Bimbo no longer slept. Her nights were now filled with stifled sobs and sweat-soaked sheets. No matter how much she faked strength, no matter how high she held her head walking through the village, her heart was a drum of guilt that would not stop beating.
Seven years had passed since that silent act.
But the Ogen River does not forget.
So she began going back there, at first in secret. At night, when the village lanterns were off and only the croaking of frogs accompanied her steps, she would stand barefoot before the dark water, eyes filled with tears.
“If you hear me, my daughter, forgive me,” she would whisper.
She would throw flowers, sometimes banana leaves with small bills tied to them.
“Mom was wrong. Mom was blind. Come back to me.”
She did not know why she did it. Maybe madness. Maybe hope.
But the fact is, she truly cried. Not for her mother-in-law’s judgments. Not for the village gossip, but for the invisible hole that had existed within her since that early dawn.
“Ogen River, if you took her, bring me another. Bring me a living daughter, and I swear I’ll love her, even if she comes skinny. Even if she comes dark.”
It was a promise.
And the universe has always listened.
Three months later, to everyone’s astonishment, Bimbo was pregnant.
“A miracle,” said the neighbors. “A sign,” shouted the preacher.
“The womb has opened again!” sang the mother-in-law, who now even praised Bimbo’s beans.
Mario, her husband, was moved. He smiled again. He kissed Bimbo’s forehead every morning. He even started planting yams in the yard with renewed hope.
But Bimbo was afraid.
Her belly grew, but so did the guilt.
Until the day came and the cycle, like a cruel clock, repeated itself.
It was a soft, rainy afternoon. The sky was not crying. It was only whispering.
The same midwife from seven years ago, now older but still with firm hands, assisted the birth.
The baby was born, breathed, cried.
“A girl again,” said the midwife, smiling.
But as she stopped, the child was different. Skinny as a stick, with a high forehead and eyes far too big for her face. Her skin was black as freshly burned coal, her fingers long. And that same faint cry, like a tiny bird’s whistle.
Bimbo froze.
“No,” she whispered.
“Ma’am, she’s alive, healthy, but she needs care. Maybe she’s premature. She needs love.”
But Bimbo had already stepped back.
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