we are able episode 42
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
I came out of our apartment and walked to Biodun’s apartment,
knowing quite well that Mrs Omotayo would accept me. She
had accepted me back since the day she discovered how I
saved her children from death by feeding them with tea to
recover them from their multiple shock—Bode’s rough-
handling and the bomb blast.
I was surprised to see that they had a guest. Mrs Omotayo had
travelled to the village so that she could tell the villagers the
misfortune that had befallen their daughter, Taiba. She had to
get someone to take care of her children in her absence.
Biodun and I had all the day to play. The nanny didn’t restrict
us. She was amazed at the way we were doing. She just stood
somewhere watching and laughing. I was tempted to tell
Biodun what exactly I was to John, but I tried to hold it until Mrs
Omotayo would be around.
Biodun’s mother returned the day after. She came with good
news; Taiba was there in the village. She fled when the bomb
would not stop blasting, telling everyone in the village that there
was a terrible war in Lagos. So, now, it was only Bode who
lost his life of everyone I knew. Maybe I would have been dead
if not for the bomb blast, because I was almost going to give
up in the hands of Bode and Obinna just when the first sets of
bombs blasted.
I opened up to Mrs Omotayo who I really was. She was angry
that I kept it that late. She wrote at length to me that we were
going to fight to the end. She wanted me to take her to the
court of law where my mother was judged, but I didn’t know
where because when we were going there then, I was asleep
throughout the journey. I was only eleven years then, so I
knew little, being a homebody who hadn’t even been to places.
Mrs Omotayo was worried. She took me as her own child and
I began to live with her. My father’s own apartment had been
rented out for another tenant.
Biodun and I became inseparable. Mrs Omotayo noticed our
sexual intimacy and called us to order. She addressed a note to
me to that end:
“Rose, I have adopted you as a daughter and not as an in-law.
You either choose what you want to be to my son—a lover or
a sister? If a lover, then maybe you will have to step aside for
him to get matured first because I wouldn’t want to see you get
pregnant for him and then many complications attached. But if
you are an adopted daughter of mine, you will have to live with
my children like a sister and not a lover-girl. Make a choice![/i]
Indeed, Mrs Omotayo had a cogent point. I was already
becoming spoilt and I could really do an undo at the moment.
If Biodun wasn’t feeling any sexual urge for me, I was already
feeling it, a fourteen year old girl who was introduced to
freedom for the first time in her life. Perhaps, Biodun may not
know as much as I knew in this kind of game because he was
blind. I have seen too much on TV which he hadn’t seen for
once, perhaps he must have heard too, something I haven’t
had the chance to hear myself—but it is seeing that is believing
and not hearing, I thought.
I wept when Mrs Omotayo said this. She was really right
because my feelings for him had really gone out of hand—just
using some extra effort to contain myself earlier.
I agreed to be a sister to Biodun. She spoke to him as well and
in tears she agreed to be my brother. It was Laide who had all
the joy in the end. We had sidelined her long ago, but now she
would have two siblings and not one—Biodun and I. I would
be her elder sister.
I began to attend school again after leaving it for more than a
year now. My mates had become seniors to me because I had
to start from JSS 1 again. I was surprised when I discovered
that Bose was in JSS 3 in the new school I now attended. I
knew I had just been initiated into fresh trouble because Bose
would do anything to frustrate me now, putting in mind how I
beat her black and blue that day I discovered that she was the
one who stole my books.
My new school was a private one, founded by a philanthropist.
It also had primary school and a college too, for higher
learning. I shook my head when I discovered that Obinna was
now in primary 3 in our school. I felt pity on him because he
was not supposed to be in primary 3, but primary 6, but since
he wasn’t exposed to the sign language, he would have to learn
it from a lower class.
Obinna came to me and apologized for his evil deed to me. He
was weeping terribly as he signed the little he knew:
“Senior Rose, I am very sorry,” he signed and wept.
I felt embarrassed. How soon was he calling me a senior? I
forgave him at once.
Bose made a scapegoat out of me. She would be out near the
gate to order me about. She would ask me to pick all the
papers in the school vicinity. I was ashamed of myself. Bose
would laugh at me and flog me with cane at the slightest
provocation. She was a prefect in the junior school. First it was
Bode, now it is Bose; when would I be free from all these
people with ‘Bold and Bossy’ names? I thought.
My school was a day and boarding school. Bose was a boarder
but I was a day student. I felt like telling my guardian that I
didn’t want to go to school anymore, but how would I say so?
It would make me look irresponsible before her. I decided to
cope anyhow. If I could really cope with all the tortures in
Toyosi and John’s hands in those days, I don’t think anything
could stop me from coping with this, I thought.
Bose would call her friends to bully on me. They would call me
to a private place and ask me to do some odd chores for them.
Bose wanted me to clean the school toilets and at the same
time sweep the floor. She wanted me to come to her place
during every break time to scratch her back. That was exactly
where she got it all wrong—that I was a Junior student doesn’t
mean that I am a slave, I thought.
I stood before Bose as she gave me the command:
“Rose, are you deaf? I say scratch my back!” she signed,
turning her back to me. She had unzipped her uniform, waiting
to have my fingers on her back. She turned around at me and I
signed to her that I was deaf of course:
“We are both deaf and dumb.”
“Rose, don’t you realize that I am your senior? Scratch my back
before I show you my true colour,” she threatened.
“If you know you have an itchy body, why didn’t you take
your bath with an iron spoon?” I spoke with audacity. I was
ready for her that day.
Bose was angry. She threw her right hand forcefully at me to
dish me a ‘dirty’ slap, but I gripped it tight. She was surprised
that I wasn’t caught off-guard. She tried everything she could
to get her hand off my grip, but no way. I twisted her hand
and she went on her knee in pain. It was not all. I would not let
her go unpunished for everything she had done to me, so I
blew up her stomach with punches. She fell flat.
