I wasn't supposed to remember who I was.
But the dreams came anyway—waves folding over me, a voice whispering in isiZulu, soft but urgent. I woke gasping for air, heart pounding like a wild drum, even though I lay flat on my back in my tiny room in Ezakheni. The morning light pressed through the window, cold and unforgiving.
Insomnia was nothing new, but tonight felt different. The weight of that voice—like water pulling me under—settled in my chest. I closed my eyes again, trying to drown it out, but the voice didn't stop.
"It's time," she said.
The voice was a woman's. Calm but commanding. I'd never heard her before, yet I knew her. She spoke in my mother tongue, the language of my ancestors, like a thread pulling me back through time.
I rolled out of bed, feet touching the cold floor. My body was tired, but my mind raced. I poured water into a glass and drank, trying to wash away the restless spirit still lingering. The reflection in the cracked mirror caught me—a man in his mid-twenties, eyes too old for his face, haunted by things he couldn't name.
I ran a hand through my hair and looked out the window at the sprawling township below. The same dusty roads, the same buzzing life, but something in me felt unmoored, like I was drifting away from this world and toward something else.
I wasn't crazy. Not really. At least, that's what I told myself.
Last month, the sleepless nights started turning into something else. Strange visions, flashes of light behind my eyelids. Colors I couldn't name. Then came the whispers—faint at first, then clearer. I tried to ignore them, to focus on my work, on Ayanda, on anything that might keep me grounded.
Ayanda.
She was the only one who understood. Not just because she listened, but because she'd walked a similar path. She'd shown me the truth about the crown chakra—how it wasn't some glowing halo above the head, but a quiet, powerful point at the medulla oblongata, deep in the brainstem. She told me how so many pictures were lies, designed to confuse seekers.
When she explained it, something inside me shifted. Suddenly, the darkness didn't seem so heavy. The dreams made a little more sense. The voice in the water wasn't just madness; it was a call.
I took a deep breath and sat down at the small desk by the window. The old laptop hummed quietly, waiting. I reached for it but hesitated. Words felt slippery today, like they might betray me if I tried to catch them.
Maybe I should just record myself instead, like I've been doing lately. Speaking the story, letting it come out raw and unfiltered.
The voice was back, softer this time.
"It's time, mntanami."
My heart quickened. I closed my eyes and let the memory flood in—a man running through shadows, chased by unseen forces. A woman's voice in the dark: "He is the man who once lived."
I didn't understand what it meant, but I felt it deep in my bones—like a promise, or a warning.
I opened my eyes and finally touched the keyboard. Maybe today was the day I stopped running.