WE ARE ABLE Episode 44 – 45

WE ARE ABLE Episode 44

We began to live from hand to mouth for the rest of the year.My father and her illegal wife had sold most of the property—Television, Radio, Refridgerator, yet they couldn’t meet up. Now.
they began to appear religious, trying to attend vigils and other church services. However, Toyosi didn’t cease from going to herbalists to get solution, but they had none.

December was drawing close, but we had
nothing at home.
Toyosi threatened to walk out of the
relationship to wait for her
husband’s return but John persuaded her
to stay to take care of
Bode with him for the moment.
Toyosi would weep all alone sometimes. I
wondered what
actually was wrong with her. Did
anything go wrong again? I
would ponder. I thought all was getting
better, but I never
knew something had gone wrong between
the illegal couple
which I didn’t know.
I intensified my asking for my mother,
but I didn’t get any
direct answer. Toyosi asked me to see
my father concerning
my mother’s issue. When I did, John
didn’t reply me. I
wondered how someone could be so
stubborn. After all these
‘nine plagues of the Egyptians’ which had
come upon him and
his family (except me), this man still
refused to let my mother
go. Certainly my father is another
Pharaoh in the making, I
thought.
It was soon going to be New Year day,
yet there seemed to be
nothing at home to use to do the New
Year day. Bode was
complaining vehemently. The evil hand of
malnutrition seemed
to have had much grip of him than any
other person in the
family. Bode’s once bulgy cheeks had
shrunken so much. His
neck had gone thin for lack of balanced
diet and one might
easily pass him for a kwashiorkor
patience. The sicknesses
which swept across the family, sparing
me those times, really
did much to their financial status.
Toyosi expected a response from her
husband in form of
money, but she got nothing.
The New Year gradually dragged in. It
was all hunger-strike for
us. If not for Mrs Omotayo who gave us
some cooked food,
we wouldn’t have had anything to eat
throughout the New Year
day. Toyosi humbly took the meal from
her that day and shed
tears. Bode shed tears too, asking his
daddy why he didn’t
perform his responsibility as a father to
take care of the need of
the family in the New Year. It was then
John joined in the cry. I
wanted to cry too, but all I had was
laughter. My father was
angry with me. He thought I was
laughing at their calamity, so
he ordered me out of the room.
I clutched to my pen and then began to
write something:
NEW YEAR HUNGER
Glancing at life sometimes
You are left to wonder
Is it worth living?
Yes to some it is,
Cos they have what it takes
To make life worth living
But to some it’s not,
A capital NO,
Cos to them it is but
A moment spent in woes
While some celebrate
A New Year indeed,
Others Celebrate
A New Year of Hunger…
I flipped back. I had written over fifty
poems so far. I
remembered how I begun those days;
how Toyosi tore my
first sets of poems. But I wrote them
again and she didn’t get to
know. If only I knew where that Judimax
was, I would take my
manuscript to them and get published. It
would be a dream
come true. I would make the whole world
ask Toyosi and my
father where exactly they kept my
mother; six feet under the
earth or where else?
I remembered my mother again. My
patience was no more in
place. It was already more than a year
since she was jailed for
no reason at all. Something made me
think of committing
patricide. I was going to thrust a knife
through my father’s belly
at the dead of the night and end it all at
once. I wouldn’t be
without my mother all day. It would be
better to kill my father
and then get killed in return than to allow
this sinner go scot-
free.
I went to bed, waiting for my father to
sleep as well. I was
going to rise up and walk straight to his
room to do the job, I
thought.
I got up from bed and reached for a knife
close by, a kitchen
knife. I began to walk stealthily to his
room. Toyosi left the door
ajar. I didn’t care where she was. I
opened the door gently and
found my father dozing on the bed. I
walked straight to him
and lowered the knife into his body with
all my strength. I
watched him grope for death. Now I
needed to escape into the
night, never to be seen again, but then
Toyosi appeared at the
door and screamed! I knew she
screamed. going by the raised
muscles on her neck.
I woke up from my nightmare. So it was
a dream, I sighed.
How on earth would I have killed my own
father?