I had made history. It hadn’t for once happened in the school, a
junior student beating up his or her senior. Even the junior
boys dared not beat up the senior girls, but I had just breached
the rules and regulations of the school. I knew what would
follow but I wouldn’t care.
I was caught red-handed by a teacher passing by. She had
seen the action already. Now she began to lead me to the
Principal’s office as she ordered that someone else should help
Bose to her feet for treatment.
The principal was mad at me when he heard it. I was asked to
stool down and I obeyed.
“Rose, do you know the implication of what you have just
done?” the principal signed to me.
“N-no s-sir,” I said.
“You just beat up your senior—a prefect for that matter…”
“But she was the one who…”
“Shut up!” the man shouted at me. “You shall be expelled from
this—” the man stopped signing as he looked above my head
and smiled. Seemed he had a guest.
A young man hugged him. The young man was his son who
was in the higher institution, University of Lagos. I have heard
about him but haven’t set my eyes on him since I came to the
school.
The young man turned to me and then we both gaped for
shock when we set eyes on each other. It was Immaculate
Moses, the boy who helped me across the road over two years
back!
Moses’ mouth went wow when he saw me. He demonstrated
before me in sign language and I was awed. The last time we
met, being the only time, he wasn’t able to do the sign.
“How is it, Rose?” he had asked. I was surprised that Moses still
knew my name.
“I’m fine, sir,” I replied him. Moses’ father was very shocked to
see that we knew each other. He began to speak with his son.
Moses signed to me that I should be up on my feet. At first I
didn’t listen to him, fearing what his father could do to me. I got
up eventually when the headmaster himself gave me the go-
ahead. Moses asked me why I was involved in a fight.
“Rose, don’t you know that fighting is bad?”
“Yes I know sir,” I signed back.
“So why are you fighting—with your senior for that matter?”
“She—she…” I knew it would be a very long story.
Moses said he wanted to be alone with me because he was
perceiving that I had a lot of troubles going on within me.
“Rose, I have been willing to have a heart to heart talk with you
since two and half years back when we met, that was why I
gave you my home address. You didn’t show up there, why?”
“I came, but…I was told you have relocated,” I responded.
“You came? Oh! Sorry!” Moses signed. “Come, let’s go.”
I was looking at his father who was not interrupting his son. I
wondered what he would say if he saw me going with his son.
Moses led me to a car just outside his father’s office. The
Toyota Camry glistened in the early morning son. It was
smooth to the core. Moses ordered me to get in. I was afraid
and shy.
Bose was close by, gaping like a monkey whose banana was
lost. Others, her friends, were gaping too. I plodded in, beside
the driver’s seat and began to fasten my seat belt. Moses sat
behind the wheel and drove off.
We pulled up in a very big restaurant. I was shy because my
school uniform was still on me. People would take me for
something else, seeing me in a school uniform. As we sat
before a table, I saw eyes staring at me. I knew they were
saying some contumelious words but since I had no
functioning eardrum I didn’t hear them.
“Rose, do you know something?”
“No sir,” I replied.
“Since two and half years back that I met you, I have been
feeling like I should know you better. That day, you looked very
troubled. I wanted to know everything concerning you but that
day was so short—we couldn’t talk at length—you know I was
deaf those days…”
“Deaf? How sir?” I asked him. I thought he was making fun of
me.
“Yes, I was!” Moses maintained. “I was deaf to the sign
language you knew how to speak. The barrier in
communication pained my heart so much that I began to learn
it from my dad as soon as I got home that day. Now I can do it
even better than him—I can sign the American and even the
British. Can you sign the ASL too?”
“Yes sir,” I replied. “It’s quite easy.”
Moses coughed over a fist set before his mouth. Then he
changed the topic:
“Rose, that day when I saw you, you were very worried. What
was wrong?”
“It is a very long story,” I said. My eyes went gloomy. I was
not ready to dig into those story of the old memories.
“I’m all eyes, Rose,” Moses said. “I’m not going back to the
campus today, so I have all the time on earth.”
I began to tell Moses everything I could. When I ended my
story, Moses was already shedding tears in sympathy.
“Rose! We must find them! We must find them!” he signed
vigorously.
Moses wanted us to swing into action immediately. He paid for
all our expenses and off we went.
A lady asked for Moses’ attention and he halted to speak with
her. I set my face few metres ahead and saw a couple. The
husband got into the driver’s seat and the wife also bent to get
in. The two of them appeared familiar. I was shocked when I
discovered that the woman was Toyosi but the man didn’t look
like John—of course I was sure the man was not John, but he
looked familiar to me.
I screamed. When Moses heard me scream, he left the lady
alone and rushed to me.
“Rose! Rose! What’s the matter?”
“She’s the one!” I signed and pointed to the car which was
already zooming off!
“Gush! Rose, get inside the car!” Moses signed. He was going to
give them a chase.
Moses zoomed after the car, but we lost it eventually. Oh! So
painful! Moses drove me back to school just when the closing
hour bell rang. His father wasn’t pleased at all. He never knew
we would spend the whole day out of school. Earlier, when I
asked Moses if his father wouldn’t be angry with us, he assured
me he wouldn’t.
“Rose, my father himself knew something is bothering you and
he knows quite well that I know how to let people say their
minds,” Moses had said.
I perceived the man was only angry because we spent too long
outside the school.
I watched them speak in voice language. Perhaps they didn’t
want me to hear what they were saying. When they were
done, the principal smiled at me and signed, “Rose, for a better
academic performance and a good frame of mind, we are
changing your class.”
“Sir, please don’t change my class!” I screamed in sign
language. “I am very sorry for everything I did.”
“Rose, you don’t need to be sorry at all because I have
concluded that already…”
I looked at Moses…
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Re: We Are Able(a Touching Story) by SammyHoe(m):
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The principal asked me to come with my guardian. I was
scared. What actually did Moses tell him? Why was he asking
me to come with my guardian? Would they report the case to
her? She would be very much disappointed in me for fighting.
