Chapter 28 "Carrot Shaped and Colored Ear Plugs...dedicated to McCaine

Earlier that morning, May awoke from her sleep prematurely. It was time to put the “bathroom game plan” into action. Three hours prior to this moment the bathroom game plan had become essential, in her mind at least. One might find the “bathroom game plan” humorous, but they obviously have never slept in ant covered sand, 50 yards away from the six inch hole toilet seat in the middle of the bush of Africa. That person might never had taken the perfect dose of Tylenol pm, one and one-third tablets worth, promptly at 11pm that night and surely that person would be better versed in chemistry then May. (the previous“then” was intentionally spelled incorrectly by the author with hopes it might make Cappy smile, should he still read silly little story blogs). In order to understand the current game plan one must recognize the past failures…

At approximately 2:00am, standard time, May’s bladder awoke her. Her carrot shaped and colored earplugs, an essential part of her evening attire, had fallen out. Actually, just one ear plug fell out, the one that found residence in her left ear remained. This was a small detail that later would be of vast importance. She lifted her eye mask up. It fit loosely around her forehead and the back of her neck. She reached around in search of the clock-flashlight, as she thought, surely my clock would win a competition for ingenuity as it was a clock, alarm, and flashlight all in one. She began to wonder who gave her this clever little gift, but could not recall the day she received it. Presently, her hand made a sweeping movement across the tent floor but came up empty. May thought, maybe I can make it to the bathroom without a light. Later she would find that to be the most unintelligent decision of all of the unintelligent moves she made that night.

May stretched her extremely bug bitten legs out of her sleeping bag, stood up and walked to the tent door. Her walk was a wobbly one and almost resulted in her tripping over Red’s head, which rest peacefully two feet away from the zipper. May partially stepped and partially tripped out of the tent. Her barefoot landed in the thousand-wide ant army that seemed to be attacking something on the other side of the tent. She bent down in search for her flip-flops. Where on earth are they, she thought as she brushed the ants off her feet. She reached her hand slightly under the tent, her head, ear-length away from the battle line.

Are these little creatures laughing at me, she wondered. To her surprise, in a quiet and groggy voice, May whispered such phrases as, “just wait until next time”, “you can’t handle this”, and “rematch”. As any winning competitor does, the ants laughed at her, rather weak, attempt of “talking smack”. She could have sworn she heard them saying something but, between the Tylenol pm and the carrot shaped and colored plug embedded in her left ear, all she could make out was a muffled, “all, jant, all”. Later May would realize the ants battle chant was, “fall, giant, fall”, but at this particular moment, she was more concerned about slipping her flip-flops on and getting out of their territory.

Unknowingly, May stepped two feet into the climax of this game. She realized the Tylenol PM made her senses a little dim, what she did not realize was the carrot colored and shaped ear plug stuck in her left ear caused her equilibrium to be off balance. As a result, her third step landed her sprawled out on the dirt ground. Her light blue trimmed eye mask fell back over her eyes and she awkwardly lifted herself back up only to stumble blindly into the wall of Mr. Chard’s stick room. She removed the eye mask, took two more steps forward and finally realized she must remove the carrot colored and shaped ear plug from her left ear. She made it to the bathroom, half seeing and half guessing where the hole was, and made it back to the tent...alive.

May found her missing ear plug and her clock-flashlight thanks to Red’s headlamp. She lay down in her bed thinking of what she would do the next time she needed to use the bathroom. Little did she know, “the next time” was just three hours away. She made a “bathroom game plan” even though she was still unaware of her opposing team. She fell asleep thinking of all the restaurants she would eat at her first day back in America. She awoke three hours later to her bladder’s urgent beckoning.

May put the plan into action. She wrapped the cotton eye-mask around the foam ear-plugs and stuck them in her pillow case. After the successful completion of what May called, “pillow case protection”, she pulled her clock-flashlight out from under her mat where she devised its perfect position to be easily grasped when needed. She stepped gently over Red’s, auburn hair and the yellow blanket that covered her face, and made it successfully to the door of the tent. She slipped her feet into the flip-flops she had lain to the right of the door, facing outward, on her previous bathroom attempt. The ant army retreated and was no longer an obstacle. May made it to and from the bathroom at a steady pace with no stumbling, and this time she even saw the hole.

