SUBMERGED IN BLINDNESS(story)

The green emulsion paint smeared on the wall of their bedroom was much greener this particular morning. Maybe it had something to do with the poor lighting created by the kerosene lamp that sat on the rickety wooden table beside her dying mattress. The holes made in them were as though they had been burrowed by the village rats. Umueze village was known to have rats that looked like hybrids of rabbits and squirrels. This was probably in fact true, because they were big enough to arrange an attractive pot of egusi soup. But the villagers forbade her indigenes to consume the meat from rat. Looking at the holes in her old mattress, Obianuju wondered why such a tradition was existing in the very first place. She had over the years been victim of these rats. She had housed some of these creatures, and at night, they had burrowed through her yams and cassava tubers in the barn at her backyard. Once, they had bitten her youngest son; Tochi’s finger, because he had forgotten to wash his hands after dinner before going to bed. The rats she shared her apartment with never paid rent, not once. Yet they terrified the legitimate owners of the house. She wondered why her co-tenants never cowered for long after a successful genocide. They usually went into hiding, deceiving one that they had encountered extinction, only to spring up again once the plaintiff felt fully compensated by the jury. It seemed unfair that all they could do was to have jubilation over the numerous dead bodies and discard them; when her children lacked animal protein, and her pot of soup lacked the last ingredient of attraction.
She had been embarrassed severally by these creatures who would usually stage a performance only when a guest was present. They shook their bodies, squealing and twerking at the feet of horrified guests, gathering gist for their gossip meetings at night.
Obianuju was disturbed; she had been for a whole week already. She was only beginning to feel sleepy when the last round of rat hysteria took place. And now she was reminded of her problems again. Her life irritated her already, and now the idea of a new baby in the family was going to make her head explode with insomnia. This was not part of the plan, when she accepted to wed Odikannaya. Life seemed so good during those old days. It was almost as if nothing could go wrong. But now, they were at this insane point, and Obianuju couldn’t remember how they had gotten here. His arms fell around her waist just that instant, gripping tightly, even as he adjusted his sleep-sunken body and muttered a few sleep words that made no sense. It wasn’t unusual for one to do this while asleep, especially when done to a loved one, but for some reason, Obianuju felt offended. She was getting to that point where everything about him now made her mad, even the things that never should. Was she becoming a bitter woman? It wasn’t something she’d immediately concur to, but a part of her considered it two seconds longer, before shaking it off.
She gave him a serious look. He was her helpless looking husband, fast asleep, with saliva drooled and settling at the sides of his fleshy mouth. He was a fair complexioned African man turned dark probably due to long hours of toiling under the sun, and lack of skin care products. His partially dreadlocked low cut hair, which had become because he scarcely ran a comb through it; was sparsely decorated with brown foam-like particles from the old mattress like flowers on a bride’s hair. He had beads of sweat on his forehead too. The roughly arranged bed sheet he laid on had plastered a pattern of lines on the side of the face he once laid with. He was partially bald, with evidence of beard-war against the hairs that grew into his cheeks leaving very little distance to his eyes. Odikannaya had beard bumps scattered all about his face. They had become irritating, because it was beard bump growing on beard bump, and urine application; as was the local method he had been subjected to in the bid to manage his condition wasn’t very effective.
Obianuju sat there, now wondering what it was that attracted her to him in the very first place. She slowly and gently held him by the wrist, in an effort not to wake him up, and threw his arm away from the grip of her waist. It wasn’t her fault; even the waist was tired of having him. It was true what Somto; her friend had told her. She had become Odikannaya’s only source of recreation. That was why it appeared she went through child birth every year. If only they could afford other forms of recreation, maybe she wouldn’t be where she now stood psychologically. He promised to make her Cinderella. But the difference was that Cinderella began with scrubbing floors, and then she got her prince, her beautiful gown and the status of a princess, but for Obianuju, as is the case with many African women, she got her prince and beautiful gown, but continued scrubbing floors. This was slavery. Yes, she wouldn’t mind slaving over the man she loved, if it wasn’t this bad. But it was that bad. She did everything for him, from cooking, to washing to scrubbing, to sexually satisfying him, to giving him children every year that they now weren’t so sure they could protect and give education anymore. But he would listen to nothing about it. Her opinions didn’t matter to him; after all, she was nothing but his wife.
