“This is stupid,” I said to myself as I tied my shoe lace. I yawned loudly and turned to look at my bed. It was so inviting. I looked away almost immediately and stood up. I stretched like a cat that had been sleeping all day and picked up my phone and looked for interesting music. “Time for some motivation.” I said to myself as I walked to the door. I found my Sarkodie album and plugged my earphones in. I locked the door behind me. I stepped outside and inhaled the fresh early morning air. It was still fairly dark. Yes, I was going jogging and no it wasn’t my idea. My doctor recommended it. It felt stupid but it was either this or the gym and I wasn’t ready to pay 2000 Cedis a month!
I started off with a brisk walk. It wasn’t bad at all. I guess the music helped too. Before I knew it I was jogging. It was actually fun, well at least for a while. I looked around and saw a suit shop. The suits looked really good and it looked like the shop was having a sale. “Wow! How come I have never seen this before?” I asked myself as I passed it by. I always drove fast to work. Never checking my surroundings out. There was also a bookshop across the street. I stopped and looked through the glass. I saw tons of novels. The type my wife liked. I decided to come to the shop on my way to work when they would be open. I could get her some books as a present when she got back from her trip. I smiled faintly and started jogging again.
I was so carried away by the things I was seeing around that I run much further than I intended to. This was my first day so I planned to take it slow. I got to the bridge and almost screamed when I imagined how long the journey back was. I stopped and learned against a tree. I was breathing so hard. “Ah this doctor has worried me. Now I am going to be dozing at work.” I said to myself. Just then I heard a sound. It was coming from the side of the bridge. It sounded like someone crying. I could see a figure. It looked like a girl. She had long black hair in a pony tail. It was still pretty dark and I wondered if this was a trick to have me robbed. I didn’t know her anyways. It was none of my business. I turned around but still heard her. Her cry just sounded so genuine and then all of a sudden it stopped.
I turned around and looked at her. She was standing up now. She put one leg over the rails. I run towards her and yelled, “stop!”. She heard me and stopped she looked at me with fear in her eyes. “Don’t come near me! No one is supposed to know!” She cried. I wasn’t sure what to do so I stopped. “Why are you doing this?” I asked to buy me some time to think. “Why should I tell you? You don’t care.” She shot at me. Hmmm I wasn’t sure what to say. “I just want to know why you are going this far?” I said. It seemed to work. She was silent for a while. “God took him away from me. I loved him so much.” She said with tears forming in her eyes. “I’m sorry but this isn’t the best thing to do.” I added. “Why not? This was where I saw him. I knew he was perfect. He was cute you…it has to be here.” She said, getting really emotional. She had a black bag around her hand. Probably some weight so her body won’t float. I had thought long and hard enough. I had a plan.
“My goodness what is that?!” I yelled, pointing behind her. This was the decoy. I run fast and pulled her away from the edge of the bridge. We both fell and I held her back. “You may not want me to but I will save your life. I can’t let a young girl like you kill herself.” I said. “What? What are you talking about?!” She said trying to break free. “Weren’t you trying to jump off the bridge?” I asked, rather uncomfortable. “No you dimwit! I just wanted to throw my dead dog into the river.” She replied pointing to the black bag. I turned and saw the tail of the dead dog sticking out. How embarrassing I stood up and she managed to do that too. “You are strange.” She said. I screamed, “I am strange?!” inside my head. “Sorry.” I said and turned around and left. I was too shocked to tell her my piece of mind.
The next day I bought a treadmill and never went out jogging again. Forget the gym, I was going to stay home and workout. This world is full of strange people!
