One cold December morning, long ago, I found myself standing before a fire place, warming my hands over a mound of glowing coals, listening to the wind whistle past the houses out-side.
On the walls behind me you could see my tall, blacked out, shadow shivering, trying to get warm. That same morning I was waiting for Santa Clause to collect his cookies and milk but, he didn’t turn up. I was so disappointed, I felt like making a whole puddle of water tears near the window ledge; still waiting for him with my last hope, but he didn’t turn up.
My papa came in the room quietly without me noticing, because I had my back turned towards him. I think that he ate and drank the milk and cookies. The reason why I say that is because he came towards me, got down on both knees, side by side with my shoulders, put his right hand on my head and whispered in my ear.
“So Santa Clause came didn’t he.”
“No, no he never, the milk and cookies are still there,” I replied.
I turned my head slowly towards the plate and with a surprise it was gone. The cookies were drunk and the milk was drunk. I looked at my papa with the biggest smile on my face, when I saw milk trace above my papa top lip.
That was me at the age of six. Since that day I haven’t believed in Santa Clause.
A year and a half has past. The bright sun light is shining up the white, quiet room. My weary eyes can’t barely open from the light. I was trying to open my eyes to find my way to the bathroom.
After I had washed my face, I was wondering to myself why is the house quiet? Why aren’t my brothers and sisters running around the house like hooligans? Why aren’t my parents shouting at each other? So I went down stairs to find out what was happening. When I finally reached the bottom of the stairs, I looked around and saw the whole family crying quietly. Their long sad faces made me want to cry, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know what make my family cry so bad.
I walked towards my mum slowly.
“What’s the matter, why I everyone sad.” I asked
“Why are you crying?”
“Remember your uncle Noli? Well … well”
“Well what, what happened?”
“I can’t do it, I just can’t do it,”.
My mama started to weep more. My papa came to me, got down on one knee and said
“Your uncle Noli, remember he said he was going to go away, well now his gone away and he is never coming back!”
I thought to myself, that he went on holiday and eventually he would come back, but he never did.
By the time I was ten, I found out that he passed away. I was angry that my parents lied to me, but at the same time I understood why. I was too young to be depressed, so I thank them for that.
At the age of eleven when I was starting secondary school, I was getting bullied. Everyday I would go home with bruises on my face. If not on my face, on my arm, and if not in that, they would be on my body. I’d go home, and my mama would ask me
“What’s that on your face, how did you get that?”.
“It’s nothing, I fell down the stairs,” I replied.
I kept on saying that for a couple of days, soon day after day, I’ll have to come up with new lies until, my mama got so angry. Eventually I told her what was happening, and you know what she told me, she told me this.
“Who ever it is, how ever big they are, no matter what they do or say it wont hurt you, because deep down you’re my little soldier”.
So the next day I went to school, and he came up to me, asked me for my money and I told him no. He started to laugh and I thought to myself yeah it’s worked. Next thing I knew was that he pushed me so hard that I fell down on the floor headfirst. Then he shouted aggressively at me
“Give me your money now!!!” I was about to reach for my money when, suddenly I remembered what my mama said to me. So I got up, clinched my fist, and punched him so hard it was almost like lightning combining with a rock chucked on your head. I thought to myself for a slit second he’ll collapse on the floor, but what do you know. He gets up, straightens his back, starts to twitch his eyes and gives him one big right hook.
I could remember for a while was waking up in the medical room with an enormous lump on top of my eye.
At the end of the day it was all sorted out. They expelled the boy, and put me in detention for two days. After that everything was back to normal except for my lump.
Today at the present day I am fourteen. In four months times I’ll be fifteen. I keep on wondering to myself what are the results. I hope that I will get level five in English, level six in maths, and level five in science. In the future I would like to join the army, because I wouldn’t like to have a desk job, it’s to boring for me. I’m one of those people that like to have an adventure, travel round the world. So these are the memories that I can remember during my life.
