She was crying loudly so I was awakened by her sobs.
I opened my eyes and noticed the lush and soft green where I was laid perfectly. These grass are certainly soft, but not enough to smoothen my rocky relationship with my mother. And this time maybe she really realized I'm just like a big boulder on her shoulder. She left me here, certainly, beside a fellow creature. A fellow creature who did not just awaken me from my sleep, but a fellow creature who turned out to had awaken my whole being.
I found her crying besides me. I knew this area, this place is not our house so I left her and went to find my way home. Even though I knew I just lost my home, or I should say I was left alone. I distanced myself away from her because I know I don't belong here. This is her home; this is not my home.
While consoling myself by picking some wild berries, my loneliness caved in my thoughts thinking that, maybe. Maybe.
Maybe, we were both abandoned by our parents. I've heard stories already, about abandonment. It's not just stories, maybe it will be my story too. I've heard mom saying that to me for a few hundred times already. I hope it's not the same for the other girl also. I hope her parents are different. Or maybe they are, if I just need to confirm. I need to go back.
Her cry dissipated along the mountain tree leaves, I figured she is still their child. While I was not their child anymore as for I can't seem to find my way home to home, or they deliberately destroyed it. Turns out, I am the one who should be crying now.
My sorrow can be even darker than the night now, but I need to get away from this dark forest now. The problem is I don't know how; I don't have a light with me. I only need a light or even a small hint of hope, fire. Fire, fiiiiiiiiirrrrreeeeee!!!
Is that really fire? Am I not dreaming, it means I'm not the only being here in this forest. So I quietly crept behind whatsoever this creature who was holding a âsaleng. I don't want to scare him or what so I just followed him silently because I knew he would be leading me to their house perhaps. Anyways, why can't I feel the heat of his fire, and his or her fire seemed to be too close to his face. He can't feel heat? Cool, or oh no! Not cool at all.
This being or this creature suddenly disappeared in front of me, while I'm about to disappear in front of a cliff, just a few breath and I could had fallen. My breath didn't fail me but it seems like my heart would be the one to jump. I can feel my heart pushing mightily against my knitted clothes. What creature did I follow, I might have been out of my mind? I never thought or even think through who could be here in a forest in a deadly hour. Of course it would make sense if it's another unseen creature, because I had never actually seen him or her during the whole journey. I just followed this creatures' light, this creatures fake hope.
While I'm still adjusting my eyes to the dark, the light appeared in front of me again, as its getting nearer, the more that I can't see this creature's face. Then one by one fire starts to appear on my sides and more in front. At first it's just about ten, then, thirty, then more than a hundred. I looked around me and saw that even on that side of the cliff, fire like light are appearing one by one. Gosh!!!
âButatto. A freakin' Butatto. I might had attracted them with my deep sorrow. They smelled my foul loneliness. Yes, I'm lonely and in sorrow but I know for sure I don't want to join them.
âSaleng â a kind of wood that can easily ignite a fire. A piece of wood that people use before when electricity has not reached the village. They can tie a cloth at the end of the wood and it can be their light during night. It can be carried by hand because it burns slowly.
âButatto â an unseen creature carrying a fire-like light that lives on the mountain. No one had ever seen their face, people can only see their light. They will appear as an individual at first then they will split into two until they will be more. They were common before but as Christianity progresses they also decrease until I never saw them now. Other people said that they actually immigrated to other towns where Christians are few.