Cecile Jarrett, Contributor

Sam Sharpe

Cousin Joe really complicated things for little Akeel. As he attempted to suck his fingers, many questions bothered his mind.

What does Joe mean? Why did they cream my father and bring a big man's body in a little pretty flowers vase?

Wha mek dem nevah bring him down like Miss Mavis husband? Him hola body in a big pretty box and put it in de church weh everybody could si him an know seh a him dat?

Why dem give mi dis likkle picture of him instead of de big one dat dem put beside de vase?

Yes, when his mind was searching for big answers, Joe made it worse by telling him about his family link with Sam Sharpe and a million things that he (Akeel) needed to learn about this important connection and the fact that he was the last boy from the Sam Sharpe line.

As he sat staring into Joe's eyes, he heard footsteps coming towards him. They were Akeen's. She and Elizabeth, their mom, had come from New York for the funeral.

Akeen hit Akeel on his left shoulder and said, "You're it! Catch me if you can!"

She thought that being the good runner she was, Akeel could not outrun her. She was very wrong. In a flash, he caught up with her and tagged her. She tried in vain to catch up with him. She couldn't. That morning, she learned from Granny about Akeel's swift feet at home and at school. "

"Doan try mi love, doan try to race him, you will be a sad loser. Nuh play dat game wid him, mi dear."

While chasing his sister, all the perplexing questions left his head.

He was long-legged Akeel again - not a Sharpe; not a last boy who was expected to learn things he knew nothing about, or even cared to learn.

He was Akeel, the fastest boy in River Bank. That's who and what he was and always would be.

The time that his mother and sister spent in Portland after the funeral in St James was too short.

Everybody left one by one to where they came from - England, Canada, America and Nigeria.

Akeel wanted to travel too, but that was not to be. They decided he could continue to live with Granny, but get on a trip to Disney next summer holiday. It was also decided that he and Granny would spend Christmas with Joe in St James.

Akeel's sprit did not take to Joe; something about him that he didn't like. He begged Granny to call off the Christmas visit. In fact, he became ill just before Joe was expected to pick them up and bring them down the country.

Akeel was relieved when Granny took his advice. They never saw Joe again until after Akeel's 10th birthday in 2012. But Joe's eyes kept haunting him.

After a couple years abroad, Elizabeth decided to return to Jamaica to take up a nursing tutor's post at the Cornwall Regional Hospital and to re-unite the twins for good.

The family house in Spring Mountain was given to the twins, but Joe was allowed to live there as caretaker for the past four years.

He didn't like the idea of leaving the home when Elizabeth, her children and Granny re-located to St James. So, he was allowed to stay with them until he found a suitable place in MoBay.

Akeel was no longer afraid of Joe, but didn't want to learn any mysterious Sharpe lesson or secret from Joe. Joe insisted that he was Akeel's special tutor, the one to tell him the mysteries of the Sharpe heritage and the solid link between Portland and St James.

He would mention how Nanny and Cudjoe were twins like himself and his sister. Sometimes, he told him that the mistress of Rose Hall was a good friend of his great, great-great-grandfather and that the two could do things that could blow his little mind.

"You have to grow bigger to hear dem deh stories," he would say to Akeel who had no interest in what Joe had to tell.

One Saturday evening, all the girls left the two men in the house to bond. Joe began to tell Akeel about Sam Sharpe, his intelligence, strength, leadership and accomplishments.

He told Akeel that Sam Sharpe's old people came straight from Nigeria the place where Red Ibos lived.

"Sam Sharpe was a man with Ibo blood; a man made to father sons, but unfortunately he had no son, but a daughter who name her sons Sharpe. That is mine and your line to daddy Sharpe through his daughter," he declared.

As he outlined Akeel's lineage to him, he kept drawing closer and closer to the boy. Akeel felt uncomfortable in his presence.

He looked intently at Akeel when they shared a moment of uneasy silence. Then he began to unbuckle his belt. Akeel stared through him and pulled himself to a more comfortable distance.

"Yuh fraid fi mi bwoy!" he shouted. "I want yuh to. Yuh Granny neva initiate yuh good. Yuh too soft, yuh need to feel a good lick cross yuh back. Yuh need to stand up and tek lick like a man, a Sharpe man. Life nuh easy an yuh must be tough. I gwine lick yuh fi di fun of it, since yuh fraid."

He pulled the belt full length, raised it and brought it down swiftly. Akeel slipped it, jumped high in the air and landed intentionally on Joe's bad right foot. Joe winced.

"Yuh little @#@!"

But Akeel was nowhere in sight. He took to his feet and ran for more than two miles to the Spring Mountain Police Station.

He did exactly what Granny taught him. Her voice rang in his head as he ran. "When your life threaten, run to di nearest police station".

When he got there, he outlined his encounter with Cousin Joe whom they knew well, and asked them to call Granny. They did. Granny, Mommy and Akeen got to the station in record time.

"Yuh don't know cousin Joe very well, do you? Is a man whose head tek him sometimes and he can do some strange things during them bouts. Keep the boy and him sister too, far away him. His own daughters have to stay far from him or he would beat them to pulp just for the fun of hearing them scream. He likes to make children cry. What we should do with him this time?"

Akeel was ecstatic when Joe was ordered to pack his belongings and leave the house. He just wanted to get on the track team at his new school to outrun everybody else.

When Akeel entered Alvaranga Preparatory School, he gave himself three areas to shine in: show respect to everyone at his new school, pass GSAT for Cornwall College, and win every race at school, in the parish and in the county of Cornwall.

He also promised himself to find out the truth about some of the things Joe had shared with him regarding the Sam Sharpe family line.

He felt that he had some of the dark secrets in his soul and that he must bring them to light.