Whatever it would cost me, I would not tell Mrs Omotayo a
thing, I thought. That day, when I got home, I just lay
somewhere like a bunch of idle broom. Biodun himself didn’t
know that I was around because the taxi left me behind when I
was nowhere to be found, although the principal informed
them that I had gone somewhere with his son.
I wondered how Biodun would feel. I hope he wasn’t nursing
any kind of feeling towards me anymore. If so, he was surely
going to be hurt if he heard that I went out with Moses, a son
to the principal of the school. I had just passed beside him on
tiptoes, yet he heard the sound of my footstep and spoke. I
didn’t hear the sound of his speech. I was silent.
I found myself in Chi….’s class. As a matter of fact, I was happy
being with him there. We were playing together as I taught him
sign language. He smacked my head and I pushed him lightly.
He must have accepted his fate. Afterall, being demoted does
not kill one, I thought. I was shocked when Chi… suddenly
gave me a hard knock on the head.
“What have I done wrong?” I signed to ask him, then my eyes
flashed to life and I saw Biodun standing over me. He had just
struck his stick against my head while he was walking to find
his way to the toilet by himself—Laide had slept off in her
bedroom. Sleep cleared off my face and I realized that I was
only daydreaming. I got up from the rug and began to make
for my room to have a proper sleep. Laide saw me and did
some signs to me to ask where I was. She had just woken up
too.
Biodun realized that it was me he hit on the head with the stick,
perhaps Laide told him that just now. I didn’t answer them a
word as I hurried to my bedroom. I was already getting fed up
with life—those bad dreams never want to let me be. I gave up.
Biodun must have taken my action for malice—that I didn’t
want to answer him because he struck my head with a stick,
but it wasn’t the case. The threat of the principal who promised
to change my class was what was really weighing me down. I
tried to figure out what exactly Moses said to make him
determine to change my class; maybe as a result of my
immaturity in containing undeserved punishment from my
supposed senior. Perhaps because Moses took me out of the
school compound for too long at the detriment of my
education, I pondered on. But that shouldn’t call for a grave
consequence as such, I pondered.
I couldn’t sleep throughout the night. How would I feel being
sent to the primary school just because I fought a senior who
was actually a mate? Bose—how on earth would I admit her as
my senior? Over my dead body! I snapped my fingers over
my head as if my head was my dead body I was talking about.
I didn’t tell Mrs Omotayo anything about it. It would be better
for her to know about it somehow by herself than for me to tell
her with my own hands.
The principal greeted me with a question the following
morning.
“Rose, where is your guardian I ask you to come with today?”
“She is very busy sir,” I lied. My hands shook someone,
denoting that I was telling a lie.
“That’s a lie!” the man went straight to the point.
“Y-yes,” my hands stammered. “I didn’t tell her.”
The principal came close to me and looked me in the eyeballs,
an impervious look though. Just then, Moses entered.
“Moses, take her to her new class immediately,” he
commanded him. Moses stared at his father a little while,
having no visible expression on his face too. He just held tight
to my right wrist, picked up a cane with the left and led me
away.
I wondered what Moses would do with the cane. Was he going
to cane me? I thought he was a friend, so how come he would
now thrash me with the long cane? I would have asked him
what he was actually going to do to me, but I felt it would be
disrespectful of me. I was only a JSS 1 girl about to be demoted
while he was already in his third year in the University,
studying Law. He must know how to punish someone for real,
I thought, since he is a lawyer.
Moses began to lead me to my new class. I was scared that I
would now be demoted, going by what I saw Moses and his
father doing to each other earlier—arguing. Moses began to lead
me towards the JSS 3 class, my seniors. I knew I was going to
be beaten to pulp there. I made my arm strong and halted
along the way. Moses kept pulling me along, just exactly the
way he was doing to me two years back while taking me
across the road. I wondered if he was a military man.
When Bose saw me brought amidst them, in their class, she
began to babble with her hands. Her friends laughed along with
her as they saw us. They were expecting Moses to command
them to beat me up for beating a senior.
“Bose, come over here,” Moses called.
Bose walked majestically to the front of the classroom. She was
glad seeing me. Moses asked me to lie on a desk as he handed
the cane over to her. She collected it with alacrity and raised it
above her head to lash me. I watched as her hand swooped
down, but the cane hanged in the air. I was shocked. I raised
my face to see what was happening. It was Moses. He was the
one who gripped Bose by the hand, preventing her from
flogging my back.
Bose and her mates were shocked. They hadn’t seen it in such
fashion. They began to ask why. Moses frowned at them as he
began the story:
“Bose, you deserve to be punished yourself,” Moses burst out.
“How sir?” Bose’s hands went wide agape.
“You are a very wicked fellow Bose! Rose told me all the evil
you did to her while she was in your former school; how you
stole her books and fought with her all the time. Rose told me
that you were a bully and here you still her. You don’t deserve
to be a prefect here because you are a bully and I will tell my
daddy about that. He will remove you from that post before
long.”
Bose was weeping.
“And from now on, Rose will be the Senior Prefect of this
school.”
Moses ordered me to take my seat. I was reluctant because I
felt that Moses was doing contrary to what his father had asked
him to do. Moses led my by the hand to a seat belonging to
someone who was not in class.
“Rose, here is your seat from now on,” Moses said. I stood
before the seat but Moses forced me to be seated. I was awed,
staring around me. They were looking scornfully at me.
“Do you know how much this girl has achieved?” Moses said.
“Without a father and a mother, yet she won prizes in her
former school, writing striking poems. Ask Bose what I meant
and she will tell you,” Moses told them all. They were amazed.
Moses warned them all not to do me any harm, else they
would have to face the risk of having their names expunged
from the school register. I felt like a queen, but a little iota of
doubt still stared at my face.
