I had a sort of premonition of disaster. I tried to exclude myself from any responsibility. My attempt to dump the kids onto Zahira, while I hid in a dark corner somewhere, failed. As it was, I was stuck looking after them on my own.
The last time I had this feeling of dread, Dhuha took her faeces and spread them on her bedroom wall. After I cleaned her and her bedroom, I left her to play. Then she did it again, but this time in her sister’s room. It took ages to get it off the walls because of the textured wallpaper. My arm pained for two days. I hate textured wallpaper.
Last night, Dhuha snuck upstairs, while I was seeing to her brother. When I realised it had gone quiet, I rushed upstairs and found her and her wall covered with her faeces once again. The putrid but familiar smell was everywhere.
I put her in the bath, while I cleaned the walls. She loves the bath, so I allowed her to play. I went downstairs and started reading. About 10 to 15 minutes later, I heard a drip drip coming from the ceiling. I rushed upstairs and found Dhuha dumping large amounts of water onto the floor.
I stopped her and drained the water. Went downstairs and put a bowl underneath the drip. Went backup stairs and got Dhuha dressed. Came back down stairs to prevent the boy from playing with the bowl of water. Noticed that the ceiling was bowing where the drip was. I touched it gently and was shocked at how soft it was.
Dhuha came down and I prevented her from playing with the bowl of water. She went back up stairs. The ceiling bowed even more and finally came down. Abdurrahman was gasping at the dramatic scene and saying “Oh my God!”.
I cleaned the ceiling off the floor. It took a while. The hole is surprisingly large. When I went back upstairs to check on Dhuha and found that she had destroyed her nappy. I put her in the bathroom, while I cleaned up the new mess.
Finally, I gave her another bath. I didn’t let her play this time. Dried her off, dressed her. Went back downstairs and sat on the sofa and tried to contemplate what had happened over the last couple of hours.
Less than five minutes later there was a knock at the door, Zahira was home.
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