The Escapade

I am currently standing on the top of the southern hills of Riori - the town where I used to live until this morning.  It has been almost 16 years since I was taken in by the orphanage and had started living in this town.   I don’t know who I am or where I am from.   According to Miss Ary - the current head of the orphanage, I was found by two farmers on the western outskirts of Riori. It was a very stormy day with clouds almost cutting off the sunlight making it very dark. They had found my crying self wrapped up in a cloth, laying on the ground beside my dead mother. “She did not have any external wounds on her. Most probably she had died of hunger and prolonged suffering.” They had buried my mom in the graveyard on the Eastern outskirts and I was taken in by the orphanage - Rose.   Although I call this place a town, it is actually a self proclaimed town in the midst of nowhere. It is covered by hills on the northern, eastern and southern sides.  Things like agriculture, sewing clothes and the like are done here itself so the people living here call this a town.   The orphanage - Rose, where I lived in,  was located on the southern edge of Riori.  It had been named Rose after the founder of the orphanage Maria Rose.  Her name was well known among the people living in the town because she had decided to go out of the way and help the orphan children being poor herself. The current head Miss Ary is her daughter.   There was a small wooden statue of her near the entrance of the orphanage which had been made by some of the kids living with her at that time. Leaving all that aside, my days in the orphanage were fun. We were treated exactly like our parents would or perhaps better than that – I wouldn’t know. Miss Ary taught us and recited stories to us. Mr. Phillips, her husband, used to play with us sometimes. He was mostly in charge of bringing food and other supplies to the orphanage.    When I was more or less around 7 years old, all those who were older left the orphanage and took up different jobs within the town except one.   His name was Airo.  He was the only other boy except me who was from outside the town.  He was a very bold and brave type of a guy.  Airo did not take up any job in the town, rather he decided to leave Riori. He wanted to go in search of his real ‘home’.    Miss Ary had tried to convince him to stay back a number of times but he had politely refused her every time. At the time he left, he was 17.    There was a boy of my age named Rio who was always with him.  I remember that at the time when Airo was supposed to be leaving, Rio had cried a lot and had wreaked havoc continuously for two days.  At the time when Airo was finally leaving, he had said to Rio ,“Remember one thing Rio, we are free.” When he turned back Rio suddenly exclaimed, “Let’s meet someday again!” with a smile. “YEAH!”   “....We are free?” Thinking about that sentence later on, it was quite a deep one.  Only when people are caged, they realize the value of freedom.  After the elder brothers and sister had left, there were only 9 of us left including me and Rio.  As time passed, gradually Rio and I became good friends and I came to know more about him.   Actually there was not much to know about the others except for how they became an orphan.    Rio’s father had died before he was born so he had never seen him. His mother had died two months after giving birth to him so he did not remember her.    There were a  few additions to our orphan crew gradually. When we were 10 years old there were 15 of us in total.   After that there were no notable additions until we were 14.   We used to spend all our time disturbing Miss Ary and playing with the little children.  Sometimes, we would also sneak out of the orphanage at night to explore the town as we were not allowed to go to the town by ourselves.    After Airo had left, Rio used to spend a lot of time in the library reading books about different places. He grew very interested in maps and topography too. “Hey Rio, why are you so interested in maps…?” I had asked him one day out of curiosity. “Doesn’t it look interesting - the forests, the lakes, the mountains, the various countries, the oceans, the deserts everything?!” “Well, in picture format nothing looks so interesting to me…” “Use your imagination i***t!” yelled Rio. The term i***t was kind of Rio’s catchphrase. “You see – I want to become a traveler when I grow up a little and explore all the different places of the world.” “It is more like you want to go on a search mission for Airo, isn’t it?” “Let’s see” One night, Rio and I sneaked out of the orphanage. Usually at 12 Miss Ary used to check everyone one final time and then she used to go to sleep, so we used to sneak out after that.    We went to the Western Outskirts of Riori that night for a mission.    It was the day before Miss Ary's birthday.  We had decided to present her a bouquet of fresh flowers, so our mission was to collect different types of flowers from the flower field.   The western outskirts - the place where I had been found 13 years ago at that time.  The reason we chose the western outskirts is because there was a vast flower field.    It was only at those times when I used to go there that I realized how I did not remember anything about my identity.   “Hey Two, come here fast!” To be continued...