MOTHER — A Short Story:
Kira reunites with his dead mother in the most unexpected way.
She appeared, standing by the door, with a smile that revealed her milk-white thirty-six. Her near-perfect dentition created a grin that showcased her upper gums entirely, resembling an unveiled surprise gift. With one hand, she folded the entrance door's cotton to the side, and with another, she held her small waist. The light from the late morning sun seeped in, followed by an unexpectedly refreshing air, too cold for that time of day. The rays enveloped her, casting her silhouette on the wall adjacent to the one on which I crouched, sipping turmeric tea.
The tea had been given to me by the madam of the house, Shino, as part of her visitor's regimen. Being the nurse she was, she believed it was her responsibility to ensure their nutritional well-being. But upon seeing the stranger, the taste of the tea collided with a sweet memory I attempted to relive, so that it slipped away just as my brain was about to grasp its slippery tail.
The gregarious-looking stranger looked familiar in an unfamiliar way, and that was the bane of half my inner struggles. The other half consisted of the natural plight of a healthy man experiencing an early morning erection. Her naturally tiny waist appeared even tinier due to the high-waist pleated skirt she wore. My stomach churned, and my heart drummed an upbeat rhythmsomething that hadn't occurred to me in nearly two decades. If I had spoken much at that moment, my tenses would have been misplaced, and my tongue would have stumbled over the wrong pronunciations. In my heart, I whispered, "You are the one I've been waiting for. But how did you end up here and now?" But I didn't even understand why I was saying that to myself.
After finishing my tea, Shino, the wife of my host, brought me the date palm I had requested earlier. She wanted me to consume the hot turmeric tea to open up my stomach because it was beneficial for various reasons, including sexual ones. I eagerly devoured the dates, their sweetness counteracting the biting spiciness of the turmeric blend that I had been enduring before the arrival of the shrouded stranger.
The petite stranger, whose name and identity remained unknown to me, advised, "You need to peel it open first to ensure there are no lurking worms. This species can't be trusted."
Seated on a plastic chair two steps to my right, she possessed a voice that bore a resemblance to something buried deeper than the depth of my ancestral root, starting with Adam.
"Okay," I replied. "Thanks, dear."
Though I knew I was supposed to peel the dates, as my host had taught me, my thoughts were scattered. The ghostly presence of the beautifully captivating girl had messed up my logical reasoning.
I averted my gaze, pretending not to care, yet I was still aware of her presence. I listened intently, hoping for a telepathic connection to form between us. But nothing.
She turned her seat, drew nearer, and delicately peeled and cleaned the dates one by one, placing them in my hand. I was eating from her hand!
I expressed my gratitude each time she handed them to me.
"Who is she?" I wondered. "So warm, caring, and noiseless, reminiscent of someone from my ancient past!"
Curiosity urged me to ask her, but my intuition warned against spoiling the enchantment. I decided to embrace the novelty. Ignorance is not always a disease. Sometimes, it saves one a lot of worry.
Much later, I learned that her name was Una. She had come from her parents' house in Undi to join us on our motorcycle journey to school. Una was an NCE student at a nearby teacher's training college, and she was the daughter of a devout Christian, Deacon Likara. She would ride with us on the bike and then transfer to another one at a certain point to reach her school.
An hour later, we were ready to set out. We climbed onto the bike, with Tarok as the rider. Una sat behind me, and I found myself sandwiched between Tarok, the familiar, and her, the unfamiliar. It felt like my past was in front of me, and my future was behind mean unimaginable setup.
I loved the scent of Una. It was fresh and unpretentious. The seat was tight for three, so whenever the bike jolted up and down, her bosom would brush against my back like soft sponges soaked in the lather of imported Joy Soap. Also, whenever the bike navigated a bend or picked up speed, she would hold onto my shoulders.
Her touch was gentle and genuine, an unspoken connection, yet no real connection. I cherished it secretly, hoping for more bends and exhilarating rides along the way. I even wished we would lightly tumble onto the grass, so that she would fall on me or I would fall on her.
But that was not really what I wanted. In my subconscious, I was waiting for her at an intersection. I wanted her to meet me there. I couldn't explain, even to myself, how. It was a feeling words couldn't contain.
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As we drove, Tarok fed me with stories about the village and its eccentricities. She was well-versed in these tales, often laughing and providing corrections to the details.
When we reached Baya, the place where we were to drop her off, she disembarked. Baya was a significant junction where three narrow but navigable bush tracks converged. These roads traversed barren farmlands, awaiting the arrival of rain so that the farmers could resume their work. One road led to Jin, another to Undi, the village we had just left, and the third connected to the main motorway leading to Simka. Here, she would take a bike to Jin, while we would spend some time at Maya to console an only son who had lost his mother.
This felt familiar once more, but the thoughts were too tangled up, and I couldn't catch up with processing them one by one.
We waited under the shade of a Kuka tree for a bike to come for Una. The sun burned fiercely, showing no remorse for the discomfort it inflicted upon us. Thankfully, the tree provided some relief. As we waited, I silently prayed for more time to unravel the puzzle while I gazed at her repeatedly, wondering how the story would unfold.
I examined her clothing more closely. Una was wearing a pleated skirt adorned with crisscrossing white and blue lines, running both vertically and horizontally. On top, she had a black shirt that hugged her petite frame. I found myself thinking, "I must be with this girl," as if someone were dragging her with me.
Finally, a bike arrived, and we had to part ways with her. Jealousy and indignation surged within me towards people I didn't even knowthe people at school whom she was going to meet. They would talk to her, shake hands with her, and perhaps even hug her. I struggled to suppress images of Hikira kissing her or Yunu taking pictures with her. It was an uncomfortable feeling to lose something that was never yours, all because you had the feeling it belonged to you in an inexistent past.
Before the bike zoomed off, I asked her, "When will you come home to visit us next?"
She smiled and replied in Hausa, "I don't know."
My host explained that she would come whenever he wanted her around. He was her guardian, and her parents had entrusted her to his care since she was a preteen. Even if he asked her to come back today after school, she would have to return.
My spirits lifted. I had thought, like a ghost, she would vanish much like she appeared, and I would never see her again.
I asked my guardian, "Is she engaged?"
"No! She's very free and available," he answered nonchalantly, without looking at me or putting much effort into the reply.
I knew he was pretending not to care about my concern. And I knew he knew that I had fallen in love with his little surrogate daughter at first sight. And I sensed that he was secretly pleased with it.
A week later, I asked Una out, and her shy silence became her consent.
The more we lived together, the more she reminded me of someone from my pastmy mother.
Mother went to church on Christmas Day and never returned. The church was ambushed and set on fire by fanatics of an opposing religion while worship was going on, and almost everyone inside was killed. A few people escaped to tell the story. After her funeral, she appeared in my dreams repeatedly, assuring me, "Kira, wipe your tears. I will come back for you."
Una was an astonishing mirror image of my mother in countless ways. They shared the same blood type (O) and genotype (AA). Both were left-handed, had an ebony complexion, and stood at a height of 5 feet. What's more, Una's baptismal name was Sarah, just like my mother's. Their similarities extended even further, with both of them having a deep fondness for the color wine and blue and a shared hobby of gardening, painting, and pottery.
Remarkably, Una entered this world precisely twelve months after my mother exited it (December 25th), making them birthday mates.
