As the clock ticked about to strike 12:00am, my eyes were still wide open. The thought of leaving for the summer vacation camping had left me vulnerably excited. I packed my bag earlier enough not to miss a single thing. Previously I had requested my mum to buy me an extra hand glove. When my mum asked me what I needed it for, my reply was “one is for the water and one is for the land. My mum halted me with the word still on the tip of my mouth, frowning vehemently and disputing the fact that the river at Sugarland Children’s Camp is deep and dangerous to swim.
“Never do a thing without Miss Pauline’s direction. And you must not spend up to 10 minutes in the river in the name of swimming. Do you understand?” she warned.
I have always wanted to swim this year. Last year we had a different schedule because of age difference. I was 6 years old then, and they didn’t allow my age group to swim. I was not happy that my mum wanted to stop me. I refused to heed that advice just immediately she said it but I didn’t say that to her instead I said.
“Yes mum, is it because I’m fat?”
“You said so not me.” She replied. “I care about you but not too much to merge myself into you and restrain you to behave well. You got to take care of your-own-self. You are as big as 7.” She said and entered the kitchen. She looked tired, like someone who has been awake all night. “If she’s not going to the children’s party then what could be keeping her up,” I kept thinking as I watched her quick pace in and out of the kitchen, bringing one item separately after another for the breakfast.
“You look worried mum; don’t you want to go to the camp with us?” I asked, searching her face for reply but she didn’t reply, seemed like she did not hear me at all.
“Let me help you” I offered, collecting a tin of sugar from my mum, she reluctantly let go and I placed it on the table.
“Don’t worry, I will get them ready,” she said and hurried off to the kitchen again to bring just one other item: chocolate, cereal, milk, plate, water flask repeatedly bringing them separately one after the other like she has been doing for some morning now and repeating same over and over again.
I became tired to watch the rueful drama, my stomach was racing in hunger and I placed my head on the dining table.
“Get up, get up boy don’t fall asleep,” I heard my mum’s voice call. “Take some cereal,” she urged me caressing my back. She had prepared a bowl full of cereal and passed it on to me. She always fed me well, and then I began to spoon some cereal into my mouth. I ate quickly like a starving lion.
“You shouldn’t be a problem there and don’t bring one home, I have had enough problem worrying about your father who never come home forgetting he has a son needless to talk of a wife.” I looked at her; the pains showing in her face more than it is in the words she said. I felt pity for her then and I so much wanted to keep her rules and not fail them.
“Do you understand?” she asked again. I have almost forgotten she asked a question, with my mouth full of cereal I nodded my reply.
And then I began to spoon the cereal quickly into my mouth. The symmetrical worries in the corners of my mother’s eyes as I watched her, made it almost impossible to rhyme my pace with the spooning. I wish I could clear the worries my Dad’s attitude brought to her but I didn’t know how to. Don’t know exactly what to do.
“Yes mum” I managed to say to conclude my mother’s verbalization.
I finished and got up. “I’m ready to leave now,” I announced.
Yes you are, replied my mum standing up, she came closer, bending her head, and she placed her forehead right on mine. She whispered to me, “mum loves you very much,” and her breathe mixed with mine it smelled like chocolate and cereal. I replied “I love you too mum.”
The first day of the camp was awesome! We were about a hundred kids in the camp. In my age group we were just twenty; ten boys and ten girls, and our group commandant is Miss Pauline. She’s a very tall and slender lady. I was hoping we would have a different commandant this year, and it was a dream come true. The one we had last year; Miss Nora wasn’t friendly at all and she once caught me trying to take chocolate from someone’s box and scolded me angrily, I felt sour and recoiled unto myself like when I will pour salt on earthworm in my mum’s garden. Miss Pauline looked different with her eyes bulgy like she has a small tennis ball in her socket instead of a pupil. My eyes were still fixed on her and I felt she noticed it at that moment because she looked at me for a moment then pointed at me before she asked “Hey boy what’s your name?”
I opened my mouth to talk, but it was so heavy and I forced the air out to say “Jumbo.” “Nice name for a big boy” she said and my head swayed at that moment. No one had called me that before, my mum would only say that am big enough to take care of myself and my dad only called me boy whenever he appeared on our door step.
“Okay, what’s your name?” she kept raising her voice to ask the other pupils and throwing remarks after another. When they finished, she said. Alright… you all are welcome to Sugarland Children’s Camp and I want to make sure that all of you will have a splendid time. She shared us the camp rules and asked us to read out along with her.
