WE ARE ABLE Episode 22 and 23

WE ARE ABLE
Episode 22 and 23

I was filled with suspense as I awaited Toyosi to tell me where my mother was. Perhaps, she had taken her somewhere to kill her.
“Impossible,” I said to myself.
Toyosi pulled me by my hair as she led me to my room and began to throw my things out from there. She then led me to the kitchen to show me where I would be lodging henceforth. I would be living with the rats over there.

Toyosi tore a sheet of paper and wrote all the rules and regulations I must follow there. They were very many.
I began to read:

Deaf Rose, henceforth here are the things you must observe:
You should not step your toes in the parlour except whenever you are needed there. You are now a housemaid and nothing more. You will only be fed once in a day as from now. You will cook, wash the plates, clothes and clean the house every time. There is no more school for you–your room is the kitchen henceforth…
The rules were without end.

Toyosi pushed me. When I fell, she pinned me to the ground with her right hand.
My suffering started afresh. I had returned to my old self, this time worse. Toyosi had now made my father’s home her permanent residence. I wondered if her husband wasn’t concerned about her whereabouts.
I couldn’t do anything well at the thought of my mother. It was already a week and I still didn’t know what happened to her. I was living a hell on earth.
Toyosi would beat me up at will. She would complain that I had put too much salt in the meal. All the clothes I had just washed, she would demand I rewash them because they were not as clean as she wanted.
Toyosi wasn’t going anywhere anymore. Maybe because of me I didn’t know. She was always at home, monitoring me. She would prevent me from leaving the house. As if she knew that leaving the house was the next thing on mind. If only I could get out of this house arrest, then the next step would be for me to flee the house.

I could earn a living outside, I thought. My mind flashed back to that swindler feigning deaf and dumb that day. I would just do something similar: I would write I AM DEAF AND DUMB on a paper and laminate it. Then I would put it on my chest and beg for alms. But how could I possibly get out of the house?
Whenever Toyosi was leaving for the market, she would lock me in and take the keys with her. That would be the only time I would have the opportunity to visit the parlour.

Bode was my regular human-guest in the kitchen, always there to bully on me. I had many non-human guests; geckos, cockroaches and rats. At night mosquitoes would lodge with me too.
I had made some big yams into pillow. A bag of rice was my mattress. Rats and cockroaches would run around my body as I lay flat like a handfan.
I was desperately seeking a way out. My poem book was nowhere to be found. I didn’t get talked to by anyone. I had developed phobia already, fearing everything around me. Even Bode could walk up to me and give me a slap on the face. My confidence had vanished.

I became sickly. My appearance had gone imbecilic. I do fold my hands together all the time, shaking like a cloth spread on the line.

One day, I got to the parlour while everyone had gone out of the house. I lay on the sofa and sighed. The fan was pouring its breeze on me. My stepmother mustn’t come and meet me there, else I would be doomed.
Toyosi got in suddenly. I was in soup. If only I had some functioning ears I would have heard the sound of the door as she was turning the keys in the keyhole.
Toyosi thumped hard on me until I was no more on earth. My mother’s aparition appeared to me and spoke to me. She said she had been killed by Toyosi. She said she didn’t want me to die too, so I should rise up again.

I felt a blow at my back. When I raised my head, Toyosi poured a pail of water on me. She was laughing. I thought I was destined for suffering so I accepted my fate.

The courage to write a poem was no more in me. The zeal had died since Toyosi tore the book I was writing them in. I remembered what my classteacher told me; so how would I come in contact with that publishing company, Judimax? I had better give it all up.

The world was no more worth living in; no one to share my pain with me…just only me in the planet earth. I had totally accepted my fate. Now a little surge of strength had engulfed me. I would confront Toyosi and ask her for my mother once more. This time around, I will pull up a strong face teeming with audacity. I thought I had nothing to lose at this juncture. Nothing worse could come on me since I had already experienced the worst tragedy anyone could have.

