The first time I saw it on the kitchen floor I left it thinking I’d throw it out in the morning. I should have given this matter some attention because next morning when I was getting ready for work, I saw it come up my foot and attach itself onto my ankle. I put my fingers around it and tried to pull it off. Every time I took it off it came back up again. Eventually I pulled my sock over it and left for work. In the evening when I came back it slid off my ankle and went to hide in some corner. Sometime during the night it made its way into my bed. This started to become a routine and the leech began to go everywhere with me. At work it was always there on my table underneath a pile of papers or a file as I met clients, held business meetings, watching me as I tried to expand my business. And as my business turned around so did my profits. But some time later I noticed a bite on my lower leg. I began to feel unwell. Day by day as the leech dug deeper into my flesh a hole the size of a ten pence coin became visible. And because of my illness the business began to go down and the debts piled up.
How could you have let a parasite like that live on you for so many years? The doctor said shaking his head.
I told him it knew my weaknesses and my strengths. It knew to slide off my leg whenever I got angry. It would go and hide somewhere and come back when I cooled down. I’d even woken up during the night dreaming the leech had gone into my throat. I couldn’t open my mouth. I could only look, my eyes wide and startled.
That day I came home thinking I should have killed it because it’s killing me now. ●