The Girl Who Could Not Tell the Truth
signalling not to ask now. School ends. I feel sick and weak so I rest at my table, trying to feel better. Hestia comes by and puts her hand on my forehead. “Oh gosh, Raven you have a fever,” she says.
By Yiu Chi Yuet (Queen Elizabeth School)
“Can you help me get back home, Hestia?” I ask. “I think not... I have club activities later. Let me find someone who lives near you to take you back home. Wait here.” “Okay, thank you, Hestia. Sorry for bothering you.” I say. “It’s nothing. We are friends, so I should do this. Rest a while.” she comforts me, and leaves. Sometime later, I feel someone beside me. I open my eyes and see Zander and Lisha. They look at me and say, “Let’s go home, Raven.” I feel weird but I cannot refuse as I can’t even move a finger. I’m tired and feel weak, so Zander carries me on his back and Lisha takes my school bag. On the way, Zander asks Lisha to tell him a story. Lisha starts. “There was once a pale man with dark hair who was very lonely. Everyone who met this man shunned him. He did not chase them. Instead, he took an axe and split himself in two right down the middle, so he would always have a friend.” What a terrible story, I think. Why would someone split himself into two? The more I think, the more weird it gets. I notice that they aren’t going in the direction of my home, so I ask, “Did you go the wrong way?” They answer, “No, dear Raven, we are going back to our home.” I’m terrified, because Lisha’s hair has turned white and her eyes shine blue, as we step into the forest... The three of us slowly disappear into the forest and drift gently into oblivion.
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“She’s cursed,” people said. I walked down the corridor pretending that I could hear none of that. There has always been a tale in our huge family. One that hurts me quite a lot, because the elders say, “It’s her. It’s obviously her. She looks just like… her.” I didn’t believe it, until I was sixteen, which was the age… she died, and I had a dream. In my dream I saw a girl in a white dress, perhaps a wedding gown, who looked almost identical to me. Staring at me with empty eyes, she told me that I could never tell the truth to anyone again. All I could do was lie. From that day on, I was probably the loneliest soul on Earth, because whenever people asked me anything, all I could tell them was a fib. I could say nothing real, because… I just couldn’t. I didn’t understand why. If I attempted to be honest with somebody, the words got stuck in my throat and I would be speechless until I changed my words into a lie. My life, surprisingly, went on smoothly. I had mastered lying. It was okay to lie to people I didn’t know. It was okay to lie to my friends, even. I thought I could keep it up my whole life. Until I met him. I just looked up one day, from my diary (how funny that the only ‘place’ I could be honest in the whole world – was in a tiny notebook), to see this boy. Have you ever met someone who you felt had a sun of their own?
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