Thursday, 25 June 2015

Anytime we do not believe in one thing


My mother call nonsense as non since. Me too do the same thing until my son correct me and tell me that it is not non since but nonsense. My mother finish primary school and marry my father. My father was a carpenter before he die. He was the kind of carpenter that do cushion chair, and people call him Oga furniture.

My father popular with furniture work. They say he do work very well and people are always coming to look for him to do their work for him before he die. My father dead when I was in primary three and my mother is a house wife. We start to find things hard and my mother say I should stop schooling and start to hawk and help train my brothers in school. My mother say girl don’t need school very well.

I am the only girl out of five children. I am the last born. I stop school and all of my brother go to school till university where they do weekend school. They hawk things after school and do jobs when holiday come. Me and my mother suffer plenty for them and they know it and like me very much for it. They get good work after they finish school.

When I grow up to marry, I marry carpenter like my mother, my brothers do not like him, they want me to marry rich men, but rich men don’t like me because they say I cannot express myself with English very well. My husband do not do furniture like my father. He only do tables and chairs for school, and bench for people shop. My husband do not have money reach my father.

My father is a good man and he never beat my mother. But, my husband beat me every time we talk of something and do not believe in one thing. If he beat me and any of my brother know, they come and arrest him. Until my mother beg before they release him. I don’t beg because I tire of him, but woman do not leave husband house unless husband pursue them. My husband also drink plenty alcohol drink which I don’t like.

One day he beat me. One of my brother come to our house in the morning and see my face swell, he call police and arrest him. He stay one month before they release him. He never stay that long in prison. My mother beg and beg before they release him. He came back looking like somebody that is dying. I gave him food, he ate and bath and change his clothes and go out and drink.

He come back, bear smelling in his mouth, but he did not drunk. He was angry and he curse me and my mother and my brother. He say we are wicked. He say my brothers should not pay my children school fees again in the big school they attend. He say he will put them in government school where he can pay their school fees. He say as they are back for mid-term break, that they will not go back to the hostel again, that they will go to school from home. He say he will look for house where we will stay so that we pack out from the fine house my brothers pay rent for.

I tell him no. I tell him that it is not possible. I tell him he can go to hell like they talk in film, but me and my children will stay in fine house, in fine area with people that go school and have money. I tell him my children will go in big people school and not government school. I tell him that my brothers say that I will also start school soon, so that I can read and write and talk better.

He vex too much for me. He shout for me. I shout back. We quarrel like we do anytime we do not believe one thing. He try to beat me and my first son hold his hand. My first son warn him not to beat me again. He surprise. Me surprise too. My husband vex plenty. He curse everybody. He curse me too much and say that I have make his children hate him. He shout and shout and shout, before he enter his room and lock it.

I do not like that my son talk to his father like that but I do not blame him or shout for him. I call him and tell him to beg his father for forgiveness in the morning. He agreed.

In the morning we wake up and do not see my husband. He write note and keep and say I should go and marry my brothers and my son and my mother. I go his workshop, he is not there. I go there every day, but I never see him again.


4 comments:

  1. this is a beautiful read,
    the flow has got the kind of energy that makes me want to know what happened next.

    ReplyDelete
  2. the language makes me laugh, especially because my transparent mind can see through it- into a transition from your illiterate narrator to a literate writer who plays God to create the characters. So, basically, your god role is unconsciously lenient in the sense that she makes some very correct statements in the course of her narration.
    I think something is missing somewhere along my read though.
    what it is, i do not know.
    could it be better? i think- yes.
    But then i think this is what a good flash fiction does to you- to know something is missing only because you want more. Good job.

    ReplyDelete
  3. the language makes me laugh, especially because my transparent mind can see through it- into a transition from your illiterate narrator to a literate writer who plays God to create the characters. So, basically, your god role is unconsciously lenient in the sense that she makes some very correct statements in the course of her narration.
    I think something is missing somewhere along my read though.
    what it is, i do not know.
    could it be better? i think- yes.
    But then i think this is what a good flash fiction does to you- to know something is missing only because you want more. Good job.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks so much, tiencepay. I appreciate your comment and don't forget to come back for better reads.

    ReplyDelete