Pink ribbons dancing in the wind-closer and closer then drifting again far away until lost in the clouds.
Dylan sat up in bed awakened from sleep by a dream once again. He walked to the patio of his beach-front home and looked across the sand to the tranquil water of the sea. From the beginning he knew the dream had a special meaning but his hectic schedule as a sportsman denied him enough time to reflect on it. But, now it seemed like a calling that he felt in his heart he should answer. As he looked across the water to the horizon he wondered about the girl-the girl he had never forgotten.
He had seen her for the first time, almost twelve years ago when he had spent his summer vacation in the countryside. The house next door hidden by tall trees and thick hedges and the soft, sweet voice singing early every morning, so intrigued him, he had forgotten his aunt’s warning that it was a forbidden place. He had made a small opening in the hedge and had seen the girl in the garden, walking bare feet on the dewy grass. Her long hair tied loosely with a pink ribbon, as she picked flowers to fill the small basket on her arm. A pretty girl, sad and lonely imprisoned with her mother in that house by her tyrant stepfather, afraid to speak, to smile. But day after day through the hedge, he had become her friend, a friendship that brought a smile to her lips and a light in her eyes. On the last day of his vacation, he had not seen her but on a pink ribbon tied to the hedge, she had written: “Thank you, for being my friend.”
He had kept the ribbon but as the years passed and his cricketing career rocketed him to fame and richness the ribbon got lost somewhere.
Dylan sighed deeply and shook his head regretfully. How could he have not known she was calling him?
He had to find her and as he travelled back to his native country, to her hometown, he visualised what the pretty little girl looked like now as a young woman. But when he reached there, he felt shattered, bowled by a wicked delivery, for she was not there, not anymore. He was told they had left, mother and daughter, ten years ago, to get away from the brutish stepfather and no one had ever seen them again.
Dylan stood at the hedge, not sure what now to do and he wondered,
“Where have you gone, where do I find you?”
He turned to go and a little flutter between the hedges caught his eye. Looking closer he saw it was a piece of ribbon, its colour faded by time and nature. On it were written two words, barely discernable: “Find me.”
Ten years ago she had left that note, so much time had passed. Dylan felt he had let her down that he should have come back sooner. He folded the ribbon neatly and put it in his pocket with a promise in his heart: “I will find you, my friend.”
Everywhere he searched, he met a dead-end but he continued his quest to find her, carrying that guilt with him, for every day that passed he prayed every morning and night, “Please God, help me find her, she needs me.”
Days matured into weeks, then one night, in his dream he saw native children sitting under a huge tree with sprawling branches by a flowing stream. They were listening raptly to someone teaching them, then one child raised her hand and said:
“Miss Deepika.”
Dylan jumped up, wide awake and exclaimed, “Yes, of course, she had said she wanted to be a teacher, thank you, Lord.”
He travelled from early the next morning to the hinterland region where she had enlisted to teach, reaching at nightfall. The anticipation of seeing her after all these years tied knots in his stomach making him sleepless. The night seemed long, the morning anxiously awaited for the reunion of two friends. She was sitting in a chair under the tree with her hair wrapped at the nape of the neck, reading to the children, her face disguised by the glasses she wore, but he knew it was her.
“Deepika!” He called her name quietly.
She stopped reading at the sound of his voice, turned around and rose slowly from her chair. He swallowed hard, the muscles in his face taut, trying to control his emotions.
She was so beautiful!
She looked at him, uncertainly for the years had changed him from boyhood to manhood.
“Do I know you?” she asked in a pleasant voice.
He took the ribbon from his pocket and held it up, saying:
“I have found you.”
By Maureen Rampertab