MEMORY LANE CHRONICLES.

The events of  that day of October are still very fresh  in my mind like   the first beam of light  glittering on a sail -  despite the fact that they happened exactly a decade ago. When I realized I had to sit for the exams in a sickly condition, e motions flashed across my  face like the sweep of sun-rent clouds over a quiet landscape. I knew very well that my condition was going to affect my performance. The imagination of seeing an opportunity of improving my life   melting  away like snow in a thaw, made me  filled with fear and trepidation. My heart was  thumping so loud that I was sure everyone around me could hear it. I felt like I was being cornered and trapped, with no where to go. The silence  in the exam room was eerily unnatural like a dawn devoid of bird songs. The pupils of my eyes became dilated and there was tremor in my hands. The thought of  poor performance  scared my mind   Like...

Dark clouds obscured the stars and moon, a fierce breeze whistled through the window as the leaves from the trees outside pitter-pattered on the roof. I rested against the cushioned seat in my room, and stared blankly at  the roof. I felt frightened   and  fatigued. I felt as if  there was a  viscous, heavy weight pulling me down .  I heard sounds like muted background noise of violins scratching away, that seemed to be ever increasing in speed and out of sync – while the outside world seemed  dampened and fading.  I was stressed by the thoughts of having to sit for a very important examination in my  life - The Kenya Certificate for Secondary Education (KCSE), while sick. The exams were due in three weeks time, and my strength  was fading slowly. My thoughts wandered from my sickly state to the events of five months before. The events of that sunny day in  the month of June changed the course of history in my high school life....

He wasn't just any other class prefect, Kevin was the 'de facto' leader of class 2 East. His  pulchritudinous  face made him stand out from the rest. The boy hovered between the corridors of our century old primary school like a colossus. I must say that I admired his magnanimous personality. Though he wasn't the bellsetter, his  class teacher picked him as the prefect. I didn't  know why the teacher chose him - perhaps because of his physical appearance. Kevin ruled class 2 East  with a rod of iron. He had learned the specifics of cruelty without learning the generality of mercy. He didn't shy away from reminding the rest of the pupils that he was in charge. He was revered by his fellow pupils. I was in class 2 West, Kevin's neighbouring class. There was a particular day when both our class prefect and our class teacher were absent. We thought it would be a day of fun and we had already declared it "a holiday" but we were wrong. With no lesson...