A Flicker of Hope

Two young people in a car, the older by 3 years driving at a speed that, strictly speaking, is over the legal limit, and in the background POINT OF GRACE, their favourite group, was playing,
Brother and sister singing at the top of their voices, turning to each other to see who can keep the high note for the longest, so engrossed, they do not see approaching headlights, so loud the music, they do not hear the screech of out-of-control tyres,
Do not realize the car is on the wrong side of the road, Their side of the Road.

11 days, 4 broken ribs, 1 fractured ulnar, I fractured femur and half a broken hip later in a white sterile room, she wakes up, and the sisters with their practiced smiles and the doctors with their forced jocularity, tell her that she is lucky, she is young, she has her whole life before her, she is hale and healthy in all aspects, except for the fact that she would walk with a permanent limp and she would never sing with her brother again.


Now 9 years later, she got down at her stop, and as the bus pulled away, she picked up the workcase filled with papers that had to be on her boss’s table an hour early the next day, and headed over to the deli for her dinner. A simple sandwich.
Most of the stores were already shuttered and the ones which weren’t were closing up. She brought her sandwich, and in the process of juggling her workload and the sandwich, she stepped on a soft, squirmy mass, disgusted she looked down and saw nothing.

She continued on but barely few steps later stopped dead, in front of a store run by a crazy woman, the kind that sprouted biblical truths at you every time you turned around, gave you free bibles and numbers for deaddiction centres, outside her store she stopped. Out of the speakers blared a song she hadn’t heard in 9 years. The last time when she saw her brother alive.

“When you are walking in the dead of the night,
And your soul is searching,
When your hope seems out of sight ,
Keep the candle burning.
Just a steady heart,
In a world that’s turning,
Shine a light and pierce the dark,
Keep the candle burning.”


She gripped her briefcase tightly and with an audible grasp, she turned around and stumbling blindly, stepped on the soft, squirshy thing, again. She stopped, again. She looked down, again. And when she would have moved away disgusted, again.
She heard a pathetic whimper. Looking down for the third time, she saw a tiny flicker of movement, crouching , she saw a tiny “dog” for want of a better word, squashed face, half an ear intact, one eyelid swollen shut, ribs and bones sticking out at all angles, with a tail that was almost non-existent. She straightened up, swore, and turned on her heel, in the background, “Keep the candle burning” was still playing.

She made it as far as the bench at the bus stop, and collapsed, burying her face in her hands. She worked to get her breath under control and her face back into the mask it had been since she was 18. A soft whimper made her look up, look down, and she saw the pathetic, starving dog again. For a moment she was held motionless by the soft brown eyes, then those eyes moved to her hand, following it she saw she still held her sandwich, which had steadily been losing cheese. Having lost her appetite now, she threw the sandwichat the dog and made her way to the dingy one room apartment that she called home.

She had just managed to lug her briefcase up to the 5th floor and as she entered her apartment, she realized that she wasn’t the only person there. With the door still open, she started cursing, screaming, throwing things at the dog but he didn’t budge, just sat there, looking at her with those soft brown eyes, those knowing eyes, those kind eyes, those loving eyes. When her neighbours yelled at her, she closed the door, but it didn’t stop her from spitting venom at the dog.

Exhausted she sank to the floor with her back to the door. He did not move. She started to cry. He came and laid his squashed face on her lap. She found herself telling him things that she had kept locked deep down since she had woken up in that sterile room . She told him about her brother, her hero, her idol, whom she worshipped. She told him about his teaching her to ride, to drive, to play the drums and a million other things only big brothers know how to do. She told him about their dream to go into business together when she finished college, breeding dogs.
She told him about the night they were driving together for the last time, the song, the joy of being alive, on the way to the movies, the, last thing she saw, his gorgeous, beautiful, brown eyes. Waking up in a sterile room, her brother had already been buried, her parents were overjoyed that at least one child opened their eyes . She told him about the almost frantic need of her mom and dad to touch her, to be with her, to talk to her, especially about their son’s last moments, and that was the one thing she could not talk about, it led to a split, with her keeping a distance from them. She cried, she talked, she talked, she cried, until there were no more tears to shed, no more things to say.

Dog and woman curled up on the hard floor and slept deeply and contendedly, broken in body and spirit, been to hell and back, now both in the right place, at the right time, with the right person.
She was the first one to wake up, seeing the dog twitch in his dreams, she smiled . She stretched, reached for the radio, hard metal blasted out, the kind of music that she had been listening to for 9 years, the kind that ruptured ear drums, gave you a headache, and didn’t let you think, now she searched stations and settled on a gospel one.

Taking the phone with her, she went to the window watching the pink promise of dawn spread across the sky. She dialed an unforgotten number and waited for a response. When the call was answered, she said, “Mom,…….. I’m coming home now …...
And tell Dad I need a car…………..”


In the background, she heard

……….Just one steady heart,
In a world that’s turning,
Shine a light and pierce the dark,
Keep the candle burning.”

She smiled again.