As soon as Moses stepped out of the class, I hurried after him.
“Sir, your daddy will be angry!”
“Not at all Rose, since he knows about this,” Moses assured. “I
told him everything about you and he wants you commended,
that is why he asked you to come with your guardian so that
he could tell her that you are deemed fit for triple promotion.
You’ll have to still come with her anyway—tomorrow.”
“Are you sure sir?”
“If I am not would I say it?” Moses said. “I am a lawyer and we
don’t say loose things. Come with your guardian tomorrow,
that’s all.” Moses hurried away.
`I began to trudge back slowly to the classroom. Bose was still
weeping in shame—the shame that her theft secret had been
leaked to her classmates by Moses. They would soon begin to
call him names such as ‘Bose the Theft Bose!’ or ‘Queen of
Thieves’.
Bose buried her head on her desk and kept on weeping. I rose
from my seat and began to walk to her desk. I put an arm
around her back and tapped her gently with the other. She
raised and face and became shocked at my sight.
“Bose, that is past tense; let’s be friends,” I signed to her and
then stretched my hand before her to hold. I waited to see if
she would take it or reject it.
“Bose, let’s be friends,” I used my hands once more and then
stretched it before her again.
I came out of our apartment and walked to Biodun’s apartment,
knowing quite well that Mrs Omotayo would accept me. She
had accepted me back since the day she discovered how I
saved her children from death by feeding them with tea to
recover them from their multiple shock—Bode’s rough-
handling and the bomb blast.
I was surprised to see that they had a guest. Mrs Omotayo had
travelled to the village so that she could tell the villagers the
misfortune that had befallen their daughter, Taiba. She had to
get someone to take care of her children in her absence.
Biodun and I had all the day to play. The nanny didn’t restrict
us. She was amazed at the way we were doing. She just stood
somewhere watching and laughing. I was tempted to tell
Biodun what exactly I was to John, but I tried to hold it until Mrs
Omotayo would be around.
Biodun’s mother returned the day after. She came with good
news; Taiba was there in the village. She fled when the bomb
would not stop blasting, telling everyone in the village that there
was a terrible war in Lagos. So, now, it was only Bode who
lost his life of everyone I knew. Maybe I would have been dead
if not for the bomb blast, because I was almost going to give
up in the hands of Bode and Obinna just when the first sets of
bombs blasted.
I opened up to Mrs Omotayo who I really was. She was angry
that I kept it that late. She wrote at length to me that we were
going to fight to the end. She wanted me to take her to the
court of law where my mother was judged, but I didn’t know
where because when we were going there then, I was asleep
throughout the journey. I was only eleven years then, so I
knew little, being a homebody who hadn’t even been to places.
Mrs Omotayo was worried. She took me as her own child and
I began to live with her. My father’s own apartment had been
rented out for another tenant.
Biodun and I became inseparable. Mrs Omotayo noticed our
sexual intimacy and called us to order. She addressed a note to
me to that end:
“Rose, I have adopted you as a daughter and not as an in-law.
You either choose what you want to be to my son—a lover or
a sister? If a lover, then maybe you will have to step aside for
him to get matured first because I wouldn’t want to see you get
pregnant for him and then many complications attached. But if
you are an adopted daughter of mine, you will have to live with
my children like a sister and not a lover-girl. Make a choice![/i]
Indeed, Mrs Omotayo had a cogent point. I was already
becoming spoilt and I could really do an undo at the moment.
If Biodun wasn’t feeling any sexual urge for me, I was already
feeling it, a fourteen year old girl who was introduced to
freedom for the first time in her life. Perhaps, Biodun may not
know as much as I knew in this kind of game because he was
blind. I have seen too much on TV which he hadn’t seen for
once, perhaps he must have heard too, something I haven’t
had the chance to hear myself—but it is seeing that is believing
and not hearing, I thought.
I wept when Mrs Omotayo said this. She was really right
because my feelings for him had really gone out of hand—just
using some extra effort to contain myself earlier.
I agreed to be a sister to Biodun. She spoke to him as well and
in tears she agreed to be my brother. It was Laide who had all
the joy in the end. We had sidelined her long ago, but now she
would have two siblings and not one—Biodun and I. I would
be her elder sister.
I began to attend school again after leaving it for more than a
year now. My mates had become seniors to me because I had
to start from JSS 1 again. I was surprised when I discovered
that Bose was in JSS 3 in the new school I now attended. I
knew I had just been initiated into fresh trouble because Bose
would do anything to frustrate me now, putting in mind how I
beat her black and blue that day I discovered that she was the
one who stole my books.
My new school was a private one, founded by a philanthropist.
It also had primary school and a college too, for higher
learning. I shook my head when I discovered that Obinna was
now in primary 3 in our school. I felt pity on him because he
was not supposed to be in primary 3, but primary 6, but since
he wasn’t exposed to the sign language, he would have to learn
it from a lower class.
Obinna came to me and apologized for his evil deed to me. He
was weeping terribly as he signed the little he knew:
“Senior Rose, I am very sorry,” he signed and wept.
I felt embarrassed. How soon was he calling me a senior? I
forgave him at once.
Bose made a scapegoat out of me. She would be out near the
gate to order me about. She would ask me to pick all the
papers in the school vicinity. I was ashamed of myself. Bose
would laugh at me and flog me with cane at the slightest
provocation. She was a prefect in the junior school. First it was
Bode, now it is Bose; when would I be free from all these
people with ‘Bold and Bossy’ names? I thought.
My school was a day and boarding school. Bose was a boarder
but I was a day student. I felt like telling my guardian that I
didn’t want to go to school anymore, but how would I say so?
It would make me look irresponsible before her. I decided to
cope anyhow. If I could really cope with all the tortures in
Toyosi and John’s hands in those days, I don’t think anything
could stop me from coping with this, I thought.
