Lahore canal

The sun was blasting its usual intense heat. The humidity was ever present. There was a slight wind, which was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because the people that were standing by the banks of the river felt cooled. A curse because there was no reason for them to leave. The river was not really a river. It was called The Canal. It ran through parts of the city. Once, it had run through the entire city. Then the city had expanded, and The Canal had not. It was dirty. It was opaque. The surface was opaque. It smelled, and standing outside, on the roads on either side, you could smell it and your nose would wrinkle in disgust. Yet it was an important part of the lives of so many people. The drug addicts would gather and smoke or consume their substances by its banks. On hot summer days like this one, hundreds of children would be splashing or swimming around on it. Their mothers, if they weren’t cleaning toilets in other people’s homes, would be sitting and gossiping by the banks. On days like this one. But this day was not ordinary. People were standing by the banks, looking at the river. Wrong direction. Usually, they were looking at the roads, at whatever poor souls had gotten into accidents. Everyone offered their own, usually differing accounts of how those accidents had taken place. Today, they would too. But right now, there was an eerie pin drop silence. Even the cars felt like they weren’t rumbling by, engines humming loudly. The police were in knee deep, pulling out a body. It was a small girl. Her hair was long and lustrous. Wet. But you could tell it had once been beautiful. Her face was beautiful. At peace. Her hands were tied together. Her chest had caked blood on it. Her clothes were sparse. As if they had been ripped off. The officers, out of respect, formed a wall around the girl as they pulled her body from the river. It was a simple case. No one wanted to say it out loud though. The girl had been raped. The girl had probably been kidnapped. She had been raped. She was only eight. The newspapers would confirm it. Lahore. Little girl found in the Canal. Eight years of age. Kidnapped days earlier. Examiners waiting for results, but say very likely that she was raped multiple times. It would be sad for a few days. And then people would forget it. They always did. Her mother wouldn’t. The kidnappers would not be caught. Or maybe they would. They would be sentenced to justice. Or maybe they wouldn’t. The courts worked in mysterious ways. No they didn’t. People would forget, this would become a non priority. By the time the courts would summon the kidnappers, they’d probably be dead of old age. I am here to tell you the story. To make sure you don’t forget it. My story. The little girl was me.