WE ARE ABLE
Episode 45

When I woke up, it was on my mother’s laps I found my head, inside a car belonging to Mr Joe, the Judge. I thought it was a dream, but many hands signed to me that it wasn’t. They smiled at me.
“What’s happening?” I asked. My mother wept all over me. She was lean, too lean to survive the next few days. She would need a very serious medical attention.
It was Moses who had all the patience to narrate every detail to me after I fainted:
Hanged? For what?” Moses voiced out.
“For what she did of course!” the warder said.
“What did she do?” Mr. Joe asked.
“She killed her husband of course,” the warder said confidently and then a little iota of hope greeted the air. She was definitely not the same person as my mother.
“Oh!” everyone sighed. “That’s not the Hannah we are talking about,” James said. “The one we are asking for was brought here three years back, fair in complexion and…”
“Sorry, we don’t know any Hannah apart from the one that was hanged this morning.”
Moses turned to my aunty and asked, “I hope my Rose is responding to treatment, aunty.”
“Yes she is,” my aunty said. “Poor Rose! I didn’t know I was feeding her the information raw. She just coughed now but she hasn’t opened her eyes yet.”
They began to comb every cell for my mother who had probably been checked into the prison with a different name. Eventually they got to a ward and found her sitting at a corner, lean and unkempt. She couldn’t believe her eyes.
“Here’s she!” James and my aunty pointed at her since they were the only two people who knew her, apart from the Judge, Mr. Joe. The first person she asked for was me, but she was rest assured that she would see me in the car where my aunty was taking care of me.
My mother gave everyone in the cell a peck before exiting. They were up to ten inmates, crammed together in a single cell.
“Goodbye Iyabo,” they said, bidding her farewell. Iyabo was the name she was dubbed by the evil people who put her in the prison. They didn’t even remember where actually in the cell she was put since they were not intending to release her forever. Now it was the turn of those evil people to rot in cell.
The case was heard in court for the last time. Moses was our lawyer—they had theirs too, but no way. It was obvious that everything their lawyer was saying was a lie. There was nothing left to say.
Eventually, John and Toyosi were sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment each while the Chief Prison Wardens who pleaded guilty were sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Semiu, the man who discovered John but wasn’t permitted to live.
I became very popular, a deaf and dumb girl who won a case in court, yet having no voice. Thanks to everyone around me who were my voices—I had so many.
When the sentence was made, it was Biodun who gave me the tightest hug. He even lifted me off the ground and we both staggered and fell, but he didn’t stop laughing. Somehow it was hard on me to imagine that my biological father was the one convicted, yet I was happy about it. Well…that is my destiny, I thought.
Bose congratulated me and gave me some snapshots. I didn’t even know she was present in the court until I saw her just now. I lowered myself at Laide and gave her a peck. Mrs Omotayo stroked my hair gently and James, seated by her, shook me. My aunty held my hand, turned it around and deposited a kiss right inside my palm. Moses exchanged greetings with the other lawyer and began to head for me. He held me tight and kissed my forehead. Maybe if

Biodun had seen us, he would be jealous, but he is blind. Mr. Immaculate, Moses’ father, pulled my nose and laughed. The journalists were all over me to record my voice. Unfortunately, all they had were my gesticulations—sign language. Finally my mother rocked me into her bosom and shed tears of joy.
Now I knew how everybody loved me. Maybe it would be same way people who would read my story in the future would also fall in love with me, I thought. To my greatest shock, some important figures were waiting for me outside the court. My class-teacher, Mrs Oyindamola and her husband had just led some people to the court, herself had just returned from the UK that afternoon. I ran as if somebody was chasing me and buried my face inside her bosom, weeping. She deserved much more.
“Rose, do you remember Judimax?” she asked me.
“Sounds familiar,” I said. I had completely forgotten where I heard the name from.
“They are the publishing company—here to publish you now! Hope your write-ups are intact.”
“Y—yes,” I signed. “But I already have many publishers—you, my uncle, my aunty’s husband, Moses’ father, the Judge and…”
“Yes! One book one thousand publishers,” Mrs Oyin said with a smile. “We shall all be your marketer while Judimax publish you because they know how to do it best.”
I shook hands with them—three men and two ladies. It was as if I was dreaming.

