12.00am – I have never been the best sleeper in the world. Tossing and turning. This night was a little different. – The air was cold, we retired from the party early & went to sleep.
4.00am – I wake up, I don’t know why. I check my phone 4.00am on the dot. I head to the bathroom to splash my face and take a drink of water. I am feeling anxious – which isn’t unusal. I think of the day ahead, counting the hours I have left of sleep, I try to relax. I can’t. Legs jitter, shins ache, wrists swell and heels burn.
4.19am – I look at my phone once again, 4.19am. Almost instantly, a sense of overwhelming calmness and peace sweeps the room. Sleep was immediate.
7.50am – (1 Missed Call from Terry Geddis)
8.00am – I wake, phone is on silent – I am not sure why I wake up. I look at my phone, I have missed call from my dad. Reasons why flood my mind, one in particular stands out, somethings wrong.
8.05am – I ring him back – My mum answers…
“Yasmin love, come to the house”
“But Ma, I am in Belfast”
“Are you? Just come home”
“Yeah sure you know I am. Why?”
“Just come home love”
“But we didn’t drive, I will have to get the train”
“Ok love, be safe, God bless”
8.10am – I check my brothers online status. Last Active: 39 minutes ago
Ok – he is safe. Mum has told him to come home early too.
8.15am – I ring my dad back – He answers.
“Daddy is my Moses ok”
“Yes”
“Promise me he is ok”
- I can hear my mum in the background ‘Terry don’t”
“Yasmin he is ok, just come home”
9.20am – Train home.
‘It can’t be my brother Duane? Could it? Nah he was online’
‘Nope, stop thinking like that, it will be ok’
‘What will we do if something happens Moses’
‘Your Dad would never put Moses in danger’
‘Its Granny, shes 156 years old Duane, this is going to be awful’
10.40am – Coleraine Station
10.45am – Our house
10.58am – We are pulling into the cul-de-sac of my mum and dads. I slowly count the cars.
- Davids BMW – understandable
- Tommys Jeep – strange
- Dads Van – understandable
- Big Rosemary – usual
- The Merc- usual
10.59am – I see Moses at the gate.
11.00am – Mum opens the door.
In that moment, the air went cold. Something bad has happened. I look into my mums eyes, she is tired, she is in shock. I sense something permament, lifechanging and terrible is about to be revealed to me. I stand in the garden, her eyes pleading for me to come in the house. I can’t – I start saying ‘No’ over and over again. I don’t know what I am saying ‘No’ to.
Duane is ushered to the kitchen, I turn into our family living room.
I see my daddy, and for the first time in my 24 years of life, I see him crying, hard.
‘Yasmin, we need to stick together, we need work through this’
It was confirmed with the atmosphere in the house, when I opened the car door, and looked at my mum. A piece of me had left, much bigger than a uncle, a granny or a aunt.
My mum took my hand, we were both shaking. I needed to hear the words from her mouth, from the only other person who felt my pain to the soul, the burning pain in her eyes. I felt her words flash through me like lightening.
I felt like my mum was stabbing me mulitple times with a jagged, rusty, blunt knife. Watching me suffer. In slow motion I seen her open her mouth and my whole world ended.
‘It’s Zachary’
THE Original Superstar 