12. THE GIRL FROM NOWHERE

Amelia sat on her cot, quietly, as instructed. The room was filled with black, empty darkness. The sun was nowhere in sight, yet she had been woken up to receive her breakfast and do the chores. She wished for even a little bit of light to find its way into the room from the well lit hall, but the Mother always made sure that the doors and the windows were closed, not letting in even the tiniest ray of artificial or natural light into the bedroom. Amelia never understood the reason for this. Why did the Mother want them to remain in complete darkness? Didn’t she realize that the youngest ones were terrified of darkness? That the only reason they weren’t crying was that they were even more afraid of the Mother herself? Did she think that keeping them in darkness will make them appreciate her more and make them more eager to work in the light? She was right about one thing. The children, especially the youngest ones, worked harder at the day to day chores, just so they could spend more time in the well lit rooms of the house, among the Mother’s fineries.

Amelia found it to be cruel and despised the Mother for her misdeeds. Even though she had spent all her life under the Mother’s roof, she knew that this is not the way they should be treated. In the books she secretly read, the children were always treated like they were something precious, something to be treasured. Even though the books contained stories about mischievous kids being punished for their bad deeds, it was never as bad as this and they almost always deserved it. Even the good children that were treated like the ones that belong to the Mother, always found their way out of the prisons of their fear and found happiness. But those were only stories, she knew, and this was the reality.

She enjoyed reading the books about fantasy and magic, but she found the educational books to be more worthwhile. Sometimes, when she found a box of matches and hid it under her shirt or dress, she would spend the night teaching the other older children to read.

A few years back, a man had lived with the Mother and he had thought the alphabet and writing to her. Of course, this had also been done in secret. The man used to bring the children food and sweets at night, while the Mother was sleeping and sometimes, when she was out, he would turn on the lights. She still remembered sitting on his lap as he corrected her reading. Other kids would gather around them and listen to the stories, their eyes wide in surprise at how beautiful they were. She liked the man, but when the Mother found out that he had been feeding them, she threw him out. There had been a lot of screaming and fighting, the man threatening her, saying that he’ll report her to the authorities. The children had run to her and she hugged them as they wept.

The man never returned, even though he promised he would. Amelia had her suspicions, because she knew that the man would never let them down. She thought that he might have even loved them. She was sure that the Mother had done something to him, might have even killed him. That night, she came into the room and found them all crying, gathered around Amelia. She didn’t cry. She was stronger than the others. The mother ripped the children one by one out of Amelia’s arms and gave them a beating. Amelia got the worst of it, because she didn’t cry and she had been caught comforting them. The Mother whipped her, and screamed that she won’t stop until she could hear Amelia cry. But she never did and the Mother stopped an hour later, because she got tired. After that, Amelia couldn’t lie on her back for a week and for a day every shirt she wore was stained with blood. That made the Mother even angrier. But Amelia was glad that the others didn’t have to suffer more and she was more than willing to receive more beating just to keep the other kids out of the line of fire.

She got her books from one of the school children that passed by the fence that surrounded the garden she was often forced to work in. The girl, who couldn’t have been younger than 15, hid the books in one of the rose bushes on her way to school. Sometimes, she left little notes in the books, reassuring ones. After Amelia was done with the books, she used to write little notes of her own for the girl. After a while, the girl asked for requests and it was then when Amelia started reading more serious and educational books. Most of all, she enjoyed Biology and the girl would write little definitions beside more complicated words before leaving the books for Amelia. That was how she learnt everything she now knew about the world.

Sometimes, the older children would ask her questions and she would explain the more complicated things in a simple way, because she believed that they should be educated too. She was very envious of the school girl and was even more grateful for her compassion. For all those years, the Mother didn’t even suspect it all happening under her nose, and Amelia was always very cautious. Certainly, she didn’t want the girl to meet the same fate as the man. She did always wonder whether the girl knew the man and was doing it by his request. If so, she felt very sorry for her, because she knew how hard it was to get over losing him.

She had been sitting in silence for over an hour, surrounded by other cots that contained other children, sitting in the darkness, just like her. The Mother always woke them much earlier than necessary, just to force them to sit in the dark. Amelia didn’t mind, because that gave her some alone time, to think about the world outside the tall fence. But she worried about the young ones, because she knew that they were very afraid.

Finally, they heard the Mother approach the door and get hold of the handle. The doors opened with a slow creek and the light from the hallway finally found its way inside the cold bedroom. The Mother’s face was in shadow, with the light illuminating her figure, making her appear almost like a saint. But Amelia knew that she was nothing like the saints of the books. Her entrance caused the room to become dead silent, even the birds that were barely auditable before, had grown quiet. The Mother put her hand up, and all of them knew that it was an order for them to stand up and form a queue before her. All the children made their way to their designated positions quickly, but silently.

The time was 5:30 on the 23^rd of June. It was a start of another dreadful day, but this time it would end quite differently and would allow Amelia to take her first lungfuls of the rotten smell of freedom.