You never forget the shape of a promise made in childhood.
It lives somewhere strange, in the corners of your memory, in the places where dust turns golden near sunset, in the echo of sandals slapping against a dirt road, in the laughter that used to feel endless because you were too young to know that almost everything ends. When you are eight years old, promises feel like laws written into the bones of the world. When your best friend grabs your shoulders with trembling hands and says, I’ll come back, brother. I promise, you believe him with the entire force of your small, loyal heart.
And when five years pass, you still hear it.
You hear it on mornings when the hens start crying before dawn and your mother is already awake, kneading dough with tired wrists. You hear it when your father coughs from the mat in the corner and turns his face toward the wall because pride hurts him more than sickness. You hear it when you carry a sack of bottles to sell, when the straps bite into your shoulder, when the neighborhood boys your age race each other in school uniforms while you count coins under a faded awning beside a tiny shop.
