CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – AMARA, A MOTHER’s SACRIFICE.

Ogechi’s mother-in-law watched her with open worry. Her almost black eyes scrutinized the younger woman’s every move. She stood near the drying bush meats and plants surrounded by silvery smoke. She stood there, unaffected, ignoring the rising smoke under the drying meat and plants. The entire compound smelled sweet and tangy, the smell of roast meat. The older woman’s chicken sat beside her human. Clocking from time to time in disapproval of her little chicks rolling about in the open kitchen. The older woman’s attention caught by the chicken’s recent clock of warning disapproval, turned to the mother hen with a look of understanding. Their younger ones all seemed to think they knew more about life than they did, and it wasn't easy just to sit in silence and hope that they learned on their own. 

The older woman walked laboriously to her daughter-in-law; her feet heavy against the ground. She dropped down beside the younger woman, managing not to groan. The older woman yawned and rubbed at her ankle. 

“You should watch how much you are working.” 

Ogechi said without even turning to look at her mother-in-law. The older woman nodded, but it was evident that she disagreed with whatever the younger woman had said. The fact was that she did not even hear what Ogechi said. These days, Ogechi was full of meaningful small talks repeated so many times that the older woman could reply without actually needing to listen to what had been said. 

The chicken beside them clucked again; the older woman made a throaty sound in response. She looked first at her frowning daughter-in-law, with her wrapper folded very close into her upper thigh, and then at the brown, wailing child balanced on her stretched legs near her feet. As the older woman watched, her daughter-in-law massaged lukewarm water onto the child’s stomach using washcloths. Her little brown mouth opened wide in protest, her tiny body contorting as she stretched her small arms and then her legs. The matted hair on her scalp did not help her little case. The old woman felt her heart contract. 

“I can bathe her, you know; it is my duty as the oldest female of the family.” 

Oge’s mother-in-law offered, her eyes never leaving the wailing child who was now blinking her eyes in bewilderment, surprised at how good the warm water felt on her stomach. She will have the same look tomorrow and the day after that. She will protest every time at the unfair massage her body has to endure every day. And every day, she will wear that bewildered look when the warm water settles the muscles around her tiny stomach. Children, the old woman thought. 

Oge ignored her mother-in-law and focused her attention on pulling now, first on the little arms, having soaked her hand in palm-kernel oil, she moved over to the tiny legs, muttering prayers of blessing and protection over the little body as she oiled it. Oge suddenly winced visibly; the experienced eyes of the old woman did not miss the movement of Oge’s protruding stomach. 

“Oge, when will you give up punishing yourself?” 

The old woman asked. Oge paused on the tiny foot her hand had been pulling. She shook her head as if to say she did not want to talk about it and breathed in through her mouth. The pain in that one action tore through the old woman. She felt her own body tremble. Age was as much a blessing as it was a burden. These days, she felt her age more than she would like to admit. 

“This is a blessing.”

She assured her daughter-in-law. 

“Which part?” 

Oge asked the older woman, her voice full of the venom and poison that her heart seemed to accumulate these days. 

“Will you call Amara a curse?” 

The older woman asked her. 

“Tufia. Of course not.” 

Oge spat. She heard the tears in her voice, but she was long past tears. The older woman watched her closely. 

“So why do you insist on caring for her as if she were a consequence you have to bear?” 

Oge turned her eyes on her mother-in-law; tears stood in her eyes, tears she had stubbornly refused to shed. 

“We are the cursed ones, Mama. Not this child.” 

Oge said, averting her eyes from her mother-in-law's all-seeing gaze, she winced again, sucking in air through her mouth. Using her free hand, she rubbed at her stomach and sighed, feeling the exhaustion that had been chasing her around these days. 

“I know it may seem to the whole village that we are cursed, but we must try not to say it in here. We must believe this, Ogechi. Tufia. We cannot be cursed.” 

The old woman made a circular hand motion around her head, warding off evil; old, flabby arm muscles joined in the motion. 

