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Listen to me: I’m just a kid, so treat me like one, please. Give me jeans, sandals, nike backpacks. Make allowances for my petulance, my lapsing into ‘you know’s and ‘likes’, my wanting to go home. My unabashed feet-tapping when Ciara is played, my temporary high while flipping through Elle. Let me call you ‘uncle’ instead of your first name. Go ahead, ask me if I can manage all this, offer to offload me. Come on, doubt me!

I walk into the empty conference room, with the PR lady in tow. She shows me to my seat, on the right-hand side of the VIP. And a spritely young lad tells her to “entertain” me, while the Director and managers get ready. Get ready, for me? I sit, facing a panel of men twice my age, men who flew into town for their company’s anniversary dinner, who have been managing an international company before i was even an embryo, who were now set on impressing….me.

And i wonder how in the world the next hour will ever pass.

It did, and it speeded by me quicker than i had thought. I hope no one saw through my smokescreen, my shield of nonchalence/confidence/enthusiasm, to realize I am only an 18-year-old.

Lee asked me in the car if I had just graduated from varsity, and instinctively, i lied. Yes. Just joined the company a couple of months.

back in the conference room, all i’d wanted to do was throw off that jacket, get up from that table, and tell them ‘guys! im 18. why are you telling me about access flooring, inviting me to your gala dinner, preparing such a sumptious feast for me, when i frankly dont give a *&*$#! So can we just dispense with the formalities, and tuck in? With our hands? Because i don’t see how that miniscule pastry even deserves the use of cutlery?’

back in the newsroom, the editor asked, ‘were you intimidated!’ i smiled, and thought…

‘i deal.’

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This song takes me right back to that evening. And I don’t even have to close my eyes. Right here in my room, i can see that tree, feel that bench, remember the pain. Tell me it means something, because it was supposed to be The Turning Point for me. But it was never meant to be.

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pick up the pieces. see the silver lining. two sides to a coin. theres silver on either side. make visible what is unseen. put the brush to paper, and paint me a portrait of joy. paint me a picture of calm. overwhelm me with love. saturate me with peace. overcome me with bliss. please. peace.

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I can’t decide which is the braver thing to do – to continue fighting and hope that by some stroke of luck or by God’s grace, I somehow do it on my own; or to crumble and admit that I am overwhelmed. So here’s taking the middleroad, and allowing me some room to collapse on, some allowance for tears to shed.

How long more, girl, will you hold on? How much more immorality will you excuse? How much more time, before you can’t even recognise yourself. Overfraught with – dare i say it – disgust for yourself. Sin shows itself. Look into the mirror, and see everyday’s crime surfacing in those lips, the eyes, the complexion, the cheekbones. It’s only a matter of time. It’s me against time. I will lose.

So much for scholarships and admissions. Those disputes, will all come to naught. Nothing but big talk. If you can’t get your act together.

Do you want to be a poet and write?

I want to travel the world. I want to want to change. It scares me, these thoughts about escaping, about getting away from this *. I want to cry, i want someone to hold me, and tell me everything will be alright. Nothing soothes me more, than hearing this over and over again. Everything will be alright. It’s gonna work out. Nothing gets me through the rough like these comforts. So simple. So confident in its simplicity.

How girl, you wouldn’t even take the first step! Tomorrow, 8pm. Make it. Make it. Make it there. And please, give me a sign, anything, tell me it’s alright. That it’s all going to be fine. Tell me you love me still, that you can forgive me, that I can bare all that is hidden, that you will still care, that you wouldnt look at me with scorn, that you wouldnt loathe me, that you wouldnt hate me, that I’m still the same in your eyes, that I can still be the one. Because I can’t see myself the same way anymore. I’ve fallen ranks, and it takes so much out of me now.

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For what it’s worth, my rendition of a valentine’s day tribute.

Me—a romantic sod at heart? Silly heart, why do you dance at the mere thought of receiving a rose. Why get excited like a giggly schoolgirl daydreaming about getting serenaded. Why still indulge in those comic-book thought balloons—your face lighted only by the candle, my hand nestled warmly under yours, the air kissing my left cheek, your lips caressing my right. You smell as familiar as that heap of warm laundry, that baby powder from childhood days. Will this be? I join the dots in my thought balloons, and yes, it is your face I am dreaming of.

It’s time like these. When the radio plays the tunes which send memories ebbing. When I read Jeanette Winterson rewriting Launcelot and Guinevere. Darn, even when I click the Empty Trash button. That I start facing metaphysical crises of the most contrived sort—why isn’t there an ‘empty trash’ button in my life? Why can’t everything I wish to forget be megically erased. Kapoof. Deleted. I could try to CTRL my memories, make them selective, choose ALT thoughts to replace these, but they just cant be DEL.

Love.

I wrote two paragraphs without even using the word—some kinda of tribute. Love begins with an ugly face: it makes you selfish, then it refines you, and will be the best thing that has happened to you. Do I know love?

I want to say I do. I want to think I do. Because that is all that matters. Because my dear, what a magical feeling it must be, to confidently boast of having the world’s most beautiful woman in your arms, of being the most blessed man you know, of knowing what love really is. Even if your lover is a frumpy, overweight clerk, and you have just lost your job. That doesnt matter one iota.

The flower of my armoury–writes C.S.Lewis. Wouldnt you just die to hear that.