Bose would call her friends to bully on me. They would call me
to a private place and ask me to do some odd chores for them.
Bose wanted me to clean the school toilets and at the same
time sweep the floor. She wanted me to come to her place
during every break time to scratch her back. That was exactly
where she got it all wrong—that I was a Junior student doesn’t
mean that I am a slave, I thought.
I stood before Bose as she gave me the command:
“Rose, are you deaf? I say scratch my back!” she signed,
turning her back to me. She had unzipped her uniform, waiting
to have my fingers on her back. She turned around at me and I
signed to her that I was deaf of course:
“We are both deaf and dumb.”
“Rose, don’t you realize that I am your senior? Scratch my back
before I show you my true colour,” she threatened.
“If you know you have an itchy body, why didn’t you take
your bath with an iron spoon?” I spoke with audacity. I was
ready for her that day.
Bose was angry. She threw her right hand forcefully at me to
dish me a ‘dirty’ slap, but I gripped it tight. She was surprised
that I wasn’t caught off-guard. She tried everything she could
to get her hand off my grip, but no way. I twisted her hand
and she went on her knee in pain. It was not all. I would not let
her go unpunished for everything she had done to me, so I
blew up her stomach with punches. She fell flat.
I had made history. It hadn’t for once happened in the school, a
junior student beating up his or her senior. Even the junior
boys dared not beat up the senior girls, but I had just breached
the rules and regulations of the school. I knew what would
follow but I wouldn’t care.
I was caught red-handed by a teacher passing by. She had
seen the action already. Now she began to lead me to the
Principal’s office as she ordered that someone else should help
Bose to her feet for treatment.
The principal was mad at me when he heard it. I was asked to
stool down and I obeyed.
“Rose, do you know the implication of what you have just
done?” the principal signed to me.
“N-no s-sir,” I said.
“You just beat up your senior—a prefect for that matter…”
“But she was the one who…”
“Shut up!” the man shouted at me. “You shall be expelled from
this—” the man stopped signing as he looked above my head
and smiled. Seemed he had a guest.
A young man hugged him. The young man was his son who
was in the higher institution, University of Lagos. I have heard
about him but haven’t set my eyes on him since I came to the
school.
The young man turned to me and then we both gaped for
shock when we set eyes on each other. It was Immaculate
Moses, the boy who helped me across the road over two years
back!
Moses’ mouth went wow when he saw me. He demonstrated
before me in sign language and I was awed. The last time we
met, being the only time, he wasn’t able to do the sign.
“How is it, Rose?” he had asked. I was surprised that Moses still
knew my name.
“I’m fine, sir,” I replied him. Moses’ father was very shocked to
see that we knew each other. He began to speak with his son.
Moses signed to me that I should be up on my feet. At first I
didn’t listen to him, fearing what his father could do to me. I got
up eventually when the headmaster himself gave me the go-
ahead. Moses asked me why I was involved in a fight.
“Rose, don’t you know that fighting is bad?”
“Yes I know sir,” I signed back.
“So why are you fighting—with your senior for that matter?”
“She—she…” I knew it would be a very long story.
Moses said he wanted to be alone with me because he was
perceiving that I had a lot of troubles going on within me.
“Rose, I have been willing to have a heart to heart talk with you
since two and half years back when we met, that was why I
gave you my home address. You didn’t show up there, why?”
“I came, but…I was told you have relocated,” I responded.
“You came? Oh! Sorry!” Moses signed. “Come, let’s go.”
I was looking at his father who was not interrupting his son. I
wondered what he would say if he saw me going with his son.
Moses led me to a car just outside his father’s office. The
Toyota Camry glistened in the early morning son. It was
smooth to the core. Moses ordered me to get in. I was afraid
and shy.
Bose was close by, gaping like a monkey whose banana was
lost. Others, her friends, were gaping too. I plodded in, beside
the driver’s seat and began to fasten my seat belt. Moses sat
behind the wheel and drove off.
We pulled up in a very big restaurant. I was shy because my
school uniform was still on me. People would take me for
something else, seeing me in a school uniform. As we sat
before a table, I saw eyes staring at me. I knew they were
saying some contumelious words but since I had no
functioning eardrum I didn’t hear them.
“Rose, do you know something?”
“No sir,” I replied.
“Since two and half years back that I met you, I have been
feeling like I should know you better. That day, you looked very
troubled. I wanted to know everything concerning you but that
day was so short—we couldn’t talk at length—you know I was
deaf those days…”
“Deaf? How sir?” I asked him. I thought he was making fun of
me.
“Yes, I was!” Moses maintained. “I was deaf to the sign
language you knew how to speak. The barrier in
communication pained my heart so much that I began to learn
it from my dad as soon as I got home that day. Now I can do it
even better than him—I can sign the American and even the
British. Can you sign the ASL too?”
“Yes sir,” I replied. “It’s quite easy.”
Moses coughed over a fist set before his mouth. Then he
changed the topic:
“Rose, that day when I saw you, you were very worried. What
was wrong?”
“It is a very long story,” I said. My eyes went gloomy. I was
not ready to dig into those story of the old memories.
“I’m all eyes, Rose,” Moses said. “I’m not going back to the
campus today, so I have all the time on earth.”
I began to tell Moses everything I could. When I ended my
story, Moses was already shedding tears in sympathy.
“Rose! We must find them! We must find them!” he signed
vigorously.
Moses wanted us to swing into action immediately. He paid for
all our expenses and off we went.
A lady asked for Moses’ attention and he halted to speak with
her. I set my face few metres ahead and saw a couple. The
husband got into the driver’s seat and the wife also bent to get
in. The two of them appeared familiar. I was shocked when I
discovered that the woman was Toyosi but the man didn’t look
like John—of course I was sure the man was not John, but he
looked familiar to me.
I screamed. When Moses heard me scream, he left the lady
alone and rushed to me.
“Rose! Rose! What’s the matter?”