I walked right into the parlour. She was having her head on a pillow, having ensconced herself on the sofa. I had no fear. I tapped her shoulder and stood tall. If I perish, I perish, I thought like the biblical queen.
Toyosi never expected it. She was stunned when she saw that I was the one tapping. She must have thought that it was Bode, going by the way she was turning lazily from side to side while I was tapping her.
I read her lips. She had just said ‘What!’ I was prepared for the worst. She had warned me not to ever step my feet into the parlour except if she needed me there. As a matter of fact, the only time Toyosi would need me was when food was ready. I would have to set the table for the family and return to my corner–the kitchen.

Toyosi’s eyeballs bounced like basketballs in their sockets. She was ready to pounce on me. My look was stern right now. I was ready for her.
“What do you want?” she said with sound language which I understood going by the movement of her lips. I had been very familar with such lip movement.
I didn’t need to sign anything. I just gave her a note I had written earlier and then I sank into a chair opposite her. She raised her head to lengthen her look. Her mouth was wide agape.

Toyosi began to feed her eyes with the content of the note I wrote there. I was expecting a reply, but for minutes she was still having her head bent, perhaps absorbed in the one-sentence note I gave her.
Is there anything in there to ponder about for so long? I ruminated. I stood up and walked close to her. I signed my request before her face right now.

Definitely, she had murdered my mother, I thought as I gave consideration to the vision I saw in my trance when she beat me to blackout earlier.
The simple question I asked in that note was “Where is my mother?”
Toyosi stood up in a flash. She was speechless. I stiffened my bone as I got prepared to get a spicy slap on my cheek. Her shoulder touched my forehead while she was rising up. To my amazement she just walked away.

Toyosi returned with a pen and a notebook. She began to write something. When she was done, she gave me the note and stared into my face.
I took a little time to stare back into her eyeballs. Her big almond eyes reminded me of the almond fruit.

I began to read:
You asked a question and I have an answer for you; your mother has returned to her habitat, the prison. Well, it was a funny little trick back then. We got your mother out by bribing the chief warder and everybody we needed to bribe. It was for a little time, so she would return back there. Oh! You would need to see the horror on your mother’s face when I led her to three policemen at our return from Abuja. I told them she was an escaped prisoner.

Your mother was arrested and taken back to the chief warder. Her jailterm would no more be two years but five, says the chief warder. Rose, I hope you’re now clear of it all.

My tears dropped on the note and my eyes went dim, but there was more to read.
Last month, November, your classteacher was here to see your mother and you. I told her you now leave in Abuja, schooling there, so she wouldn’t bother coming to see you anymore. And as you know already, your aunty has travelled out, so then, tell me who will fight for you. Who else knows you are existing, no one? Not even your father. He sees you as dead, just the way I also see you.

I let the note fall off my grip as I sighed. Knowing that my mother was still alive was all I cared about. Let Toyosi do whatever she could, I wasn’t going to be moved.

Toyosi picked the note. It was as if she still had something to write:
Two men walked in here just yesterday; they got your contact address from your school. They said you won a publishing contract with them. I chased them out with a turning stick when they wouldn’t want to admit that it was the wrong address they had. They wouldn’t dare look for you again because I threatened to pour acid on them at their next visit. Ask me where your poem notebook is right now; I turned it into mash and flushed it down the sink. Gone forever!

I knew what I would do if there seemed to be no one to talk to. I would rather find solace in that book my aunty told me about–the bible. She said it could comfort one. I have read it sometimes in the past but eventually, I gave it up.

Now I had no Bible, but John had one dusty one he kept inside his room, on a small table beside his bed. If only I could get in there to have it, then all would be well, I thought. My father wouldn’t even look for it even if I took it from there, because he had abandoned it since I was three according to what my mother told me.

