CHAPTER FIVE29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCuszsSnjeL
The bell had rung twice already, but Musa hadn’t moved from the window. His shirt clung damply to his back, sweat from a sleepless night and the kind of fear that doesn't shake off by morning. 29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKa5dnz42Kl
The compound outside was waking up slowly—boys yelling half-hearted insults across the quad, buckets slamming against concrete at the water taps, the usual mtu ni mechi leo! —indicating a laid-back, carefree bravado bouncing between Form Fours.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjA5XfMs4e8
But he wasn’t hearing any of it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVomW80Z3eV
His eyes were fixed on the far wall.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpN0urZPkDh
The one they called dunda.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlwAKLolttn
Not its real name, of course. But among a few of them—the ones who’d listened more than they talked—it meant something. A place where things crossed. Notes. Looks. Sometimes, people.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq93KdcIqW0
And last night, they’d crossed it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO9rsPujfbT
He still felt the burn in his arms from pulling himself up and over. Still heard the sharp breath of Otieno behind him, limping on the way back from that forbidden path.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxHOHAsVbdE
Musa turned from the window, eyes falling on the side pocket of his school bag.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡe70IhPAUX4
Inside, folded carefully between the cover of a torn CRE exercise book, was the first letter.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjQ92lsMTRF
"To the girl with the sunflower hair ribbon..."29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyjFFS71Bid
He never got to send it. Someone had beaten him to the wall.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡS4Te26SeGY
But now it was too late.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxCjNqLp0B0
Because last night, something changed. For months now, Musa had crossed it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYaOTERSCFE
Quietly. Carefully.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcbDAqvmBZO
Never to meet anyone specific. Not at first. It had started with passing notes, coded jokes, half-written lyrics, little trades. Some of the girls would meet them at the vines in the wall during preps or when the bell rang late. Never faces. Just fingers passing folded paper. Voices whispered through leaves.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6vtfNX1IoC
And sometimes… more. Otieno had someone. Musa had... no one.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3QCdBYvI9t
Except the smile.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcpaYWbSQAo
That one smile. From the Madaraka Day parade a year back. She had stood there, yellow ribbon in her hair, laughing quietly at something her friend whispered. That moment had carved itself into him like a signature on wet cement.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbh5bJ2ZZUX
He had crossed the wall five times since that day. Whispered with at least three different girls. Swapped lines of poetry he barely understood. But never her.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ27br1DLZ2t
Never the girl with the sunflower ribbon.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡym7tCEOGdQ
And as his feet hit the ground, he whispered to himself—barely louder than the wind:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbU2ecJwGyY
“I’ll find you. One day.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9XB3NjJFI2
He didn’t know her name. Never heard her speak. But he remembered her.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTmwQJtk7PI
It had been during the Jamhuri Day inspection the year before, when both schools were assembled on the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Sports Complex grounds. The sun had been brutal, melting through blazers and brows, the kind of heat that blurred vision and time.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTyUbhkV5bg
Boys stood in lines on one side of the field. Girls on the other. A gulf of baked red earth between them. She had been near the front of the girls’ group—second or third row. Her posture was sharper than the rest. Back straight, eyes forward, the kind of discipline that made a student stand out.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVYM8UrZBNR
But what caught Musa wasn’t how she stood. It was what she wore.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoYlYaVx4KW
A yellow ribbon, tied around her bun.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8xA5umpJFj
Not school regulation. Not loud either. But defiant.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkcZ6MO3flQ
A silent flare of color in a world that punished difference.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3SRHIVBVJz
And then—she laughed.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKJeBzU4NFo
Quickly, quietly. Her friend must have whispered something. Her hand flew to her mouth, but the smile broke through. Just for a second. He saw it from across the field and something about it cracked open a window inside him.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgw521nFBzo
She didn’t look his way. Probably never would.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZvRbrfPktI
But from that day on, when he walked past the far end of the wall—the part the girls called dunda too—he always slowed his steps.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUU02Kso6NK
Just a little.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEp3sybKAZV
In case something waited on the other side8964 copyright protection25ＰＥＮＡＮＡlP36lhMvSX 維尼

216.73.216.103