“The gods forbid, our gods forbid, my chi forbid.” 

The older woman repeated over and over again. Ogechi pulled Amara’s naked body to her chest and removed her still-soaking legs from the red makeshift bath basin. Oge pulled the basin to the side with her free hand, all the time avoiding her mother-in-law's eyes. It did not matter what the old woman said; it was difficult to overlook the misfortune that continued to cast cold shadows over their family. The older woman sighed as if she could read Oge’s mind. 

“We called the Debia, remember? He did not see anything. So why will you listen to people talk?” 

“Whether he saw something or not, are we going to act like we have not suffered from one misfortune to another? What exactly have we done that the gods and our chi will decide to treat us so harshly?” 

Oge cradled the baby in her arms. The late morning breeze, in addition to the deep, soothing massage and bath her tiny body had endured, was conspiring to put the child to immediate sleep.  

“Ada, Mama, our Ada. That poor child.” 

Oge muttered under her teary voice.  

~ 

“Good evening, how are you?” 

Oge greeted one of her neighbors as she walked towards her compound, with over a hundred firewood sticks balanced in a bundle on her head. It had been a good haul day, she thought, smiling at the children who greeted her, clad in only underpants and ashy faces from a day of playing in the sand. She greeted them back as she passed them. She was humming to herself, feeling quite satisfied; her baby inside her lurched and kicked as if for its dear life. 

“My chi.” 

Oge cursed, smiling proudly down at her huge stomach. It had taken her a few weeks, but she had fully recovered from her long sleep and was feeling like her old self again. Swinging the machete in her left hand, she raised the same hand to her head to support the bundle she was carrying. The machete hand dropped again to her side, she swung it along her side as she walked, the waist bead shaping her huge stomach swung in rhythm with the happy woman. 

“How is it going?” 

She greeted Ogolo’s mother when she reached their compound. The woman responded with the same greeting. 

“That is quite a load you are carrying.” 

The other woman commented conversationally. Oge laughed. 

“Which one? The one on my head or the woman who will not stop kicking me?” 

Oge joked, and Ogolo’s mother laughed in response. She was sifting through her melon seeds on a hand-woven basket. Around her, goats and chickens milled about. She had quite a big compound to support her large family. 

“You are truly a lucky woman, with the way that child kicks and fights inside of you, it is obvious that you are having a girl, yet she is not stealing your beauty, my first took out the front of my hair, see how close to bald I have become.” 

The woman pointed to the front of her hairline, pushing back her threaded hair for Oge to see. Oge laughed and waved her off with the hand holding the machete. 

“There is nothing there to see because your hair is fine. I will see you later.” 

Oge called walking away. 

“You take care.” 

Ogolo’s mother waved at her. Oge walked into her compound, the setting sun blinding her. She was humming again; she could not help herself. 

“I am back, oh.” 

She shouted at the empty compound, going around to the backyard where the heap of firewood lived. The sun was out for business, she thought, squinting, half attempting to shield her eyes. She first saw the bundle on the floor when her eyes finally settled on the setting sun. She threw the bunch of firewood she had spent the whole day gathering, cutting down, and carefully arranging together, without a second thought. The machete she was holding was flung to the ground. Oge was running as well, forgetting for a moment that she was an expecting mother. The only thought on her mind was Adaku lying in the grass, surrounded by trees like she was one with the earth. Oge rebuked the evil thought as she reached her cowife. 

“Ada. Ada.” 

Oge whispered when she reached the woman; she was breathing. Oge breathed, relieved.  

“Ada, Ada.” 

She called tentatively, but there was no answer. 

“Wake up, please.” 

Ogechi pleaded, her heart pounding with fear, against her ears. Please, she thought, as familiar dread crawled its way up her back like the shadows of the trees blocking the sun. She knew she should shout for help, but with the noise of early evening, nobody would hear her. She did not want to leave the poor girl there; she thought, running her hand over the lifeless face. She is still breathing, she assured herself. Her thoughts snapped to attention when she heard a rustle in the bushes. She raised her head to a guilty-faced Ogolo, looking at her with panic, his hand cupping pears from Oge's family's pear tree. But of course, that did not concern her at that moment. 

