at my fifth birthday party.
I was alone from the beginning like I am now. My parents never considered giving me a sibling to talk to either. After that birthday, my biological father thought best to cease contribution to my life. I became accustomed to that – people leaving.
My foolish mother re-married straight after my father left. She couldn't stand to be without a man in her life. For many years, we lived in an old cottage house beside my stepfather's work in Tongaleeni (known for its forest of Summer fires). My mother was unemployed, 'I'll do whatever you ask me' type. As always, she would abide by her husbands predominate control on her.
They are throwing handfuls of dirt on me now. Gnawing at the wood, seeping through the cracks. Tasting bitter like the words from constant teasing in grade seven. The irregular line of hair threaded between my brows, joining them together in unison like awkward chemistry between an Irish and hip-hop dancer.
I try to claw my way up the cascading cliff to stop them. But my fingernails are decaying. Burying me deeper in their judgements.
"Why do you always need to know everything?" I shout as a secondary mechanism of attack.
There's silence from both the sender and receiver.
"None of you even understand how it all came to be. I couldn't escape his grip." My voice has escaped me. Can't explain myself now.
The township of Tongaleeni kept a well pruned 'town mentality'. Those who grew up there would need to adapt to how the others lived- gossiping and playing musical chairs with relationships. A girl called Janet had me over for a sleepover once. We spent most of the afternoon perched on the wooden paddock fence.
