Those We Throw Away Are Diamonds by Mondiant Dogon & Jenna Krajeski

Author:Mondiant Dogon & Jenna Krajeski [Dogon, Mondiant & Krajeski, Jenna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-10-12T00:00:00+00:00

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♦

AT ONE THE NEXT NIGHT, Thomas knocked on our door. I hugged Faustin goodbye, but I didn’t say much. I worried that if I said goodbye too many times, I would start to feel truly lonely. For the first time in my life, I was completely alone. In search of company, I left the concrete house and returned to the camp, where I moved into an abandoned tent near Gasana’s mother, the only person I knew there. We started helping each other. I fetched water and she would cook for us both. She rarely talked about the seven other children she had lost, but maybe because he was Faustin’s friend or maybe because she hoped he was still alive, she talked a lot about Gasana.

“He is a very scared kid,” she told me, stirring a pot of beans. “I worry about him trying to fight.

“When he was born, I was relieved that he would be my last,” she said, laying out some laundry. “Seven children is a lot for one woman. Now I wish I were young and could have more.

“Maybe Gasana has become a brave boy,” she told me, feeding the ducks. “I think he will be fine.”

“He will be,” I always told her. “When I go back to Rwanda, I will take him and you with me.”

I had no idea if Faustin had made it to Gihembe or if my father was alive or dead. No one had a phone, and I didn’t know how to send a letter. Refugees who were only two years older than me, barely teenagers, were being recruited by the rebels, and I thought it was only a matter of time before I was forced to join as well.

It became clear to me that my only option was to leave Kitchanga. I decided to walk to my mother’s village, where I would look for a woman my mother affectionately called Mama Zawadi. They had been friends before my mother married my father and moved to Bikenke, and although she was a Hutu, I felt sure that if I found her, she would help me.

One afternoon I said goodbye to Mama Gasana. She waved from where she sat in front of her tent, watching, as always, for Gasana to come home. “If you see him, tell him I said to come home,” she said.

“I will,” I replied, as I always did.

My mother’s village was a seven-hour walk from Kitchanga. Instead of going through the forest, where I knew rebels often robbed and killed people, I followed the road, praying that I wouldn’t meet anyone. I had nothing that could be stolen, and I was too young to fight. But in North Kivu, it was best to avoid everyone.

It was the hottest time of year, and even though I left early in the morning, sweat began to run down my forehead and into my eyes as soon as I left the camp. I could smell my shirt as it began to stick to my body.

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