“Go get your mother.” 

Ogechi yelled at him. The urgency and fear in her voice propelled the feet of the little boy. She is breathing, Oge reassured herself over and over again, as she watched the barely perceptible rise of her co-wife's chest. Less than a minute later, she heard the distant footsteps of Ogolo’s mother and her daughters, their excited chatter giving them away as they rushed towards Oge’s backyard. 

“My Chi.” 

Ogolo’s mother exclaimed as she saw both women on the ground. The panic on Oge’s face caused the woman to pause, but only briefly. She was by the side of both women in a second, taking charge. 

“Ejima, you two go and call Uchechi’s grandmother, she told me she was stopping at Nneka’s grandmother’s over at Ola.” 

She commanded her twin daughters. 

“Ada, take Adaku’s right arm. I will take the left. Mummy Uche, I think you should go and boil water, gather as many healing herbs as you can, sanitize two basins with boiling water and salt, and we will need clean clothes.” 

The woman spat out her command in a clear tone of voice, her knowing eyes fixed on Adaku's stomach as she and her daughter gently lifted her to her feet. Ogechi looked at her dazed. 

“But she is not due for another two weeks.” 

Oge replied. The look of panic had completely given way to confusion, as if her mind was trying to protect her from completely folding up in panic. 

“I am afraid the water soaking her wrapper is not urine, Mummy Uche.” 

Oge looked closely at Adaku and wondered how she had missed the completely soaked wrapper. The shady trees had done nothing to dry her, Oge thought; she shook herself. The baby is coming. Mother and daughter were already moving towards Adaku’s room, carrying the weight of the slumped woman. 

“I hope your mother-in-law is here on time because she needs to ward off the evil spirits lurking around as the oldest woman of the family.” 

Oge nodded her agreement as she rushed off to fetch all that was requested while assuring herself that the girl would be fine. She was just nineteen; youth was on her side. She was a very strong-willed girl, and she would be fine. By the time she was finished with her assignment, her mother-in-law had already returned and sent for her son, Obuzor. 

She carried item after item into the young girl’s hut. When she was finished, she sprinkled salt over Ada’s door and rubbed salt on herself to ward off bad luck and evil spirits. The compound was emptied of children because it was common knowledge that mischievous spirits hung around children. Oge was not allowed to see Adaku after they had managed to wake her up, and the birth process had begun. She sat outside the girl’s hut, her heart in her mouth, praying to her chi and all the gods she remembered, for the life of both mother and child. Her family had seen enough pain, she prayed; they had paid their dues, and this should not be another thing they had to add to their trauma. When Obu returned, he rushed to her side and took her into his arms. They sat pensively like that, long after the sun went away, long after the frogs and crickets started their day, long after the mosquitoes came to play. They barely moved, afraid to think, scared to talk to each other, afraid to make anything of the still, near silence from the labor room, afraid to make anything of anything when the midwife was called for. It was the Debia’s presence that made Oge lose it. 

“Remove her from here.” 

He commanded Obuzor. Oge would not move; she had a stubborn resolve that was unlike herself. This compound was not going to lose another child, she told them. 

“It is bad luck for you and that child inside you. Go away from here.” 

The Debia insisted, pointing his wand at her, his aged eyes declaring secrets that Oge refused to believe. Some of the neighbors who had come to help coerced her along to her room, Obuzor on her heels. 

~ 

Adaku never fully regained her consciousness; she came awake only to deliver her baby into the world and to give her her name. 

“Amaramu.” 

She whispered hoarsely as her baby was shown to her. 

“Amara.” 

She never even got to hold her child before she closed her eyes for the last time to the world. 

In her room, Oge’s baby started to kick as if she were in distress. Oge wailed. 

“Pain has returned again to our family.” 

Adaku Ogechi’s cowife was dead, but her daughter lived.