“She’s the one!” I signed and pointed to the car which was
already zooming off!
“Gush! Rose, get inside the car!” Moses signed. He was going to
give them a chase.
Moses zoomed after the car, but we lost it eventually. Oh! So
painful! Moses drove me back to school just when the closing
hour bell rang. His father wasn’t pleased at all. He never knew
we would spend the whole day out of school. Earlier, when I
asked Moses if his father wouldn’t be angry with us, he assured
me he wouldn’t.
“Rose, my father himself knew something is bothering you and
he knows quite well that I know how to let people say their
minds,” Moses had said.
I perceived the man was only angry because we spent too long
outside the school.
I watched them speak in voice language. Perhaps they didn’t
want me to hear what they were saying. When they were
done, the principal smiled at me and signed, “Rose, for a better
academic performance and a good frame of mind, we are
changing your class.”
“Sir, please don’t change my class!” I screamed in sign
language. “I am very sorry for everything I did.”
“Rose, you don’t need to be sorry at all because I have
concluded that already…”
I looked at Moses…
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Re: We Are Able(a Touching Story) by SammyHoe(m):
11:27pm On Dec 08, 2014
The principal asked me to come with my guardian. I was
scared. What actually did Moses tell him? Why was he asking
me to come with my guardian? Would they report the case to
her? She would be very much disappointed in me for fighting.
Whatever it would cost me, I would not tell Mrs Omotayo a
thing, I thought. That day, when I got home, I just lay
somewhere like a bunch of idle broom. Biodun himself didn’t
know that I was around because the taxi left me behind when I
was nowhere to be found, although the principal informed
them that I had gone somewhere with his son.
I wondered how Biodun would feel. I hope he wasn’t nursing
any kind of feeling towards me anymore. If so, he was surely
going to be hurt if he heard that I went out with Moses, a son
to the principal of the school. I had just passed beside him on
tiptoes, yet he heard the sound of my footstep and spoke. I
didn’t hear the sound of his speech. I was silent.
I found myself in Chi….’s class. As a matter of fact, I was happy
being with him there. We were playing together as I taught him
sign language. He smacked my head and I pushed him lightly.
He must have accepted his fate. Afterall, being demoted does
not kill one, I thought. I was shocked when Chi… suddenly
gave me a hard knock on the head.
“What have I done wrong?” I signed to ask him, then my eyes
flashed to life and I saw Biodun standing over me. He had just
struck his stick against my head while he was walking to find
his way to the toilet by himself—Laide had slept off in her
bedroom. Sleep cleared off my face and I realized that I was
only daydreaming. I got up from the rug and began to make
for my room to have a proper sleep. Laide saw me and did
some signs to me to ask where I was. She had just woken up
too.
Biodun realized that it was me he hit on the head with the stick,
perhaps Laide told him that just now. I didn’t answer them a
word as I hurried to my bedroom. I was already getting fed up
with life—those bad dreams never want to let me be. I gave up.
Biodun must have taken my action for malice—that I didn’t
want to answer him because he struck my head with a stick,
but it wasn’t the case. The threat of the principal who promised
to change my class was what was really weighing me down. I
tried to figure out what exactly Moses said to make him
determine to change my class; maybe as a result of my
immaturity in containing undeserved punishment from my
supposed senior. Perhaps because Moses took me out of the
school compound for too long at the detriment of my
education, I pondered on. But that shouldn’t call for a grave
consequence as such, I pondered.
I couldn’t sleep throughout the night. How would I feel being
sent to the primary school just because I fought a senior who
was actually a mate? Bose—how on earth would I admit her as
my senior? Over my dead body! I snapped my fingers over
my head as if my head was my dead body I was talking about.
I didn’t tell Mrs Omotayo anything about it. It would be better
for her to know about it somehow by herself than for me to tell
her with my own hands.
The principal greeted me with a question the following
morning.
“Rose, where is your guardian I ask you to come with today?”
“She is very busy sir,” I lied. My hands shook someone,
denoting that I was telling a lie.
“That’s a lie!” the man went straight to the point.
“Y-yes,” my hands stammered. “I didn’t tell her.”
The principal came close to me and looked me in the eyeballs,
an impervious look though. Just then, Moses entered.
“Moses, take her to her new class immediately,” he
commanded him. Moses stared at his father a little while,
having no visible expression on his face too. He just held tight
to my right wrist, picked up a cane with the left and led me
away.
I wondered what Moses would do with the cane. Was he going
to cane me? I thought he was a friend, so how come he would
now thrash me with the long cane? I would have asked him
what he was actually going to do to me, but I felt it would be
disrespectful of me. I was only a JSS 1 girl about to be demoted
while he was already in his third year in the University,
studying Law. He must know how to punish someone for real,
I thought, since he is a lawyer.
Moses began to lead me to my new class. I was scared that I
would now be demoted, going by what I saw Moses and his
father doing to each other earlier—arguing. Moses began to lead
me towards the JSS 3 class, my seniors. I knew I was going to
be beaten to pulp there. I made my arm strong and halted
along the way. Moses kept pulling me along, just exactly the
way he was doing to me two years back while taking me
across the road. I wondered if he was a military man.
When Bose saw me brought amidst them, in their class, she
began to babble with her hands. Her friends laughed along with
her as they saw us. They were expecting Moses to command
them to beat me up for beating a senior.
“Bose, come over here,” Moses called.
Bose walked majestically to the front of the classroom. She was
glad seeing me. Moses asked me to lie on a desk as he handed
the cane over to her. She collected it with alacrity and raised it
above her head to lash me. I watched as her hand swooped
down, but the cane hanged in the air. I was shocked. I raised
my face to see what was happening. It was Moses. He was the
one who gripped Bose by the hand, preventing her from
flogging my back.
Bose and her mates were shocked. They hadn’t seen it in such
fashion. They began to ask why. Moses frowned at them as he
began the story:
“Bose, you deserve to be punished yourself,” Moses burst out.
