She couldn't understand what was happening, was she dead? No, she didn't think so. Everything wouldn't be so dark and an angel should have appeared before her, she was sure of it. What had happened? The voices she was hearing confirmed it to her that she wasn't dead. They didn't sound like celestial voices, they were familiar voices. Wasn't that her mother's voice? Why was it breaking? Why was her mother choking on her tears? She could hear Mrs. Adigun's voice too. It was consolatory. She was trying to make her mummy stop crying. Somehow, Abigail knew she was the centre of whatever happened or was happening, but she couldn't say why. And then she remembered! She remembered she was on her way to show Mrs. Adigun her poem when she fell. She wondered if Mrs. Adigun had read her poem.
She could hear footsteps, she could sense a new presence now. When the person spoke, she heard a recognizable masculine voice. It was her dad. She tried to shout but couldn't, she tried saying something but her lips refused to move, she tried standing up but her body didn't respond. She wanted to converse with these people badly, to wipe the tears off her mother's face but there was no way. She was a living soul trapped in a lifeless body.
As Pastor Brown went through the door of ward fifteen of the John Johnson's Hospital, his heart sank. His look moved from his sobbing wife to his daughter's best teacher, to her (Abigail's) bandaged head, and rested on the electrocardiogram monitoring her heart rate. He was devastated to see his daughter's motionless body. His wife ran to him and hugged him tightly as her sobs gave way to wailing. He wished he could also cry out loud but he had to be a man and console his wife. After all, it was his fault. The visitor at the office wasn't just bluffing.
"Shush now, we don't want to be sent out of here," he whispered to his wife as he stroked her hair.
Mrs. Adigun stood up from where she was sitting beside the unconscious girl's bed and walked up to where the couple stood and patted Chichi on the back. "It's okay," she looked at Pastor Brown and nodded her sympathy. The distraught pastor broke the hug and faced the VP. "What happened?"
The VP sighed. "I don't know for sure how it happened, but I was told she fell trying to make way for the furniture men to pass on the narrow balcony."
"Jesus," Brown Ade muttered.
"Thank God for the school doctor and a teacher who were downstairs. They had rushed her straight here when they discovered she still had a pulse," Mrs. Adigun sniffled, trying to hold back her own threatening tears, "I think she was coming to show me her poem. I took it from the floor. It had been stained by her blood."
Chichi's tears were pouring out. She managed to control herself from making too much noise. She went back to where she had been sitting earlier, hands in face.
Mrs. Adigun moved near the pastor, and rested her right hand on his right shoulder.
"Pastor, I beseech you not to despair. I believe this is just a test of faith," she paused and looked at the unconscious Abigail. "Try to see the light at the end of the tunnel," she turned back to the Pastor and continued, "I mean, not just anybody survives a three-storey building fall. Though in a critical condition, she's still alive," she held his hands now." This testing time will pass, you just need to hold strong"
The pastor bowed his head and fought hard with his tears while the VP still spoke.
"Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But..."
"Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing," The pastor completed, nodding.
"That's just it, pastor," Mrs. Adigun affirmed. She patted the pastor on his shoulder twice and moved to join Chichi. The pastor looked at where his daughter laid. It was just the second day of the countdown and his daughter was already fighting for her life. What was his sin?