She re-entered the tent and lay comfortably in her bed reflecting on the morning’s first attempt when it all, finally, made sense. The eye-mask, the flip flops, the Tylenol pm, the ants, and of course the captain of it all…the carrot shaped and colored ear plugs were the other team. She was sure of it. She could even remember the tiny arms on the little bodies of those ants, they were dancing and clapping and cheering the team on. The eye mask was the silent player, but nevertheless just as important as each of the other team players. The flip flops had the most pressure on them and thus, hid, or was that just a trick in the game plot? And, the carrot shaped and colored earplugs, they were the captain of this inanimate object team? Wait, the clock, was the clock in on it, did it disappear in those moments when she needed its’ flashlight eyes the most…oh she could not bare the thought.

She remembered her sweet sister, McCaine, had given those earplugs to her…could she be the coach of all this, the master mind behind all this game? Was she out to defeat her? First thing in the morning she would have a “coach’s meeting” with McCaine to discuss the previous nights performance. After all, the best defense is a good offense. She fell back asleep with thoughts of how she had become “strange” and with wonders of whether or not she would ever “fit in” the American culture again.

Chapter 27 "Red Slash Paradox"

May entered the small stick room slightly earlier then Red and Berny, the new sister who came to their team two weeks prior to this cool morning in November. Her legs hung over the poorly painted iron pole bed as her body rested on mere threads intricately woven above and below to create a rainbow of twine strands. One might call this tapestry an economical mattress, but the subject who slept upon it would discontentedly describe it as nothing more then mere strings elevated above the ground. This morning it did not so much take the form of a bed, but rather a couch for the sisters and the visitor they expected. May’s eyes strode around the room. They jumped to the top where she noticed the flimsy wall barrier held up the tin sheet roof that lay slightly lopsided above their heads.

Her eyes moved to the sides of the room. They skipped over the gaps between the surplus of sticks and took a brief rest upon the slits she could see of the gigantic white tarp suspended on the outside of the wall facing the east. That morning it was a coat of protection from the wind’s breath that seemed so powerful. Its main purpose was not to protect the occupants of the room from streams of air, but rather the bullets and guns that were prevalent outside the door. Draped diagonally over the huge black gun in the middle of the tarp was a large red slash. For a brief moment May contemplated the red slash paradox that was the sign.

The sign protected the sisters from the same guns that protected the entire village from the rebels that had already killed 200,000 thousand people and caused another 2 million to flee for their lives. Anyone who was to enter their living quarters must rest their gun on the rock wall outside of the compound for, as the sign clearly stated, no guns were allowed in. Her mind critically found the sign to be a cheap comfort, nothing more then a superficial plastic protection from metal drops that stole, and would continue to steal, mothers and fathers and sons and daughters.

Her mind traveled a road of visions that resembled pot bellied babies, each viciously sucking on a single lolli-pop that appeared to be their first meal in five days. She saw the tired eyes of women who were alive and dead at the same time, breathing air into bodies that were drained of all hope. She thought, what is oxygen without hope? She saw the torn bodies of men, scars risen from thorns that tore into their black skin as they ran from rebels who set their homes on fire. She saw round lumps on their legs and their arms that were three inches too close to the bullet’s path.

Usually, May attempted, desperately, to avoid these pictures in her mind. She saw them daily but she distanced herself. She could not let herself enter in, even in the smallest way, this suffering in front of her. She was afraid it would paralyze her. It was later when she thought, if she closed her eyes she could see more clearly, and that is when she allowed her heart to grieve the evil in the area and the curse on the world.

Red walked into the room and unknowingly pulled May back to the present issue, where to find more tea for the visitor who would soon be there. At that moment neither sister realized the next few hours in their compound would change their lives forever.