“How sir?” Bose’s hands went wide agape.
“You are a very wicked fellow Bose! Rose told me all the evil
you did to her while she was in your former school; how you
stole her books and fought with her all the time. Rose told me
that you were a bully and here you still her. You don’t deserve
to be a prefect here because you are a bully and I will tell my
daddy about that. He will remove you from that post before
long.”
Bose was weeping.
“And from now on, Rose will be the Senior Prefect of this
school.”
Moses ordered me to take my seat. I was reluctant because I
felt that Moses was doing contrary to what his father had asked
him to do. Moses led my by the hand to a seat belonging to
someone who was not in class.
“Rose, here is your seat from now on,” Moses said. I stood
before the seat but Moses forced me to be seated. I was awed,
staring around me. They were looking scornfully at me.
“Do you know how much this girl has achieved?” Moses said.
“Without a father and a mother, yet she won prizes in her
former school, writing striking poems. Ask Bose what I meant
and she will tell you,” Moses told them all. They were amazed.
Moses warned them all not to do me any harm, else they
would have to face the risk of having their names expunged
from the school register. I felt like a queen, but a little iota of
doubt still stared at my face.
As soon as Moses stepped out of the class, I hurried after him.
“Sir, your daddy will be angry!”
“Not at all Rose, since he knows about this,” Moses assured. “I
told him everything about you and he wants you commended,
that is why he asked you to come with your guardian so that
he could tell her that you are deemed fit for triple promotion.
You’ll have to still come with her anyway—tomorrow.”
“Are you sure sir?”
“If I am not would I say it?” Moses said. “I am a lawyer and we
don’t say loose things. Come with your guardian tomorrow,
that’s all.” Moses hurried away.
`I began to trudge back slowly to the classroom. Bose was still
weeping in shame—the shame that her theft secret had been
leaked to her classmates by Moses. They would soon begin to
call him names such as ‘Bose the Theft Bose!’ or ‘Queen of
Thieves’.
Bose buried her head on her desk and kept on weeping. I rose
from my seat and began to walk to her desk. I put an arm
around her back and tapped her gently with the other. She
raised and face and became shocked at my sight.
“Bose, that is past tense; let’s be friends,” I signed to her and
then stretched my hand before her to hold. I waited to see if
she would take it or reject it.
“Bose, let’s be friends,” I used my hands once more and then
stretched it before her again.
Mr Immaculate, Moses’ father was amazed at my poems and
the true life story of myself I had been writing for over two
years. He was in a hurry to see it published.
“This is so amazing!” he screamed. “Do you mean to say you
write all these all alone?”
“Yes sir,” I humbly replied.
“Are you sure of what you are saying?”
“Yes sir, I did them all by myself.”
The man walked in slow motion to me and ran his index finger
around my face, my lips, my ears, my nose. When his finger
got to my forehead, he clicked it twice and turned his ear to me
as if he wanted to detect the sound from there. He turned to his
son and said something. They laughed.
Bose had become my best friend. We began to do everything
together. She had even come around with me to the house
twice. She never knew I could be better as a friend than as an
enemy. Bose was the first person to edit my works. She saw
her part of the story in the manuscript, but fortunately for me, I
had ruled a line on it to show that it had been cancelled. How
would I portray her as a bad character in my book? Afterall, she
isn’t a bad girl anymore.
It was Bose herself who brought the manuscript to me and
opened to those parts where her villainous characters were
portrayed.
“Rose, why did you cancel out these?” she flipped the book.
“Oh! I’m sorry I wrote them there in the first place,” I
apologized.
“You don’t need to be,” she said. “I want them there.”
I thought a bullet had just sunken into my skull when I heard
her.
“What do you mean?”
“Leave it there as it is Rose, I want to be in there.”
“As a bad character?”
“Yes, a bad character turned to a good one,” Bose said. “Just let
it be!”
“Impossible!” I shouted with my hands.
Bose was laughing. She must be very crazy.
“Never!” I said. “In fact I’m tearing off those pages.” I grabbed
the book.
“You can’t!” Bose held my hands. We began to struggle. She
overpowered me and got it.
Laide thought we were fighting. We had to smile to her to
show that we were on top of the matter. She calmed down.
Mrs Omotayo was the first to come into the matter:
“Rose, if she says you should leave it there, then leave it there!”
she communicated in sign language. In the past six months she
had kept late nights learning it.
“Why ma?” I asked her.
“Do you know how many bad characters will turn over a new
leaf by reading about her bad lifestyle turned good?”
She had a point, but it wasn’t enough reason for me to admit. It
was the past, so Bose should not show up in my story as once
bad. I would only bring in her story right from that point we
become friends, I thought.
The principal knew about our friendship, myself and Bose. But
he was amazed not seeing us together for almost six days. He
called us to his office and asked why. I narrated the whole
incident and he laughed.
“Two funny kids,” he said. “Rose, do exactly as Bose said to
you,” the man supported her. “So, this is what is causing
quarrel between you two?”
“Yes sir,” Bose said. “And I promised not to be her friend
anymore if she doesn’t start my story in her book from the
beginning.”
“I won’t!” I screamed in sign language. “Better we go separate
ways than putting it in black and white for the whole world to
see that my friend once steals and do all sorts of evil!”
“I want it just that way!” Bose spoke for herself. We eyed each
other.
“It’s better I don’t publish that poo at all—I mean the whole
book for that matter.”
“You can’t do that, Rose!” the principal said.
“Watch me sir; I’m no more interested!”
“You can’t do that, Rose. If you’re no more interested, I am!”
“But you don’t have the manuscript sir.”
“From where?”
“You of course!”
“I’ll flush it off today.”
“Don’t dare that Rose!”
“That’s what I will do sir. It’s better for me not to publish it at
all!”