Toyosi laughed and laughed as she stood up to go to her room. She didn’t chase me out of the parlour right now and I was surprised at her behaviour.
I sat down confidently to watch the ongoing programme on the TV. Only God knew what they were saying in that big box. All they were saying fell on my ‘deaf ears’ or maybe they were just miming.
Bode had just awoken from sleep. He spread-eagled as he began to laze towards me. He frowned and yelled when he saw me:

“Mummy! Rose is in the parlour!” I knew that was what he was saying repeatedly, having studied his lips movement. He walked away in shame when no one answered him

Episode 23

I began to seek a way of getting through to father’s room to get his bible. Even if I took it away from there, he wouldn’t notice it. I just had to make sure that he didn’t spot me entering there, else I would be in ‘pepper soup’. I had to look left, right and left at several occasion, but each time I was about taking the step, either Bode or Toyosi would be coming close.
Since the day I stepped into the parlour to confront Toyosi, she hadn’t beaten me. I wondered why. Maybe she was scared of my look that day, I thought. Perhaps she was up to something again. However, my bedroom was not changed—the kitchen.

It was December already. A new year would soon be here. How I wished the new year could bring something really new. I just wished to be out of the house. Toyosi had warned me earlier that any day I stepped out of the house, then I should count myself dead. I wasn’t even allowed to play within the compound.

One day, daddy sat on the sofa in the parlour. Initially, he was watching a movie. But sleep came and robbed him of his consciousness. The door to his room wasn’t shut, so I knew it was the best time to get in there. I was fortunate because Toyosi had taken Bode out for shopping for the approaching Christmas.

I plodded into his room and went straight for the bible. I got it and began to make my way out of his room. Hurriedly, I set the bedside table well as it was, else, my father would know I came in if he met his room in disarray.

I didn’t hesitate to begin perusing the holy book. Since I didn’t know much scripture in my head, I began to open at random. The passage that caught my attention was where Jesus Christ was on the cross, about to die. I read with interest. I didn’t know when tears began to run down my cheeks. Initially, I thought I was the one who had the greatest suffering in the world, but when I read it, my fear was allayed. If the son of God could suffer to death in such manner, how much more me, a human?

I picked up the confidence that no matter what comes my way, I would no more be shaking. If Jesus could cry and shout “My father, my father, why have you forsaken me?” then it wasn’t a big deal if my earthly father, John, also forsook me, I thought.

I fell in love with that expression; I thought of making it into a poem, therefore I wrote the expression down in a little paper and put the paper inside the bible.

My father, my father, why have you forsaken me?

The poem I would write on that had begun to form in my head. I would write it as soon as possible.
I kept the bible in a space behind the bags of rice close to the wall. I knew it would be safe there.

Toyosi was done shopping. She had brought a lot from the boutique. I was surprised when she came to the kitchen where I was passing the day and tapped me. I thought she was here to complain about the meal she just ate, but to my shock she wasn’t here for such intent. She pulled me up in a peaceful manner and pointed the parlour to me. I led the way, she followed. She began to point to Bode who was dressed in a well-tailored robe. She even bought a horsetail and a swaggerstick for him and asked him to do a little pose in the robe. Bode looked gorgeous in the robe. I was blushing.

Toyosi began to unloose a nylon bag. Then she brought out a very beautiful pink dress. For who? I thought. Could that be for me for the Christmas? My father frowned when she brought out the dress. Toyosi spoke to him and he mellowed down. I didn’t know what she told him. Anyway, I was prepared for the worst, so I wouldn’t be taken by surprise.
Toyosi ordered me to pull off my dress. I did that hurriedly. Then she gave me the dress.

“Wear it,” she told me in sign language. I boggled. The dress would hurt me, I thought. Who knows what the inner of the cloth was made of? Maybe she had soaked the dress in juju, I pondered on.
“Wear it!” she instructed me again. I began to pray in my mind that nothing should happen to me. Slowly, I wore the dress as I insinuated a fall of death. Toyosi was smiling and turning her head from side to side to take a close look at me. Bode and John my father had some grotesques on their faces still. My father even left the room and Bode followed him; like father like son.

Toyosi held the shoulder pads and turned me around. She asked me to walk a little further away from where I was. I did. I saw her mouth go wow! She said I looked like Cinderella. Toyosi brought out a pair of female shoes and asked me to wear it too. First, I had to stuff my dirty legs into two long stockings before putting on the shoes. Toyosi cleaned the legs with a white handkerchief before asking me to put my legs in there. Toyosi placed a hat on my head. It was a pink hat as well.