Sugarland Children’s Camp is always fun and promising more fun. In the schedule it said Morning: Horse riding. Afternoon: Painting. Last year I was refused horse riding because I was not up to 7 years as prescribed by the camp rules.
As I rode the horse, I smiled happily and stroked the horse back, it moved slowly. All the excitement melted into my mouth like a candy. I felt happy, felt so happy.
“You can come down now Jumbo” Miss Pauline said after some minutes of the ride.
“Please allow me a little more ride!” I pleaded.
“Oliver Twist! is someone‘s turn now. There will be another horse riding tomorrow, only then you can have all the time to ride.” Miss Pauline said and fixed her eyes on me, hands akimbo. Still I persisted, because I couldn’t find the resistance to get down from the horse. She quickly swoop me down from the horse and launched me on the grass.
We had a wonderful lunch in the afternoon and we all girded up to go down the river to swim. The camp commandant, Miss Pauline blew the whistle and all the children including me flew outside.
“Ready!” she yelled
“Yes!” we all chorused.
“The instruction is: you are going to swim in groups of five; no one stays more than 10 minutes in the water. We have twenty kids here so we have 40 minutes to spend in swimming and then return here. Do you hear me?” she shouted.
“Yes!” we shouted back in excitement, without even thinking the duration and the condition given to us. We ran to the river bank and Miss Pauline also ran behind us.
As we ran closer to the site, the river seemed more beautiful than the last time I saw it; then we only came for site seeing and wasn’t allowed to swim. The water seemed clearer and daring now and the flowers surrounding the shore were so beautiful. We ran very close now; just some inches separated us from the water. I tried to restrain myself but I did not stop. I jumped into the river and I saw myself swimming. I noticed I wasn’t alone, there were some boys too, maybe two maybe three, I lost my gaze at them. All my focus was in my hand as I swim like an overfed crocodile. I heard the voice of Miss Pauline calling.
“I warned you kids earlier! Out of the water all of you! Out!” I think I saw the boys swimming out of the river to meet her. I tried to do the same but I wasn’t in control. I felt some force drew me away like when a kid would push me from behind during our sports time at school. But this was different; more forceful. As I dripped underneath the water, I was drowning, I couldn’t just help myself. I didn’t even notice Miss Pauline jumped into the river to search and rescue me; neither did I make a clear coherence of the kids shouting my name severally, Jumbo! Jumbo...
I saw a large beautiful house with some men guarding the outside front view. I wasn’t drowning anymore, wasn’t struggling with the force of the water, and it was all too warred. And I think those men saw me just immediately because they aimed at my direction armed with arrows. They caught me before I could escape and took me right inside the house, we approached a throne with someone sitting on it, she was a beautiful woman, there were other women too, and all of them were surrounding her like a fence. I think they were her maids. All of them were magnificently beautiful and brilliantly colorful. When my face looked down at their legs, I saw their feet were like the tail of a fish and they were just floating.
“Mum!” I screamed then, “mermaids!” The one at the throne was their Queen, and she beckoned me closer at that moment and the guards drew me to her. I was so scared. I have never been that scared in my entire life. Those maids were smiling at me and that didn’t change a thing. I was so close to her then, and she was about laying her scepter on my head, and I think I fainted at that moment.
When I sneezed and opened my eyes, my vision was blurred and I saw Miss Pauline instead placing her two hands on my stomach and pumping to bring out the last water from my mouth. I was back at the river bank again; I starred at the kids that were staring back at me. When I closed my eyes again it was to sleep because I was so tired and very weak. I woke up and opened my eyes, and I saw myself lying down on the bed in our dormitory. I never participated in the swimming I planned so much to do, I was annoyed, I tried to get up but I couldn’t, my limbs cracked and I felt pains all over me. I was very hungry and couldn’t remember the last time I ate. Miss Pauline came shortly after and I opened my mouth to talk to her, what came out was “I’m hungry…. She smiled kindly at me.
“Let me get you medicine and some food to eat” she said and then left. I starred at the clock on the wall. It was 3:30am, I have slept so long. My thought wandered back and I remembered my encounter with the mermaids at the river, Fear gripped me again. Could they be real? Was I dreaming? I never could tell. And each time I remembered the encounter, it left me stunned, thinking and battered. I wish I hadn’t swim at all.