The Escapade
“We are going sightseeing.”
That was what Ope and I told ourselves before we left home—a stroll in the forest of Mum’s village. We had not visited since we were kids, but the path went deeper into the thick forest than we remembered. The trees were bigger, and the leaves were all woven together; we could only see the occasional peek of light from the sky. The forest looked strange. It was a long way from the village, and as we walked, the silence was deafening as though each step was leading us into something eerie.
When we turned back, all we could see were shadows. We looked at each other, and in that instance, we knew something ugly was ahead of us—we were no longer alone. We decided to walk different paths, believing one would find the right path and inform the other.
But Ope wandered into the sacred shrine and found its inhabitants waiting for her. I remembered one of the stories Mum told me when I was younger. Women were not supposed to see it, or they would be sacrificed to the gods.
Her shrill scream pierced the still air, and my heart thumped in my chest. I ran towards the sound, hiding behind trees at intervals. The masquerade danced around her slowly; there was a rhythm to its steps as if moving to a beat that an ordinary human couldn’t hear. I could feel the ground vibrating from where I stood and couldn’t imagine how heavy the vibration would be for Ope, who it towered over.
She hugged herself while the Masquerade inched closer. It was a tall and horrific figure with a grotesque face. As it leaned towards her, the spikes on its body caught the sun, and I noticed specks of blood.
My hand shivered as I dug it into my bag for my phone. But there was no signal, no way to call for help. I could hear Ope’s heavy breathing as the Masquerade circled her. A low, nerve-wracking hum rose; it carried an ancient chant from the priest who watched the scene.
Not even Mum’s emergency number went through—Mum, who told us to go to the market instead. She said we could stroll through the village and even go to the forest once someone who knew their way around could guide us—an elder or someone related to them. But I insisted we go to the forest. We would be careful and were old enough to avoid anything that could harm us.
The masquerade danced around Ope with its heavy feet. I prayed inwardly that it would not swallow her up. Ope kept saying, “Fuck. Fuck. Damn it.” It sounded like a plea, but I thought it could trigger the unseen forces around us. Her voice was husky, and it annoyed me. I wanted to scream—tell her to shut up. Did she not know that her language could provoke the gods? The spikes on the Masquerade brushed her arm, and I watched dots blood form on her skin. It was feeding on her fear.
The priest stood a distance apart, his body stoic. His face was buried in a thick cloud that followed him from the shrine. His chants bounced off the wall and the floor, carrying a weight you could feel in your soul. I could not pick out a word, but I could see the trees and their leaves sway as if they acknowledged him. He raised a hand in the air, and like a well-taught apprentice, the masquerade stopped dancing and stepped aside in an eerie sway.
The priest moved closer to Ope, grabbed her right shoulder, and shook her as if wanting something to fall out of her. Ope’s eyes were clenched shut, and she held her two palms together. I am not sure, but I believe she was praying. A girl who had not said a word of prayer for the past year, who claimed to be a Deist. She said she would one day find her way with religion and find a God who would accept her and her sexuality because she did not create the feelings. But here she stood as desperate words of prayer left her mouth in whispers.
Fear gripped me where I stood as the priest walked back and forth. His chants became monotonous, coming out in whispers. “This girl has been defiled,” he muttered, as if speaking to the wind, the cloud above him, or maybe he was talking to the invisible forces around us. His gaze was vacant, his words sounded final.“She is not fit for the gods.”
He drew some chalk on her face, the lines read like an inscription—the language the gods spoke. The priest threw her out of the shrine as if leaving her for one more second would taint the sacredness of the ground. She stumbled out of the little bamboo gate, but did not see me until I rustled some leaves to catch her attention. Her face was hot with anger. She did not look at me. She just walked towards the path that we came from.
As we walked silently home, she still would not acknowledge my presence. She was boiling, hissing up and down. When we began to see houses in the village, I heaved a sigh of relief, but Ope turned back in her anger and spat curses. “You made no attempt to rescue me. You are so selfish.” I felt a bitterness rise in my stomach. Did she not know I would have been sacrificed if I was caught? As if she heard my thoughts, she turned to face the road and continued to walk.
