Life's Journey

Life on the street

During night time when Ellen would round up the orphans, locking them up, the three girls hid behind a corner and sneaked into her room, with Saheel hiding under her bed, Barka hiding behind the curtains and Asa behind the door. After Ellen was done locking them up she went to her room leaving the keys to the gates on a table. As soon as she fell asleep, they took the keys and ran to the gates of the orphanage when one of Ellen's boyfriends, Tony, came to visit her. He knocked really hard on the gates, pushing them as Ellen suddenly came out of her room. Suddenly, urine started dropping from their legs knowing that they were already doomed as Asa quickly opened the gates and ran away pushing Tony. Saheel and Barka quickly followed as they were spotted by Ellen who immediately started running after them. They ran as fast as they could as Ellen started catching up to them. She reached out her arms and grabbed Barka. Saheel quickly went back to get her sister grabbing her arms and drawing her away from Ellen calling Asa for help. Asa who was still running noticed that they were gone, she heard Saheel calling but still kept running until she started getting pricked by her conscience. She went back to help Saheel, but it still didn't make a difference so she went to Ellen, grabbing her back and pulled her away from Barka. They fell down as Saheel and Barka started running. As Asa wanted to join them, Ellen grabbed her hand, she strugggled to break free from her grip but Ellen still didn't let go. She kept on struggling desperately as a car with no headlights was coming, suddenly, Ellen let go of her hand running away. Asa didn't understand what happened until she turned back and got hit by the car. She flew away as Saheel and Barka turned back and saw what happened. They went back to her as Ellen was approaching them. They were about to run when Ellen said to them "stop right there, she's dead and we are all accomplices in this crime so make sure no one knows about this or we are all going to jail" she said to them. "I will allow you to leave only if you keep your mouth shut or we are all going to suffer" she threatened. Saheel and Barka agreed to keep their mouth shut and they all went their separate ways.

Although they were happy about their freedom, they couldn't stop feeling guilty about what happened to Asa as it was their fault. They decided to forget about it and focus on how they were going to survive now that they no longer had a home. For that night, they slept at the entrance of a shop and in the morning they set out looking for a job. No job was available to them and they had no choice but to keep living on the streets. They just roamed around begging for food and it was night time once again. They settled in another shop, using their hair as blanket and staying close to each other for warmth. Saheel quickly fell asleep while Barka was still awake as she couldn't sleep thinking about Asa's death. She decided to let it out of her mind and just when she was about to sleep, a man with a flashlight and a shotgun approached them and Barka quickly woke up her sister. They asked him who he was and he answered "I am the neighborhood watch" then he started questioning them and before they were even able to answer one question he asked them another. As they weren't able to answer his questions he started to make accusations and pointed the gun at them. They became frightened as he started leading them to a bush. They became confused, then he started taking off his clothes and asked one of them to lie down. Finally, they understand what was going on as Barka quickly grabbed a stone and hit it on his head making him unconscious. They ran away and went to hide in an incomplete building, they couldn't relax and just kept on worrying as Barka wanted to go back to the orphanage which was better than what they were facing. After an hour when there was no sight of the man, they were finally able to relax and later fell asleep. They woke in the morning and set out again for a job but still had no luck so they just went to beg for food. They just roamed around the streets begging for food and they saw a woman throwing away some leftover food from her restaurant so they begged her for food and luckily, she was nice enough to give a couple of strangers her food. After eating they continued looking for a job until it was night time so they went back to the incomplete building they slept in. When they got there, they saw some boys wearing earrings, smoking and drinking alcohol. The girls quickly went to hide when they were spotted by one of the boys. Quickly, they ran away but one of them brought out a red cloth from his pocket and threw it on them making them unconscious. After five hours of being unconscious, they finally woke up to see that they had been kidn*pped by those boys who turned out to be cultists. They tied them up and watched over them until one of the boys came as the rest were chanting his name and hailing him. He turned out to be the leader. He then turned to them and said to them, "so you guys have the audacity to spy on us so how about we show you what we do". The girls tried to save themselves rejecting his accusations but it didn't work as he brought out the same red cloth as the rest brought out cutlasses and started reciting an incantation. Just as he was about to touch them with it, one of the boys suggested "before we use them why don't we have fun with them first". They all agreed and untied the girls, as soon as they were untied Saheel grabbed one of the boys by the neck collecting his cutlass and threatened to kill him if they didn't let them go. Quickly the leader took his cloth and wanting to use it on them as Barka took it from him. Knowing how powerful the cloth was, they quickly let them go. The girls ran as fast as they could in case they brought out a gun then Barka threw away the cloth. As they decided to be more careful from now on knowing that these streets were more dangerous than they seemed.