The Dragons, the Giant, the Women, стр. 16

at home with her sons three weeks before when the rebels invaded their county. Her husband was not at home when she saw others leaving, when she saw them packing their belongings and fleeing on the roads. Some people were headed to Guinea, and others decided they would walk toward Monrovia since the rebels had not reached there yet, and they hoped the dragon’s men could possibly fight and defeat the uprising. She was not sure which way to go and was afraid her husband would not know where to find her, so she stayed in the house. When she heard the caravan of rebels close by, she told her sons to hide around the house, in the kitchen and in the bathroom, and she tried to hide under the bed, but two rebels found her. She became silent then and her tears were more abundant.

“Nah-mah,” Ol’ Ma said.

“What happened when the rebels came?” I asked. “What happened?”

“They were unkind,” Ol’ Ma said. “They hurt her.”

“It was too long. I don’t know how long and my own son, the thirteen-year-old, he came in the room and told them he would go with them if they left me alone. So they took him and I cried for him to stay but he went with them. The next day my husband came back and we left but I don’t know what happened to my son. My husband said the rebels will force him to fight. But he is no fighter. He is a gentle boy. Brave but gentle. Now I don’t know what happened to him.”

“Ay God,” Ol’ Ma said and murmured a prayer for the woman. I wondered whether, if Mam was there, if she would hide like the woman did. I was happy she was not there, because I did not want the rebels to hurt her if they found her. But if they tried to, I would be like the woman’s son and run to where she was and hug her, and tell them not to hurt Mam.

“I hear it will take long for them to move the rebels,” I could hear the man say to Papa. “The people say leave the country until Taylor and the rebels move Doe from the mansion.”

“For true?” Brother James said.

“Yeh.”

“They want Doe to surrender. Taylor came with plenty boys,” the man said. Papa opened his mouth but nothing came out. He wanted to argue as he always did when the dragon’s name came up, I could tell. But he could not.

Papa listened to us talk to God that night and breathed into the wincing shadows on the wall. Afterward, he, Brother James, and the man walked to the front door. I fell asleep to their whispers near the entrance and woke up to the same.

SIX

My eyes were heavy and I could not look at the sun because it was no longer yellow like in our picture books with dancing girls and boys who held hands around a world too small for people it looked orange from where I stood and it burned when I looked up and so I did not orange in a white sky made my eyes heavy and because I could not look at the sun since I could not envision my face in the clouds with purple and orange barrettes bouncing up and down on a couch I should not have been bouncing up and down was a restless head or Popsicles or sunflowers or other things the clouds never made I stopped but they commanded that I keep walking and I did since stopping would mean spending more than three seconds near the sleeping bodies with frozen faces the boy with the bright blue shirt the ones who striped the streets and seeded the farm roads with no destination in sight but tears that fell under an open sun we walked and did not know where we were going tired the heat and betrayed by nightly prayers unanswered it seemed and “Where we going?” I asked and nowhere was their answer though it did not make sense that we were making such a fuss on a journey that was not somewhere and “Where is Mam?” I asked and we are going to see her and I stopped counting the days forgot what Mam’s voice sounded like they did not know which soldiers were good and which were rebels could not hand us punishments for our whining for fear it would be our last did not know where we were going so I cut my eyes and slowed down and “Come now, keep up” is from Ol’ Ma who acted like she did not see the bodies or did not smell what smelled like blood or did not care that I had stopped walking because it hurt to look up at the orange sun and clouds that drew nothing but rain my left shoe fell off and I wanted Ol’ Ma to notice but she did not so I kicked off my right shoe and it hit her heel in front of me and she turned around but instead of picking up my shoe and demanding the entire caravan to “STOP AT ONCE” walking to this nowhere she pulled my hand to keep up with her and “Come now, keep up” sounded like those guns beating against something too hard as we strolled between those men and women like crooked lines and shapes sleeping they told us dreaming of heaven now they told us under the open sun my feet were bare and I did not tell Papa because I was afraid he would not know what to say I did not tell Wi or K because I was afraid they would tell Papa so I walked—with Papa and the girls and Ma and Torma and two pastors and a neighbor and some members of our church under an orange sun and clouds to nowhere we were walking I was barefoot down this dusty road of bodies and