She led me to a round glass, standing on a carved wooden base. I saw my look. I never knew I could be that beautiful.
“Good,” Toyosi said. She asked me to pull off.

The day after, John came to me and tapped me. I was sitting in the parlour then. Toyosi and Bode weren’t at home. When I turned my gaze around, I was shocked at what I saw:
My father held his bible close to my face. Gently, he picked up the note I wrote:

My father, why have you forsaken me?

The shock was too much for me to easily come off. I was ‘dumbfounded’. I trembled. How did he get the bible? I asked myself.

John wrote a note:
Why did you write this? Who told you I have forsaken you?
He demanded that I wrote my response in the same piece of paper. I had no answer to supply. I would ask him a question in reply.

How did you discover it? I wrote back.
Shocked? You went into my room and took my bible where it was. I got to know that when you were probably trying to leave the room; my key fell from the keyhole of the door when you were leaving the room. I heard the sound, you didn’t hear it. I followed you and saw you taking it to the kitchen. I peeped at you as you were pushing it behind the bags of rice. Now, Rose, can you see how useless you are? Your ears didn’t even pick up the loud trampling of my feet while I was rushing to my door to see who was there.
I collected the note and read it. I was motionless. John snaffled it suddenly and wrote something more:
You want to know why I have forsaken you? Anyway, being forsaken is what you deserve.

Why do I deserve to be? I replied. I had always crave something like this. I had wished for so long to ask my father a heart-to-heart question to know the state of his mind and the reasons for all his inimical actions. Now it seemed he was ready to pour out his mind to me when he wasn’t actually the person I was referring to in the note. That was supposed to be the title of my poem.

Yes, you deserve to be forsaken; why did you come to the world, useless? You have never been of help to me in life and you can never be.

I have been of help to you, father—a great help for that matter.
When was that?

On May 29, 1999, just last year, I helped you when you were helpless. When the new president stormed the podium on the handover day and spoke about his ascension and about his ambitions for the country, your old TV ran out of voice, or maybe the TV station lost its voice, you came in and tapped me to come over to the parlour. I was there with you, watching the sign language done at a corner of the TV. I wrote down everything and gave it to you. You were happy you didn’t miss the president’s speech that day.
My father read the note and trembled. It was conspicuous that he was confused.

John didn’t utter a word by replying the note. He just walked out of the parlour and went straight to his room. I have won.

How would a man answer the question addressed to God? I thought amusingly. John is not God, therefore he shouldn’t dare try to address my question. For all I cared, John is not my father but a devil incarnate.

A week later, it was Christmas Day. Bode was in his robe as expected. As for me, I didn’t know how to ask Toyosi for mine; the one I wore that day. Bode held the horsetail and a walking stick in his hands and walked like a chief. John was well-dressed too, as well as Toyosi. It seemed they would be going out.
When Toyosi didn’t dress me up, I approached her to ask what my fate was. She smiled and said, “Oh! Rose, come with me?”

I followed Toyosi out of the house for the first time since three months. A cool wind settled on me. I could feel the yuletide. The frontage had changed a lot, we now had a neighbor in the other duplex. Toyosi asked me to wait for her. She entered into the other flat. She came out pushing a wheelchair towards me. A girl of around my age was sitting on the wheelchair.

Her mother came outside with a boy who appeared to be blind. The boy was dressed for the Christmas as well as the girl on the wheelchair.
Rose, here is a surprise for you,” Toyosi signed to me.
“I don’t understand,” I replied her.

“Look at that dress on her, it was the one I put on you last week,” she signed to me. The mother of the child on wheelchair was clueless. She was seeing me for the first time since two months they packed in.
Toyosi told her something which I couldn’t hear. Maybe she told her that I was their deaf housemaid, I wouldn’t know.
Toyosi turned to me and said, “I never had a dress for you. Her mother asked me to help her go shopping for her son and daughter and I did. I tested the dress on you because you have exactly the same stature as lame Laide sitting here.

Hope you are not blind like blind Biodun standing beside his mother over there.

Merry Christmas, Rose!” she signed and began to leave the house.

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