The rain started in the early hours of the morning—slow at first, then heavier, wild, and relentless. It soaked through the leaking roof of the store where Zaria slept, dripping steadily onto her threadbare blanket and the corner where she kept her books hidden in a plastic bag.
She sat up, shivering. Her body, already weakened by fever and wounds, trembled as the cold bit into her skin. Her cough had worsened, each breath now a battle against a sharp pain deep in her chest.
Still, she rose.
There was no such thing as rest in Sarah's house—not for Zaria. Sick or not, the day demanded its labor.
By the time she stepped into the main house, barefoot and drenched, the others were still curled up warmly in their blankets. Claire Rina had left a dirty plate on the table, and Mary Florence had spilled porridge on the floor the night before. Sarah, still groggy from sleep, pointed to the mess with one eye open.
"Clean this up before I open my mouth wide."
Zaria bent down silently and began to scrub.
The rain continued. After breakfast, Sarah sent her to the market—despite the storm—telling her to deliver a sack of bananas and collect firewood on her way back.
"But the rain…" Zaria tried.
Sarah stood, towering over her. "Do you think the rain stops me from feeding you? Or from clothing you? You eat here, you work here!"
Zaria lowered her gaze, picked up the wet sack, and began the long journey through mud, wind, and slashing rain.
Along the way, people stared. Some laughed. Others pitied her. One woman whispered loudly to another, "That's the girl who aborted, they say. Her family just uses her now."
Zaria heard it all. Every whisper cut like a knife. But she had grown used to bleeding quietly.
By the time she returned home, soaked to the bone and shivering violently, it was well past lunchtime. She expected silence or scolding—but she didn't expect the wooden stick.
Sarah was waiting.
"What time is this?" she barked.
"I tried… the truck delayed," Zaria explained between chattering teeth. "And the wood got heavy—"
Thwack!
The stick landed across her back, sharp and vicious.
Thwack!
Another strike. Zaria screamed.
"You think I'm stupid?" Sarah roared. "That you can move around slowly because you're sick? You lazy, rotten girl! I knew you were nothing but shame!"
Claire Rina laughed from the corner. "She cries like a puppy!"
Zaria collapsed onto the cold tiles. Sarah raised the stick again, but this time, her husband stepped in from outside.
"Enough!" he said sternly. "She'll die and people will blame us."
"She should die!" Sarah spat. "What use is she? What does she bring into this home but bad luck and tears?"
"She's still your responsibility," he muttered, then turned and walked away.
That night, Zaria sat alone behind the kitchen. She didn't eat. She didn't speak. She stared at the dark sky and wondered if anyone in the world still thought of her. If her mother ever missed her. If there was a heaven where all her pain could melt away.
Linda hadn't come in two days. Maybe her mother had found out. Maybe she was scared of being seen with "the cursed girl." Zaria didn't blame her. Everyone had a limit.
As she rested her aching head against the tree trunk, her hand brushed against something sharp. She looked down—glass.
She stared at it for a while. Long enough to entertain dangerous thoughts. Then she pulled her hand back and whispered, "No… not like this."
She still had a faint spark inside her. It was flickering, buried beneath the weight of pain, but it hadn't gone out.
The next morning, her sickness reached its peak.
Zaria collapsed while fetching water. A kind neighbor, Mama Nahia, found her lying beside the path, unconscious. She called for help, but no one from Sarah's house came.
"She's faking," Sarah shouted from the veranda. "She just wants to avoid work!"
But Mama Nahia called a boda-boda rider to take Zaria to the nearby clinic. The nurse on duty frowned as she examined the girl.
"She's severely dehydrated," she said. "And this cough is dangerous. Possibly pneumonia. Why didn't you bring her sooner?"
"She has no one," Mama Nahia whispered.
The nurse wrote a prescription, but when Mama Nahia brought it to Sarah, the response was icy cold.
"I'm not spending a single coin on her!" Sarah snapped. "Let the village raise her if they care so much!"
So Zaria was sent back home with no medication—just a warning to "get better soon or risk death."
That evening, as she lay coughing in the store, her lips cracked and bleeding, she heard voices outside.
"She will not survive another week like this," Mama Nahia said quietly.
"She's strong," another woman replied. "Too strong. If it were any other child, she'd be dead by now."
Zaria turned her face toward the wall and closed her eyes.
Inside her mind, she drifted through the memories of a better past. Of Mama holding her hand. Of Teacher Lilian saying, "You're going to change this world, Zaria." Of Linda's laughter. Of the applause when her PLE results were announced.
Then she remembered Sarah's words: "She should die."
"No," Zaria whispered to the silence. "I won't."
That night, despite the fever and the bruises, despite the humiliation and the lies, Zaria made herself a promise.
I will not die like this. I will not be forgotten. I will survive this storm… and I will rise.
But for now, the storm raged on.