Darkness

• Selena Contarino, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2020

Darkness. A pool of black ink enfolded my eyes. Darkness. A blanket of smoke enveloped my sight. Darkness. Staring into emptiness as I listen to my own heartbeat. Darkness left me helpless. It left me hurting. It left me blind.
Deep down, there’s a hole. A hole where my sight had been. My other senses have filled it and have elevated. “A medical marvel,” the doctor had stated, “you’re very lucky.”
He was wrong. Sirens, cars in the dead of night, keeping me from sleep. Strong smells invade my nose and block my thoughts. Sometimes, at night, I try to remember colour, I try to remember light, I try to remember my life before I became blind. But my mind keeps on going back to the fire.
Raging, roaring, obliterating any life that got in his way. Burning, blazing, turning the ground into ash at his touch. Screaming, crying, running for my life as the savage flames licked wildly at my ankles and grabbed greedily at my hair. This was the last moment that I had sight. Ash and smoke stung at my eyes and everything went dark. Did God make me blind so I didn’t have to watch others suffer?
“This year, you’re going to real school.”
A school. Not an institution. A school. My parents wanted me to be treated normally, so I was enrolled into a real school. Learning was tough. No pictures. No diagrams. No colours. But nobody noticed me and all was quiet. But then the wind changed, everybody knew I was there and all was whispers and insults.
There are a lot of things I do not know. I do not know the names of the boys that bruise me, punch me and spit in my face, but I do know their voices, their smells. I do not know why girls whisper, laugh and insult me behind my back, but I do know what they're saying. I do not know how my mother reacts when I come home with tears streaking down my face, but I do know she worries at night. I did not know the winds were changing again, that God would turn His face to me and smile, but I did know it was due.
Joy. she’s a curious thing. Hidden away, when you think you need her, and here when you do. She comes in many forms. An object, an event, a friend. Friends come in many forms, too. Human or guide dog. Joy, the guide dog, better than any object or event. Joy, the guide dog, a blind person’s sunshine.