The principal knew I was bent on doing it. He persuaded me
not to. I felt proud. How come someone who didn’t know me
was now showing keen interest in my write-ups tagged
nonsense by those who knew me? Hmm…would I ever forgive
my father and Toyosi his miserable wife if I saw them again?
“Okay, Rose, why can’t you go ahead and publish it; all you
need to do is to replace the name ‘Bose’ with another name
entirely and no one would know she is the one.”
I didn’t give the principal any reply. I left his office with the mind
to do my own will; perhaps I would consider his latest
suggestion.
Our neighbor who was now occupying our apartment told Mrs
Omotayo that someone came asking for Mr. John’s family who
were once occupying her flat previously. Mrs Omotayo asked
her who the guest was and she said he was the younger
brother to the head of the family.
“Rose, do you know your father’s younger brother?”
“Yes!” I exclaimed. “He travelled to South Africa some years
back. Do you see him?”
“No! He came here this morning to ask for your family!”
“What! Where is he?”
“I wasn’t at home as you know. He only delivered his message
to Mrs Eunice and…”
“Ha! Uncle James! Is he back in Nigeria?”
“Wait, let me land,” Mrs Omotayo said. “Mrs. Eunice told him
that your family is no more living there.”
“Gush!” I banged my hands against each other.
the true life story of myself I had been writing for over two
years. He was in a hurry to see it published.
“This is so amazing!” he screamed. “Do you mean to say you
write all these all alone?”
“Yes sir,” I humbly replied.
“Are you sure of what you are saying?”
“Yes sir, I did them all by myself.”
The man walked in slow motion to me and ran his index finger
around my face, my lips, my ears, my nose. When his finger
got to my forehead, he clicked it twice and turned his ear to me
as if he wanted to detect the sound from there. He turned to his
son and said something. They laughed.
Bose had become my best friend. We began to do everything
together. She had even come around with me to the house
twice. She never knew I could be better as a friend than as an
enemy. Bose was the first person to edit my works. She saw
her part of the story in the manuscript, but fortunately for me, I
had ruled a line on it to show that it had been cancelled. How
would I portray her as a bad character in my book? Afterall, she
isn’t a bad girl anymore.
It was Bose herself who brought the manuscript to me and
opened to those parts where her villainous characters were
portrayed.
“Rose, why did you cancel out these?” she flipped the book.
“Oh! I’m sorry I wrote them there in the first place,” I
apologized.
“You don’t need to be,” she said. “I want them there.”
I thought a bullet had just sunken into my skull when I heard
her.
“What do you mean?”
“Leave it there as it is Rose, I want to be in there.”
“As a bad character?”
“Yes, a bad character turned to a good one,” Bose said. “Just let
it be!”
“Impossible!” I shouted with my hands.
Bose was laughing. She must be very crazy.
“Never!” I said. “In fact I’m tearing off those pages.” I grabbed
the book.
“You can’t!” Bose held my hands. We began to struggle. She
overpowered me and got it.
Laide thought we were fighting. We had to smile to her to
show that we were on top of the matter. She calmed down.
Mrs Omotayo was the first to come into the matter:
“Rose, if she says you should leave it there, then leave it there!”
she communicated in sign language. In the past six months she
had kept late nights learning it.
“Why ma?” I asked her.
“Do you know how many bad characters will turn over a new
leaf by reading about her bad lifestyle turned good?”
She had a point, but it wasn’t enough reason for me to admit. It
was the past, so Bose should not show up in my story as once
bad. I would only bring in her story right from that point we
become friends, I thought.
The principal knew about our friendship, myself and Bose. But
he was amazed not seeing us together for almost six days. He
called us to his office and asked why. I narrated the whole
incident and he laughed.
“Two funny kids,” he said. “Rose, do exactly as Bose said to
you,” the man supported her. “So, this is what is causing
quarrel between you two?”
“Yes sir,” Bose said. “And I promised not to be her friend
anymore if she doesn’t start my story in her book from the
beginning.”
“I won’t!” I screamed in sign language. “Better we go separate
ways than putting it in black and white for the whole world to
see that my friend once steals and do all sorts of evil!”
“I want it just that way!” Bose spoke for herself. We eyed each
other.
“It’s better I don’t publish that poo at all—I mean the whole
book for that matter.”
“You can’t do that, Rose!” the principal said.
“Watch me sir; I’m no more interested!”
“You can’t do that, Rose. If you’re no more interested, I am!”
“But you don’t have the manuscript sir.”
“From where?”
“You of course!”
“I’ll flush it off today.”
“Don’t dare that Rose!”
“That’s what I will do sir. It’s better for me not to publish it at
all!”
The principal knew I was bent on doing it. He persuaded me
not to. I felt proud. How come someone who didn’t know me
was now showing keen interest in my write-ups tagged
nonsense by those who knew me? Hmm…would I ever forgive
my father and Toyosi his miserable wife if I saw them again?
“Okay, Rose, why can’t you go ahead and publish it; all you
need to do is to replace the name ‘Bose’ with another name
entirely and no one would know she is the one.”
I didn’t give the principal any reply. I left his office with the mind
to do my own will; perhaps I would consider his latest
suggestion.
Our neighbor who was now occupying our apartment told Mrs
Omotayo that someone came asking for Mr. John’s family who
were once occupying her flat previously. Mrs Omotayo asked
her who the guest was and she said he was the younger
brother to the head of the family.
“Rose, do you know your father’s younger brother?”
“Yes!” I exclaimed. “He travelled to South Africa some years
back. Do you see him?”
“No! He came here this morning to ask for your family!”
“What! Where is he?”
“I wasn’t at home as you know. He only delivered his message
to Mrs Eunice and…”
“Ha! Uncle James! Is he back in Nigeria?”
“Wait, let me land,” Mrs Omotayo said. “Mrs. Eunice told him
that your family is no more living there.”
“Gush!” I banged my hands against each other.
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