October 8, 1995
Mosanwi
Saa Saba Na Nusu Alfajiri (1:30 a.m.)
She woke with a start, sitting up slightly, as if from a bad dream. Her heart was pounding, and she propped herself up on her elbows and looked around, trying to calm herself. She was home, this was her room; shadowy and blue-toned in the light of the full moon framed by her window. On the nightstand stood an old family picture, the one where Cait, to her mother's dismay, had leaned over and given the unsuspecting Tim bunny ears. But the photo, which usually brought reassurance and a smile to her face, did not comfort her now. There was something wrong. She felt strange; alone, afraid...
And then Jeni remembered.
She had awakened similarly the day before, in the little Mosanwi infirmary, disoriented and confused. Morogo, who had been keeping a bedside vigil, told her that she had been missing for nearly a week before a tour group stumbled across her; she was found unconscious in a field just outside of town. And no one, not even Jeni, had any idea of how she had gotten there, or where she had been before.
"I remember driving... I was going to Komasa," she had said to Morogo. "But... that's it. That's all I remember. There's just... nothing."
The doctor told her that short-term amnesia was a rather common occurence after a traumatic experience. But that still didn't explain how she had gotten from her Jeep, which one of the kids found less than a mile away from Komasa, into the Mosanwi field. There had been no other reports of kidnapping, no criminal apprehended...
She peered cautiously into the dark corners and dim hollows of her room. She thought she could see arms reaching out, ready to snatch her away. She shivered, switching on her reading lamp, and pulled the covers close to her like a child.
Immediately she was ashamed of her fear. After a brief moment of contemplation, Jeni swung her legs out of bed and stood up. She needed something to drink, that would help her fall back to sleep. She slid her feet into her slippers and padded her way down the hall to the kitchen.
Everything was quiet and still, the silence broken only by her soft footsteps on the linoleum and the gentle hum of the refrigerator. She opened it, the light from within surprisingly bright, took the milk carton in hand, and selected a glass from the cabinet. She came close to dropping both when she heard a muffled knock at the front door.
Instead she set them down carefully and crept up to the door. "Who's there?" she whispered in a shaky voice, and stole a glance through the peephole.
It was the Masai elder.
Jeni sighed and opened the door. "Hello, friend," she greeted him respectfully in his own language.
He returned the salutation. "I have come to speak to you of your disappearance."
She stood in shock for a moment, mind blank. "Please, come in," she said finally, opening the door wider. He was certainly full of surprises. "Would you like anything?" she asked, but received a polite refusal.
"Jeni Blair, you are wrong," he said bluntly. "You were not taken away by men. They were visitors. They told me."
"Visitors,"she repeated. "You mean they're from another country?"
The Masai shook his head. They are not from any country. They are not men. They came to our village by the lights in the sky and they told that they were visitors. You must come to know this.
"I'm sorry, I... I don't understand."
"You will," he said, and departed.
***
It must be a myth, she thought, pouring her milk. An old Masai superstition; comet-men or something. But the elder's words echoed in her mind. They are not men...
What were they, then? She put the carton away and stood for a while, holding her glass and watching the door that was as silent as she was. Her tired eyes dropped to the kitchen's digital timekeeper. Two o'clock already. She had to get back to bed. She'd sort it all out in the morning. Besides, she couldn't really expect herself to be able to understand everything right away; eventually, she'd put it all together. She yawned and returned to her bedroom.
Hours later, when she woke up, it all seemed so distant and unreal, much like a disturbing dream that haunts a susceptible mind for days when left untamed. She was near to being completely certain that her conversation with the elder had never even occured outside of her imagination, until she saw the half-filled glass of warm milk in the kitchen.
*end*
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