THE untimely death of 12-year-old Raheem Davey has left a void in the hearts of his teacher and classmates at the Castleton Primary School in St Mary.

Raheem died when boulders crashed into his home in Broadgate, St Mary, while he slept on the night of November 11.

“Raheem was a lively student. He was full of energy, despite suffering from an illness. He was kind and was always interacting with the other students. He’s a very caring little boy because I remember one morning he came to me and he looked sad and I said ‘What is wrong with you?’ and he told me something about his grandmother. So you know right there he is concerned about family,” Raheem’s teacher, Annetha Scotland told the Jamaica Observer North East when the team visited recently.

Scotland said Raheem, who was a part of the Alternative Pathways to Secondary Education (APSE) class, struggled with reading but was never daunted by this fact.

“He had a reading issue; he was a slow reader. From time to time I would say, ‘Raheem you know you can’t get all of your lunch time anymore because you’re not doing well in reading.’ But then he would still escape from me at lunch time. Because of this, I reached the point where I said to him, ‘You cannot get any of your lunch time because you need to stay with me so I can help you.’ But he still managed to escape,” Scotland recalled.

However, Scotland said that Raheem had shown signs of improvement in the latter days of his life.

“I remember the last two days he was improving. The Thursday before his death, he was sitting by my desk and he had some letter cards putting together and trying to sound the words and read them.

“He was struggling but he still continued. The Friday I said to myself, ‘What else can I do with him?’ I looked for some videos about reading and he sat and looked at the videos, tried to see if he could read the words before they actually said them on the video. After that, I gave him some similar words and he was reading. He said to me, ‘Miss, I’m doing better. Don’t I’m doing better?’ He was excited and I said to him, ‘Yes, you’re doing better.’ He said ‘I know what I’m going to get for you on Teachers’ Day; I know’,” Scotland said.

“I didn’t realise that he was telling me thanks but now I realise what he was really saying,” she said as her voice trailed off.

“We all miss him; the class is going to be really different. We are trying to express our feelings because they are in mourning.”

Fourteen-year-old Aliyah McDonald, who sat beside Raheem for much of his time in APSE2, described him as fun.

“Miss, we usually play together, have fun and play football. We normally take the same bus home and he always said, ‘Aliyah later; I will, see you tomorrow’. I am very sad, Miss. I miss him very much,” she said.

Oshawn Morris, Raheem’s close friend, is struggling to cope without him.

“Raheem is a friendly person and I miss him because he’s very lovely. Him share everything that him have with me. Him live near my house, so I saw him all the time. Him used to talk to me and encourage me when me cry. I miss him so much. The last time I talk to him, him ask me for $5 and me give him and a piece of my bun. I miss him so much,” Oshawn expressed.