SCHOOL MEMORIES: Of Patience the 'victim of beauty'

When the Lord said to the chapel committee, “Go forth and choose Patience as the representative of S2,” we were quite shocked. It had to be some sort of mix-up. Or maybe God didn’t know her like we did. Patience had come to us in the middle of second term the previous year. We asked why she had changed school and she said, while trying to hold back tears. “A female teacher was harassing me because of my beauty.” When it seemed like we hadn’t understood, she explained that she bred insecurity and anger everywhere she went because she was at all fair-skinned drink of water. Apparently, people disliked her because she had already turned into a butterfly while most of them had only begun to wiggle around in their ugly caterpillar shapes. And some female teachers who had not metamorphosed successfully liked to hold it against her. We believed her. And then someone’s tin of biscuits disappeared and all evidence pointed to Patience. But she manufactured tears and raised her hands and invoked God’s name, seeking his protection from us the jealous caterpillars. We backed away. Someone’s money went missing on the same day Patience went on a shopping spree. We used the logic about the man whose dog spewed sheep skin on the same day his neighbour’s sheep went missing. She called us out on our ‘caterpillarness’ once again. Although we had never caught her red-handed, it didn’t seem coincidental that since her arrival, there had been rampant disappearance of property in our dormitory. Moreover, she could be placed at the scene of the crime, at the time of the crime. But each time we pointed fingers at her, she became a ‘victim of beauty.’ She made sure to talk about it during fellowship.“I didn’t choose to look good,” she would say tearfully, “I don’t understand why people hate me for it.” It was so convincing that even those of us who knew her almost believed her. Anyway. While her appointment as an S2 chapel representative came as a shock to us, we earnestly hoped that it would change her. She didn’t change. Not for the better anyway. She just transformed from being a thief to being a manipulative Bible hugging tongue-speaking thief. And God suddenly became this relentless motor-mouth who wouldn’t stop spreading baseless rumours and gossiping about us with Patience. He’d tell her to tell us to repent of sins we hadn’t even committed. Yet. Those of us who were unfortunate enough to share a cubicle with her had to endure the torture of hearing her pray in unintelligible languages for hours. Sometimes she mentioned our names. We watched her receive and read letters from her admirers and then curse her own beauty. We had never understood why she wouldn’t let us read them. Then one day curiosity got the better of us and we raided her suitcase. We found that the letters had one thing in common; her handwriting. During a heated argument at the end of the term, I let it slip that we knew about the letters. She didn’t come back the following term. We continued to metamorphose in peace and she found a new place to be a ‘victim of beauty.’

Education

SCHOOL MEMORIES: Of Patience the 'victim of beauty'