Sunday morning, I find myself in a cramped plane with the squad. It's raining cats and dogs resulting in the flight being delayed an hour. We all sit in the plane sweating and waiting for the hour to pass, everyone is giddy and talking between themselves, whereas I sit at the complete end of the plane with just the sound of rain as company. My eyes flutter close as I rest my head on the windowsill taking in the last few minutes of being inside the agency walls.
The next time I open eyes we are soaring through the sky at mid-day. I stand up and head to the restroom wanting to stretch my legs. After my well needed freshen up I head to the front of the plane to find out how much longer I'll have to be deprived of actual oxygen. Turns out, getting from Turkey to Kenya is harder than it looks. I head back to my seat and decide that there's nothing better to do than sleep for the rest of the journey, and that's exactly what I do.
I look outside after a few hours of in and out snoozing and notice the sun setting. The sight is mesmerizing and takes the anxiety of the future away. I sit there absorbing the natural beauty and forgetting about the world I’m in. "We will be landing now, agents please take your seats,” the pilot notes over the horribly crackling speaker, snapping me out if my thoughts. I see many members of the squad heading back to their seats from wherever they were before as the plane slopes downwards and prepares for landing.
We land just as the sun disappears at the horizon. We pick our bags that have been unloaded on the side of the plane and head for a mini bus that's waiting in the middle of the road. Yah! We landed in the middle of an empty field that had maize crops about my height. We all pile into the minibus as Regen goes over the housing arrangements, revealing the information that, the girls and I will only be meeting in school and living in completely different areas. Urghh! I wish I spent party night getting to know my ‘brothers’ whom I'll be sharing a house with!
We drop Molly and her ‘sisters’ off at a tiny looking cottage and bid them farewell until we meet again at school and become closer friends. Mogul, Ahmed and I travel further away from them. Regen points to the school we'll be going to and throws some shady comments that makes us laugh so hard, we end up rolling on the floor. Ahmed guffaws so vigorously until he gets hiccups the rest of the way.
We reach our temporary residence, and my eyes widen in shock. It looks roughly twice the size of the girls’ cottage and is definitely way better looking. The boys head up to freshen up while I stay in the kitchen and heat up the sandwiches for dinner. We have our meal in silence, everyone keeping to themselves and battling the wars inside. The last time any of us were out here we were going through the worst experience off our, lives. Walking back into the world just feels so wrong and confusing. We were all meant to perish with our families and not live to tell the tale.
After dinner I head out for a small walk, to recollect myself and prepare for what tomorrow holds. This will be the first real opportunity to put our years of training to the test. I keep walking with no direction in mind when I bump into a girl who goes falling to the ground. I immediately notice her eyes. She has the same eyes my mother and Hakki had. I automatically notice her other enchanting features. She has golden-brown hair that is tied low at the back of her head and her nose is littered with freckles. Her eyelashes hood her captivating eyes and her eyebrows frame them, making the emerald green color more appealing. She stands up quickly and dusts herself. I help her pick up her things and muster an apology then begin to walk away. "Wait,” she says in a silky melodic voice, which stops me in my tracks. "Are you new here? I'm Adania by the way,” she gushes, in her sickly-sweet voice, and puts her hand out for me to shake. I grip her hand and shake it introducing myself, "I'm Afet and I just moved in" I say, breaking the awkward tension lingering in the air. Adania breaks my introduction short continuing her speech, "I hope we get to know each other, after all we are the only two girls in the compound. It's bound to happen isn't it? " she continues to babble. "Yeah I guess so..." I say, turning and walking away, knowing at the back of my mind how unlikely that will be. I'm here on a mission, not to make friends left, right and center. I continue, my walk, with Adania being the least of my worries, even though her eyes bring back unpleasant memories.
That night in bed , I sit awake with tears prickling in my eyes. This particular night I miss my mom the most. Her name was Heela. She was the most beautiful and caring person I had ever known.She had sleek black hair that reached her back, although she always tied it into a tight bun to keep it from disturbing her. She had a tall slender body that made her look fit for the cover of Vogue and the sweetest voice to compliment her features. Some days when it would rain she would sing to us to keep us from getting scared if the thunder. the lady never raised her voice at a soul, even when she was at the peak of anger. Mother loved baking and cooking and she'd have the expression of an anxious child whenever we were tasting her marvelous creations. She would beam with joy with every compliment we gave and her cheeks would tint pink with pleasure when my father would smile in her direction. She would tuck us in bed with a kiss to the forehead and a soft ‘I love you’ whispered in the dark. She never left us hungry or alone and she was my best friend back then, when I was too anti-social to find one. That fatal night, when I saw her lifeless in the heap of burnt bodies, my whole world came crashing down. I didn't only loose a mother, I lost my world. The fire did take my family but it took every human part of me too.
Credits: @thesafarikindaguy for the amazing photos and @hermionejgranger703 for the edits. This chapter is for you.
Thank you all for your immense support in writing this book, it truly means a lot to me😇❤.
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VERACITY
AcciónAll she ever knew was the agency. Being the only child to have survived a fire that took out her whole neighborhood, Afet was taken by the secret agency and nurtured to become one of the best young agents there ever was. Living behind the doors...
