The road to Machakos curled like an old memory,dusty, cracked, and filled with potholes. Annah hadn't been back in years, not since Lucy died. Her parents' house still stood on the hilltop like a lone sentinel, a structure too clean, too still,untouched by grief on the outside, though she knew better.
She stepped out of the matatu and stood still for a moment. Her shoes crunched on dry gravel as she made her way up the narrow path lined with lantana bushes. The door opened before she knocked.
Her mother,Agnes Mwende,stood at the threshold in a brown kitenge dress, holding a rosary and a tattered Bible. Time had carved itself into the lines of her face, but her eyes were as sharp as ever.
"Annah," she said. No embrace. Just the name, carried on a sigh.
"Mum."
A cough came from inside the house. Then her father emerged, leaning heavily on a cane. John Mwende had aged more than she expected. His silence filled the room as they sat around the tiny living room with gospel music humming from the old radio.
"You don't call. You don't write," Agnes said, her eyes not accusing but worn.
"I've been busy."
Agnes closed the Bible and held it to her chest. "Busy like Martha. But it is Mary who chose better."
Annah forced a smile. "Still quoting scripture."
Agnes didn't smile back. "It is all I have."
There was tea already made. The conversation turned into fragmented exchanges: weather, neighbors, church. Then Agnes brought up the name Annah dreaded.
"Pastor John visited us yesterday. He prayed for you again."
Annah's spoon stopped clinking against the mug.
"Still alive, is he?"
"Still preaching," Agnes replied. "And still believes God will bring us peace."
Annah laughed...short, bitter. "Was it peace he offered when he told you to stop looking for Lucy's justice?"
Agnes stiffened, but said nothing.
"He told you she was in God's hands. That it was your faith being tested. That asking too many questions was pride," Annah continued. "You remember that, don't you?"
"Annah..."
"No, tell me. Did he pray before or after you buried her in that wooden box ?"
Agnes's fingers tightened around the rosary. "He meant well."
"He told you not to report to the police when I begged you to. When I screamed that something was wrong and nobody listened."
Her father cleared his throat. "Enough," he said, softly but with weight. "We all failed, Annah. But your mother didn't stop praying."
Agnes reached for Annah's hand. "And I still haven't. I believe Lucy's story will come out. That God will reveal what happened."
Annah pulled away. "I don't want God to reveal it. I want the truth. That's all."
There was silence. Only the radio filled it..."Hakuna Mungu Kama Wewe" humming like a distant memory.
That night, in the bedroom she once shared with Lucy, Annah lay awake staring at the ceiling. The walls were covered in old Sunday school posters. One read: Even in the darkness, He is with you.
She sat up, sweating.
A whisper.
It wasn't the wind.
"Annah..."
She froze.
Then the closet door creaked open on its own.
Her heart thudded. "No," she whispered. "Not here."
She got up and swung it open,but nothing was there. Only Lucy's old dress, a yellow one with a missing button, still hanging like someone might wear it tomorrow.
Suddenly, the floor felt unfamiliar, heavy beneath her feet. Her pulse throbbed in her ears.
A giggle echoed from the hallway. Childlike. Mischievous.
She stumbled back onto the bed, trembling.
It wasn't real. It couldn't be.
The next morning, she found her mother already outside, kneeling in the dew-covered garden, praying aloud in Kikamba. A rooster crowed in the distance. The smell of chapati wafted from the kitchen.
"I saw something last night," Annah said, approaching her mother. "I heard... Lucy."
Agnes didn't open her eyes. "Sometimes grief brings shadows. But not all shadows are lies."
Annah sank onto the bench beside the garden. "What if the truth is uglier than the faith you hold onto?"
"Then I'll hold onto both," Agnes said, standing. "Faith is not the absence of pain. It is what you use to carry it."
Later that day, Pastor John visited.
He was older, more bent, but his voice was the same,calm, rehearsed. He came bearing avocados and scripture. As Annah listened to him speak, she could feel her stomach churn.
"I remember the day I told your mother to rest her worries," he said. "The Lord's will is not always ours."
Annah didn't hold back. "You were wrong to ask her to stop fighting. You asked her to surrender."
He offered her a placid smile. "Some battles are not for us to fight."
She leaned forward. "And what if we were meant to fight them? What if we let evil thrive because we're too busy folding our hands?"
His smile faltered. Agnes looked at the two of them, lips tight.
"You seem angry," the pastor said.
"I am angry," she snapped. "Because hiding behind prayer is what let Lucy die without a trace of justice."
The room went still. Even the ticking wall clock seemed louder.
"Annah," Agnes said softly. "You came back for a reason."
Annah turned toward her. "Yes. I came back to remember who I was before I let myself forget her. I came back to remember what she meant."
And in that moment, something shifted. Not enough to break her, but enough to crack the stone she had buried her heart beneath.
That night, before she left, her father gave her an old envelope.
"I kept this," he said. "It's Lucy's last drawing. You two were in it."
Inside, a faded pencil sketch of two girls, one with a smile too big and a crown on her head.
"She called you 'Queen of Spades,'" he said, chuckling. "No idea why."
Annah stared at it, eyes brimming. The hallucinations. The giggle. The yellow dress. Maybe they weren't warnings,they were reminders.
She folded the drawing and placed it in her pocket, close to her heart.
And for the first time in weeks, Annah didn't feel haunted.
She felt called.