I reach out to the vegetables in front of me and stuck much into the basket that I held.

  "How much, Micah?" I ask the vegetarian that is selling one of the best vegetables products, in the small town we are all in.

"That's $20 for the lady and 6 cents"

  I smile as I gave him the money and he counted my change and gave it to me.

"Have news?" I ask. He's like my personal journalist. He broadcasts news to me whenever I come to buy products from him or passing by.

His mouth closed at the hearing of women screaming from the far end of the market.

Women are gathered and everyone is rushing towards that place.

"What happened, Micah?! I yell cause I can bearly hear myself cause of the shouting screamings that's going on. Micah don't reply but grabbed my hand as she led me to the place they all gathered.

  "What happened?" I ask a trader I always talk to and consider as a friend.

"She's gone!" We all hear a yell of a woman that is on her knees and crying heavily with a running nose.

"They got her!" She yells again and everyone gathered her. Each of us, staring down at the woman on her knees with pity and sympathy.

  Every month, spies or assassins are sent to different places or villages to get girls, at least ten to twenty and carry them to wherever they want to.

This woman crying is the mother of Criss. My vegeterian friend who is humble and honest.

  "Criss is gone" she said and I gasped.

  They got her and a few other ladies for whatsoever they needed them for.

  This kidnapping of girls is becoming so unbecoming and making one to be uncomfortable.

  I raced down the streets back to the mud house I and my mum shared.

She's on the bed meditating and thinking when I enter and close the sore behind me and panting heavily cause of the distance that I ran for.

  "Maria... What happened?" She asks as she struggled to stand and walk to me but I told her not to and when to sit beside her instead

"They got Criss" I say as a tear escape my already red eye.

  My mum's head hanged and she sighed as she looked deeply at me and I can tell studies me and knew what the problem is before I even know what the problem is myself.

"And I'm afraid that they might get you"

  My heart stopped beating as I turned to looks t my mum in the eye, anger boiling in me.

"What does that mean?" I ask calmly and she nodded.

  "That can never happen Mum!" I yell ast her as I stood up and walked about.

"How can you say such a thing of them kidnapping me... I'm a grown up and.... "

"Criss is your age" my mum interrupted calmly and looked at me as I kept quiet.

"There's no difference" she completed and I can't help but stare.

  "Your friend did not just got kidnapped like that" she said and I calmed down slowly.

What's she talking about? Criss got kidnapped and first of what she said is that I will follow and next that she got kidnapped for a reason.

Is it the old men mentality or what?

  I scoff as I left to the garden behind the house that I always got to cook.

  I can't believe she spoke to me like that. It's like my punishment for an offense is getting kidnapped.

What does that mean?

   I wash the dishes and at the same time cook.

  I already miss Criss. She's my friend and we did the local elementary school together.

At least, my mum could afford that.

  I and Criss have been friends for about sixteen years now and we have never had a misunderstanding.

  My eyes diverted to a pair of brown and  shiny shoes in front of me and I slowly followed it and... My Dad.

I eyes him as we both stare at each other.

It has been three years that I have seen my dad and I know it's disrespectful to do what I just did but who am I kidding?

He left my mum to some ugly and mentally disordered person.

  She got an accident and ran mad last year and now he knows what it means to pay all the bills for a disordered person.

"Dad?" I ask and he removed the hat that covered his white hair and face.

He still looks young and nourished, like I expected him to be.

   "How are you?"
   "Why do you care?" I shot at him and his eyebrows shot up at me.

  "I'm trying to be concerned... "

  "Well, don't be. Because it's not like you have anything that will help me to get out of their situation with my mother"

  He stares at me with watery eyes as I continued the dishes.

   "Where's your mother?"

I sighed as he asked that question.

"Don't ask me if you know you don't want to see what you did to her"

  I always say that because he only ask of her, he never sees her or look at her in the eyes to say his ridiculous feelings he claim to have have for her.

  I hear him sigh as he pass by me, into he house to see mum.

  I rush behind him so that my mum won't panic.

  "Priscil-" he shut up at the sight of my old looking mum that's half way to the grave even if she's just forty-something.

  My mum looked up at him with no sign of surprise or anything if what she is seeing.

Old people can always surprise their younger ones in different ways.

  "Hello... James" she said quietly and the man in the house couldn't control himself as he bursted into laughter, which is embarrassing.

"Why are you so old looking and wrinkled? No food to eat?" He yelled mocking.

What?!

The spatula in my hand knew no boundary as my hand directed it and I  smacked him hard at the back of his head and he groaned a little bit still chuckled.

The mockery and pain he's causing is too much, I swear.

  I keep smacking him till he tumbled out of the house, still laughing at us and walking away to his own house.

When are we going to experience a change in out lives? When?