Hug Thief
I suspected that this would be my last opportunity to hold her close to me. The scene was less than ideal. She needed to relieve herself. Robbed of her youthful agility by a stroke ten years prior, and further incapacitated by deep grief from losing all her younger siblings, she was unable to help herself up, let alone walk to a latrine. I had learnt to lift her to her feet in a way that does not hurt her tender areas. I always dreaded the idea of other people performing this task on her. I always felt that others lacked the deep empathy I felt for her. She was my mother after all. She gave birth to my mother but was my mother herself. She was always "ma" and never "gogo." On this day, she seemed helpless. Succumbing to death's inescapable call was almost certain. A grey pall had fallen over her usually butter-yellow skin, reflecting the curtains of the deep hollows she would soon descend to, on the back of that age-old enemy, death.