Work began in earnest on my books, the poem collections and the story of my life. I had many editors. I felt on top of the world. Seeing my mother was a great source of inspiration to me. She had added weight since leaving the prison.
Moses and I made much effort to make sure the sign language and the Braille writing style got into the school curriculum of the normal people. It was all joy for us. My books were launched and sold all over the nation. I became a celebrity, but a shy one. Journalists all wanted to speak with me—they would have to learn the sign language first, or else they should forget it all. Now people began to see reasons why they should learn the sign language—James my uncle was a living example. He had eventually gotten married to Mrs. Omotayo. When I asked my aunty the reason why my uncle had to remarry, she enlightened me so well.
“Rose, indeed it is supposed to be till death do us part, but in a situation whereby the other partner is discovered to have fornicated, then divorce and remarry is allowed. She took me through the scripture and I read it myself; it was shocking to me.
Within two years of their marriage, they gave birth to a baby boy. My aunty, Rachael also gave birth to a baby girl. It was all joy.
In the prison, Toyosi took ill. Her stomach hurt her so much that she had to be rushed to the hospital. Her womb was discovered to have been damaged due to the abortion she had in the past. For the first time, I felt pity for her because no matter how long she lived, she would not be able to have a child.
I had left Secondary school and I had proceeded with the tertiary institution. The college was also a private one owned by the same person who had the secondary school I attended.
I was only a young graduate, just twenty-three years when Moses proposed to me. It was a great shocker.
“You want to marry a disabled?” I said in amazement.
“A disabled? Never!” Moses said. “How will I marry a disabled? Rose, it is you I want to marry, Rose the celebrity, Rose the Able sign language maestro, Rose the Medical Practitioner. Can you let me into your life?”
I wept as I remembered my father’s bad-mouthed talks back then. Did he not say that I can never have a good husband, if at all I would have any?
It was like a dream when everything began to set. I would now walk down the aisle with Immaculate Moses. His father didn’t object to our marriage at all because he loved me dearly. I thought Biodun would get angry whenever he heard of our wedding proposal, but shockingly he was the happiest person on earth that day. Now I knew youthful lust shouldn’t have anything to do with the future—Biodun had just exemplified that. I prayed he had his own partner soon.
Moses was twenty-nine, but already a very established lawyer. He was ever grateful to me for providing the platform through which he met the justice, Mr. Joe. If it hadn’t been for our court case, he wouldn’t have come across the man who made him have an easy ride through his profession.
My father would have to bless the wedding, no matter what, so we went to the prison to receive his blessing. I knew he would detest the idea, being the same man who said that I would never get married in life. I thought he would shout at us, having stayed over four years in the prison, but to my amazement, the man was sorry for what he did:
“Nobody is useless; nobody is disabled; everything is about mentality,” John wrote to me. “If I come out of here alive, I will let the whole world know that everybody is able!”

John demanded some copies of my story WE ARE ABLE and my poems too. He would help me market it in the prison yard for inmates and warders. I wept bitterly while leaving him, but I couldn’t help him.
My aunty became an evangelist, hosting crusades all over the nation and beyond. There was going to be a great miracle crusade. Yes! I believe in miracle too. She didn’t need to tell me after all I had gone through in life. As usual, she assured me that I would see miracle.
Moses and I took Biodun along. We both needed miracle—his eyes, my auditory and speech. Laide was also wheeled to the venue by James her foster father. The crusade ground was hot—a two-day miracle crusade. In the end I was expecting to hear and speak, but still I couldn’t. Anyway, God’s grace is sufficient for me, I thought, because that was exactly what God told Paul when he didn’t take away his affliction.
Biodun signaled to me to ask if indeed miracle was real. I replied him a ‘yes’.
“But where is it?”
“All around us,” I said. “I knew how Biodun would be feeling right now.
“Can you hear and speak now? I’m still blind just as I was, why?”
“God understands,” I said.
“I doubt if there is anything called miracle,” Biodun said.
“There is, Biodun.”
“A proof, Rose,” Biodun asked.
“Em…you see…Biodun,” I was short of ‘speech’, not because I didn’t know what to say, but because a living miracle was limping towards us. Her wheelchair was no more in sight, perhaps it was the one raised to the air by some people over there. It was Laide!
Laide limped towards us and held us tight. I didn’t need to say a word to Biodun because Laide was doing it herself. She had never walked all her lives, but miraculously, she just did.
“Praise God!” they screamed together and I signed “Hallelujah!”
Biodun’s eyesight wasn’t restored on the crusade ground but something more than eyesight located him on the same spot we were. A young lady came around and began to say some things I didn’t hear. She was weeping like a baby. The lady told her story of how she lost her childhood elder brother recently. She had this to say:
“I have grown to know just one person—my elder brother. We became orphans just around the age of six and ten respectively. He lost his eyesight to a disease we had no money to treat because there was no parent for us. I picked up the challenge of leading him around, from one place to another, begging money to fend for ourselves. We grew up together that way. I was so used to Richard that I never thought of leaving him, but unfortunately, he died two years back. I wept my eyes out—how would I survive without having him beside me? Who else would I lead the way? Other blind people I have seen are not looking like Richard in appearance, so definitely they will not fill up the vacuum in my life. But when I see you, it seems like I am seeing Richard. You look like a twin brother to him. Please can you at least give me the chance to be your private nurse?”
“But Rose here is my private nurse,” Biodun responded.
“Just…please, let me be your nurse,” she pleaded. Her name was Dorcas. She had her way eventually and in a matter of months, they had proposed to each other. Soon they became husband and wife.

*** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***

“WE ARE ABLE!” I signed to a set of special deaf and dumb people in my former public secondary school.
“YES WE ARE!” they signed back.

THE END

Thanks to Sammy for this wonderful write up..God will bless you for been a blessing…

Can you now see that this story is More Than a BLESSING? If u Believe

Please share WE ARE ABLE story with your friends;
the once that feels disabled, the deaf and dumb, those that feel inferior etc…
This will really changed their mindset and will really inspired them to be GREAT

PLEASE DO THAT!!!

Be a Blessing!!

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The BrideGROOM OR The Presidential Villa

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