58 February 2022 The Birthday Journal Then off to the living room again, where she admired the exquisitely set up living room with sofas, TV and curtains. The dining room had a table and chairs to seat eight! Oh! And the kitchen had the most beautiful pots, an electric kettle and a microwave! She had never seen one before she came here. Such comfort as they had here with their orphanage mother. Here she could afford to dream again, could begin to build her strength again. She could forget the past. She could forget the time her aunt tied her up to a tree and whipped her blue black, forget all the times her aunt dressed her own children up in beautiful dresses and shoes while she had to go about in rags. From here, she could rise up and become the somebody she always knew she would become. She would use this opportunity to rise up, to achieve her dreams. As she neared the wall, she saw a plaque on it; a plaque which read, ‘This apartment was furnished by Mr. Opoku Arthur in commemoration of his fiftieth birthday.’ She remembered. She had not been accepted at the orphanage at first because there were no furnished apartments left. Oh! It was because of thisMr. Opoku Arthur that she had been given this new lease of life! Because of him that all her other six sisters in her apartment had been spared their previously miserable existence! She leaned against the plaque andwhispered, ‘thank you very much, Mr. Opoku Arthur, you saved my life!’ hoping that he would hear her from wherever he was. Mr. Opoku Arthur sat at his office desk looking through a pile of reports. He felt a soft tug in his heart, a soft tug as if he was being pulled back to the Elisabeth orphanage. It gave him a warm feeling, as if someone was saying, ‘thank you.’ He smiled. If only he knewwhat was happening, the connection of souls; of a man, eager to change the world one person at a time, and a girl, desirous to make use of the lifeline that life had given her.
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