There are moments in life that stick in your mind forever. Like that first day in school, that first kiss and many other first things that we meet in life. Just the fact that it is happening for the first time to you makes it special, and no matter how positive or negative the event is, it will always be fresh in your mind. And that is how this particular day has remained a fresh memory in my mind.
That day was a very special day for me. I had finally decided to post one of my many stories to one of the local newspapers and see if it would be published. My mom had encouraged me, saying she believed I was good. So with great enthusiasm I wrote my short story, got most of my details straight. All that was left was confirming one of the minor details with my sister and then it will be all ready to be sent. It was a Saturday morning, around nine o’clock when I called my older sister. See, in my story there was this particular part where one of the characters was to take a pregnancy test and I was not sure what colour signified a positive result and so I wanted to ask her that. I remember her answering the phone and she sounded all weak and tired. But the excited me just thought it was probably because I had woken her up and so I blurted the question to her, telling her about my good news. Frankly, to this day, I don’t remember if she ever answered me, and even if she did, I still don’t know to this minute what the right answer is. All too vividly I remember her words,
"....., I went to VCT yesterday. I am positive.”
I am pretty good with words, that, I have been told athousand times. I can get out of any tough situation through the help of my mouth, and my imagination. But at that particular moment, I didn’t know what to say. What was the right thing to say? Frankly, if someone in a similar situation I was in back then came to me and asked for advice on that particular question, I would not have the right answer. Maybe it is because I am not as good with words as I have been made to believe, or maybe its because there is no right answer. To say I was shocked would be an overstatement. I don’t think I was shocked at that particular moment. It was hours later that the shock dawned on me. Here she was, crying her heart out at me on the phone, from miles away. And the annoying thing was not that I didn’t know what to do or say to help her, it was more that even if I had an idea of what to do, she was miles away. And that broke my heart.
She cried a lot. I tried to reassure her with words that I thought were the right things to say, though they sounded like clichés even back then. Then finally we had an agreement. I was to keep the news to myself till she was ready to tell it to the other members of the family. A task I was sure I would do easily.
So how does it feel like to receive such kind of news? Well, for me, at first I went around like I had not made that call. Like I hadn’t heard anything from her. It wasn’t until late at night, lying in the comfort and solitude of my bed that it finally hit me. I was not naïve, I believed. We had had enough HIV/AIDS education in school to know it wasn’t some bewitching thing or anything like that. But still in my mind I saw the negative pictures. I remembered all the movies I had watched with people so weak and so helpless. And I told myself, it wasn’t going to be just in the screen anymore. I was soon going to see it live, in our house, with my sister, and that was not a very pretty picture. It was more painful to know I could not talk about it to anyone except her, and when talking to her, I couldn’t let her see that part of me that was crumbling. I had to be strong for her. I believed that she would draw some strength from me if I showed her that I was strong.
It didn’t take long for me to get out of the self pity status I was placing for my sister. I realized she was undergoing enough of it on her own. I had to start showing her the positive side of everything, and this time, it was not just going to be cliché words I was going to write to her. I had to mean every single word I said. Sure, she had made a few wrong choices in her life. Who hasn’t? And she now had a virus to deal with. But it was about time we both came out of that hole of darkness that only saw the evils in everything. We had to both be ready to get back on out feet, together. Her, as the one infected by the virus, and me as the one positively affected by it. We had to do it together, with the help of many of our friends, to bring back the joy that had been sucked right out of her life.
I clearly remember a story I wrote to her at one point. Of two girls going to the VCT to get tested. The first one get’s her results and it turns out negative. The first thought that crosses her mind is “Great, am not going to die!” And happily she strolls off to go have a drink or two as a celebration. The second one turns out to be positive, and she thinks “Oh no, I am going to die!” and slowly she gets herself home to cry in the solitude of her room. The first girl gets involved in a car accident on her way home from a pub late that night, she dies. Moral of the story, having HIV did not automatically put my sister in the ‘to die soon’ list. She would only go there if she wanted to!
I was not around much to watch my sister pull herself together. We mostly communicated by mail. But with time her mails became more positive, and through our communications I realized she was slowly transforming back to the jovial girl I had grown up with. I was proud of her, I still am.
In December 2006, a few days after I moved in with my very jovial, positive about life sister, she lost her job because her boss found out she was HIV positive. I saw her transform right before my eyes into this lifeless form that seemed to curse every morning she woke up, and cry herself to sleep every night. We were back to square one. My sister had gone back to the ‘if only I had not done that’ phase that we had finally managed to drag her out of. With every interview she went to, I would sit back and pray that she would get the job, for her own sake, she never did. It was a trying time for her, it took great courage to see her pull herself away from it all finally. I kept telling her, don’t let it pull you down. Let it make you stronger. We had come from so far….she had come from so far, it was so unfair to see her where she was at. Finally she was lucky to get a volunteer job, offering her less than half what she had been earning before. But it was the perfect place for her to be. In that job, she found a home. She found her calling. She found herself. Right now I look at her and I think to myself, I am not that strong, I couldn’t have done it that way if I was in her shoes. But she says I gave her strength. And to think I took part in making her the strong person she is today, I can’t help but be proud.
Currently she is just about an inch taller than me; I weigh a kilogram more than her. And she isn’t on any ARVs yet. Sometimes, we get confused for twins though we are four years apart. We go out, we have fun. When we are out there, no one can tell she is HIV positive, In fact, considering I always go around in a red ribbon necklace, red ribbon bracelet and red ribbon ring, I would think people would think am the infected one. But I don’t care. I stand for something, and that’s all that counts. We are living our lives, fully.
She works with a group of people living with HIV/AIDS now. And right beside her I try to always be, advocating for HIV/AIDS awareness in all ways I can.
Today, I watched my sister lying in bed with her son. Finally she is able to fulfill her dream and his. For them to live together as a family. For her to raise her son, and for him to be near his mom. She smiles as she talks about what we should buy with our next savings. It’s not much, but what else do we need. With the love around us, and the strength all of us posses, we believe we can conquer anything
The light at the end of the tunnel gives us hope, and more strength. And even if the light turns out to be just another train coming, we don’t give up. She doesn’t give up. There are lots of other people who count on her in this world, lots of people who draw bits of strength from her (me included) and she is not going to let a virus bring her down! What can I say? I am proud of my sister.
Email this Short Story 
Add to reading list
Like this Short Story? 
