Letters from a Refugee

Letter 9: From Mistalia

Uncle Aamir,

Since the smugglers disappeared, dad took the job of steering the ship, apparently he had been on a boat before. We helped the families bury their dead in the sea and then had a moment of silence for the dead. We then cleaned the boat thoroughly, so that it wasn't as much of a horrific mess anymore. We found stocks of food in a cabin that looked like they'd be able to last us for a week. There was barely any food and i'm pretty sure it'd take us more than a week to get to Australia. I was beginning to realise just why the smugglers had left, I knew we shouldn't have trusted them! With these thoughts in mind I helped dad tidy up the stocks into portions. By the time the twins regained consciousness, the place actually looked halfway decent.

Dad told them that the smugglers had gone to get some help so they wouldn't be scared or worried. Nobody talked about the pirates since it was a sore subject for everyone onboard the ship. Speaking of which, once dad had comforted everyone, I got a huge lecture on being careful and not talking back to people who can probably kill me. I guess his pride in my courage wasn't enough to stop his parental urge to lecture me about my safety. I tried telling him why i did it but he just flat out told me that they'd be fine either way. The twins kept me busy with asking what had happened while they were sick and everyone else was busy mourning, so no one noticed the hole in the middle of the deck.

It was night fall before anyone noticed there was a hole in the boat, the only reason we knew that was because of the huge wave.The wave came onto the boat while we were sleeping, it overlapped the boat and water poured into the boat. I woke up as soon as i felt something wet underneath me, then quickly woke dad and the twins up. Dad then woke up the entire boat, getting people to grab buckets and start heaving the water out of the boat. Everyone tries their hardest to get the water out of the boat but the boat is sinking, dad tells everyone to try and find the source of the water and that's when we notice the gaping hole that is filling the boat with water. I think that the only thought that goes through anyone's mind is, "we're doomed."

Even though we had sorta accepted the fact that we were going to very well drown, no one wanted to give up. We kept trying to get the water out of the boat until we could no longer fool ourselves. The boat was sinking and since most of us didn't know how to swim properly, we could drown. I think we all just stood there waiting for the boat to sink, my brothers had the look of utter terror on their faces. It broke my heart to see that, it meant I had failed, I couldn't even keep them alive long enough to let them have a chance to live. For a few minutes I just stood there holding onto the pendant like it was my lifeline, which it very well could be. Then just a few minutes before the entire boat got entirely flooded with water, I saw my suitcase, my suitcase that was floating.

I waddled towards my suitcase and then back to my family with it. I told them to grab a hold of it immediately, before telling everyone else on the boat to grab ahold of something that'd float in water. They immediately went off to find something that'd float and I made sure that everyone was holding on to the suitcase. As i looked around, I knew that we wouldn't be able to hold on for ever, our arms would give out soon enough. So, before that happened, I took out a piece of paper from the folder in the suitcase and started writing this last letter. After finishing writing i put it in the folder with the rest of the letters I wrote and zipped up the suitcase just as we were submerged in water up to our shoulders.

My only thoughts at that moment were that, I hope we got to live. I want to live a life worth talking about, a life where Sun and Moon can actually live and not be afraid of being lived. If I lived on after that moment, I wished we would all be together because I can't handle losing another member of my family, I just can't. So I held onto the suitcase like my life depended on it, which it did. The twins and dad did the same, I am happy that i wrote those letters, because at least i'd be remembered somehow. That our story would not have been for nothing, even so, I want to live. I don't want our story to just end like this, especially not like this.

Please write back,

Your niece who wants to live,

Mistalia