Memory 2, uncontrollable

Some years later, still living in a fairy-tale life that he existed in; Asmer could be found playing in the air-conditioned room with his cousins. The games they played were usually fun, but he never understood why he had to do something? Why he had to run? Why he had to hide in uncomfortable positions from a person who posed no threat to him. Or even why he had to catch people who had done nothing wrong to him.

However, he played with them every day in the summers. It was a joint family system so there were always more cousins then he could count on his fingers, roaming around the house. His best friend at the time, his cousin and only one in the house around his age, Alizeh was usually with him. They were always involved in one mischief or another when they weren't playing with everyone or watching one of the 5 cartoon movies they had at home, or watching the oldest cousin Asad rescue a princess on TV.

One time the two partners in crime decided to climb up the drive way. It was a covered area next to the house where cricket was played when cars weren't parked. Alizeh said "let's go up? We can take out the ladder from the store room and climb up, no one will even notice we were gone and we can hide there until lunch so we don't have to eat and our mom's will get worried and we can surprise them and they will get so happy." This sounded likea very good idea to seven year old and so they decided to hide and play above the drive way the whole day.

After single-handedly putting the ladder (as he considered him self a strong boy) and climbing up it; onto a very dangerous metal covered storeroom and finally walking carefully to solid ground from where they could seethe gardens of all the neighbors, the two completed their task. It was a nice view of lush green lawns and fruit filled trees at an arm's length. The shade in between the trees, old tennis balls long forgotten, broken branches and what-not littered the floor.

Time passed and voices from inside could be heard, "Asmerrrrr,Alizeeeeeeh, where are you both??" again and again they screamed, sometimes close,sometimes far, until Alizeh's mother finally spotted the two eating an apricot and smiling. But the young ones didn't realize that they had been caught. The mothers came outside and started screaming "we know you are up there, get down now,both of you. You have been very bad kids." These chants continued, but the two got further into the trees thinking the grownups were bluffing.

Soon the noises got louder and meaner but the kids kept grinning and giggling. The mothers tried to stand on higher ground to get a better look as they could not climb the unsafe path the kids had used. So thekids while trying to hide better kept crawling further and further in. Asmer said "I think the game is up and we should get out now, mom knows we are here so what is the point?" Alizeh grabbing his arm replied "why? Are you scared? This is the best part. They will give up and stop looking and we will not have toh ave lunch any more".

Asmer spoke "but we can't go any further in, I think they saw us too, let's go out already, the trees are poking me, and we can fall".Alizeh "oh come on don't be a baby, look we won't fall, if we were gonna fall we would have already, look" she said while going across the tree, grabbing onthe branch for support and THRICK came a sharp sound of the branch breaking. Followed by a scream "aaahhhhh" and a thud with another creaking sound, Alizeh had fallen over to the neighbors place and lost consciousness. Covered in seeping blood he say his best friend's body on the cold hard stone with horror.

That day he got scolded harshly for the very first time. He started crying. It was not because he got scolded, however that was one reason; it was because everyone was blaming it on him. His cousin who had woken up that in the hospital had named him to be the initiator of the plan; or rather the mastermind as her mother portrayed it. What was more confusing was the fact that she had also said that she had been pushed off the drive way because she wanted to get down and he was forcing her to stay up with him.

Of course these accusations were not true and had been planted in Alizeh's mind by her mother to tell everyone so that she would not get in trouble. The simple minded Asmer was crying because he had just gotten a taste of betrayal for the first time and for the last time trusted in his cousins/siblings. What was more troubling was that most of his cousins had stopped looking him in the eye and avoided it. Alizeh who had gotten a cracked skull was to come home in a week's time, the wait was killing Asmer.

A day before she was to come back, her elder brother, Asad,who Asmer dearly loved and idolized as he was the only male cousin, no brother in the house asked him to meet him on the roof. He knew something was up as all the cousins had been talking in hushed voices around him; even his sisters werea part of this scheme, whatever it was. So he followed his cousin up stairs, tothe always scary roof. With a serious look on his face his cousin said "don't worry I won't hurt you, why did you push Al?" as she was called among family. Asmer said "but I didn't  she fell by herself." While adjusting his glasses with one hand, perhaps to look cool, he suddenly grabbed Asmer's arm and but it through the extremely rusted ladder made for the water tank on the roof, quickly turning the scary moment to Asmer's heart nightmare.

"Why did you push her?" he said "why did you hurt my little sister?" he whispered in Asmer's ear. Asmer understood this was just meant to be a scare tactic to make him behave. But he couldn't believe they were actually hurting him. "let go of me, I didn't hurt her, she did it herself, it was even her idea" he cried, but Asad kept applying more and more pressure by the moment. "don't lie to me" he thundered, forcing Asmer to grab the a side of the ladder with his unused hand. "I didn't do it, I didn't do anything I swear"he said with tears rolling down his cheeks, "let me go, let me go".

Soon his hand started to go through the ladder, and his shoulder kept screaming in pain. "Please stop it" he screamed "my hand will break". Asad's head just came nearer and nearer, "you didn't stop my sisterfrom falling, why should I stop before I break your arm?" until finally theyheard a slight crack from Asmer's shoulder. It all went black for him for a moment, all he could see was his cousins face and think two thoughts simultaneously, "please stop the pain, or I will hurt you" and "I will destroy you, and I will enjoy it".

Finally he came to; his cousin grabbing his arm and barely standing on the window border. A huge gash in his arm where there was a lot of blood. A next thing noticed was a bloodied rusted rod below his cousin. "Did I do this? Did the monster come out again?" he thought until finally he started trying to pull his 11 year old cousin up to the roof. "Don't ever fuck with me again" he said realizing he didn't want to say it, and he had the most horrible angry expression he had ever made on. Finally he thought "what am I doing? How can use such a bad word that I saw written by some punks on the corner of the street?"

Asmer spoke to his cousin "I still say I didn't push her but I don't care if u believe me or not" and his cousin said "I believe you now". Later Asad took the blame for the broken ladder which was so rotten that a 7 year old could break. He said it had broken when he was climbing the ladder to check on the water and that is how he explained the gash. But he never managed to explain how the blood covered broken ladder could have landed so far away from the roof.

However Asmer soon returned to his daily life. Alizeh acted like nothing had happened and so did Asad. No one ever spoke to him about thetwo incidents, well no one really knew about the later one. Everything went back to normal; everything except one, Asmer decided he was never going totrust his cousins again. He slowly became quieter and quieter and home, until he drifted away completely from the influence and pretty much the whole circleof his cousins. He maintained minimum contact as is necessary to stay alive but that was all he did from then on.