Insight of a Kenyan Girl

The show had begun, but I was too blind to realize that I had been dancing to its tune all along, unwillingly. The sun and moon had collided in an explosion of chaos, and with their meeting came sparks, flames—blinding, destructive, and unavoidable. And there I was, caught in the fire, unaware of the way I was being consumed.

My mind, once so sharp and independent, had lost its ability to function without his constant prompts. He had become my puppet master, and I, his willing yet unwilling puppet. “Jump,” he would command, and I would ask, “How high?”—without hesitation, without a single ounce of resistance. I didn’t question him; I was too lost in the maze he had built, too consumed by the intoxicating grip he had on me. For so long, he held the reins, and I galloped as fast as he whipped me. The rhythm of his control was the only beat I knew.

But in the silence of my own heart, when the world faded and I could hear my thoughts again, I saw the truth. And it hit me like a wave, crashing against the shore of everything I once believed to be true. I was ashamed. Ashamed of who I had become, ashamed of what I had allowed myself to turn into. The strong, self-assured girl who once stood tall in the face of adversity had faded into nothingness. She was replaced by a broken vase, shattered into pieces, no longer capable of holding the flowers—or the water—within her. I tried. I tried so hard to hold on to the flowers, the dreams of something beautiful, but they withered before I could even nurture them. Left for dead, just as I had been.

They called me a shell of a person, a hollow reflection of the girl I once was. Dead, but still breathing. And in those moments, I wasn’t even sure if I truly wanted to be alive anymore. He had ruined me, stripped me of everything I was, everything I had ever known. I had shown him my heart, my soul, my deepest vulnerabilities, and in return, he used every single one of them to break me further. Slowly, steadily, he broke me into a thousand pieces—tender, jagged shards of what was once whole—and then he would put me back together, pretending that he cared, that he was helping me. But once I was rebuilt, the cycle began again. He would break me once more, tearing apart the fragile pieces I had worked so hard to mend.

I had become a pawn in his game, a piece on a board I didn’t even realize I was playing. A chess piece in his world, and I was losing, always losing. Happiness became meaningless, a fleeting shadow that never quite touched me. And sadness wasn’t even a choice anymore—it was simply my existence, like breathing, a constant companion. I was captive to the very man who claimed to be my savior. Empty, hollow, with no will to live, yet no courage to die. It felt like the worst kind of prison—a cage built from love, from manipulation, from false promises. And all the while, he watched with twisted satisfaction, the look in his eyes like a mad scientist observing the success of his favorite experiment.

Test Subject 001, he had named me. I was his most prized project, the one he had worked hardest to break, and in his twisted mind, I was the proof of his success. He believed that in a third-world country, where power and control were everything, his victory over me was a testament to his superiority. He had proven his theory—that men were superior, that women were weak, and that they could be tamed. That was the experiment, and I was the lab rat. He thought he had won, that he had proven everything he needed to prove. But he had failed to account for one thing.

What he didn’t know, what he could never have imagined, was that the phoenix rises from the ashes.

The plot thickened, and the game shifted. The mantis had been stalking the cicada, so sure of his victory, so confident in his power. But he was unaware of the oriole lurking behind, poised to strike. My mother had once told me that even a rabbit would bite when cornered. I never understood it then, but now I do. Now, I understand that I had been cornered. And now, it was my turn. Unbeknownst to him, the tables had turned. I held the reins now, and he was the one who would have to gallop to my command.

The flowers, though fallen and withered, remembered their vows. They remembered the promises of the past, of the beauty they once held. And the weeds that sprouted in their place knew nothing of love, nothing of memory, for they were simply the product of decay. It all started in the time of blossom and ended in the season of decay. But who was I to try and change the natural course of things? Who was I to fight against what had always been?

I have never been a fan of self-sacrifice, and I never believed in being meek or submissive. I have always believed in the principle of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. And now, the drums began to play my favorite tune. The wine in my glass was perfectly suited to my taste—dark, strong, and full-bodied. I was ready for what was to come.

The man who once reveled in the weakness of women had become the joke of men. He had fallen from his high perch, and now, he was the one to be laughed at. He had failed in every way, his theory crumbling beneath him like dust. He thought he had stolen the chicken, but in the end, he had eaten his own bait. And it tasted bitter.