The tears fell around her lips, and she tasted them a bit, sniffing, and wiping her eyes dry. Beside her feet, on the bare floor was Adanma, her very first child. Fifteen and glowing in teenage innocence and beauty, her breasts; huge explosions of fair flesh, round, firm, shinny and promising. Her backside was each butt-chick the splitting image of the bottom of the tripod stand cooking pot used for parties. They too glowed, although dark from several visits to the toilet when compared with her breasts, but they had the potential to make a man fly. Obianuju wept harder. Her greatest fear was now only few months away, if not less. Adanma was certainly going to end up like her mother. It usually began with one uneducated man and an eternal promise of love, only to accept and become his slave for life.
Certainty arrived that day she saw Adanma by the bush path leading to the Ngene stream, smiling sheepishly; brown teeth naked, lacking the coverage of her lips, while a small village boy, with an indecipherable future, a sweet tongue and a hungry manhood wooed her. Adanma hadn’t realised that love alone could not guarantee happiness. Nor had she realised that it was important for a woman to discover herself before discovering love. And for standing in the way of the only opportunity that made her realise just how aware of herself she can be, Obianuju had become devil.
A sound came from the sitting room, something had obviously fallen. It sounded like a plastic cup kissing the floor, followed by the sound of something dribbling ceramic plates on the plate rack.
“Squi-squi...” the rats gossiped. Immediately, Obianuju reached for the kerosene lamp on the table, and made her way to the sitting room. Her pot of soup was endangered. Their house had not enough rooms, so she had no kitchen. Her husband had built her a small wooden structure at the backyard, which now substituted for a kitchen, and she did prepare meals there, but at night her pot of food, utensils and other vital kitchen materials had to be brought into the house for safekeeping. Walking into the sitting room, her cups were scattered on the floor, but her pot was secured. Adanma had remembered to place a small stone on the metal object to ensure that the rats found it difficult to open the pot as a preventive step against diseases.
Obianuju had to place the kerosene lamp where its light could reflect reasonably to all corners in the house. She had learnt from experience that the presence of light made the rats aware that someone was awake, and therefore made them limit their excesses during the night. The battle of ownership for her house had gotten out of hand and situations like this usually prompted a genocide, but Obianuju had been so scared to apply rodenticides to crayfish and place on strategic places in the house, because the last time she did, Tochi ate them in place of the rats.
Obianuju remembered that day very well, she nearly lost her mind in panic. The village nurse had a warehouse of patients that day; his life was only saved by the concoction of liquid from coconut and palm oil she had hurriedly given him. It helped neutralize the poison.
The night seemed too long already, Obianuju was almost losing it. Returning to the bedroom to find everyone peacefully asleep, looking eternally uninterrupted made her very jealous. If only this restless night could end. She sat in the same position, beside her husband on the partly covered mattress defaced with holes. This time around, legs crossed. Odikannaya threw his arms around her again. She made no move, then gradually, as though he was awake and was deliberately taunting her, he threw a leg over her, imprisoning her in his warmth, as well as his saliva and sweat smelling embrace. There was hardly any ventilation in the jam-packed room. A small window slightly bigger than the size of a toilet’s window was the only way through which air got into the room. The ceiling fan in their mud-built cement plastered bedroom would have provided something next to a temporary solution, but it was begging for rest. It hung there, rotating noisily, probably from old age or loosening parts; paints faded, blades rusted. But Odikannaya would not let it down. The resources to have it replaced had long been channelled into solving other family problems. Obianuju”s mouth was twisted in disappointment, nostrils widening as she sighed in self pity.
“What is wrong again?” Odikannaya asked in between his slumber. Surprised that he was speaking to her amidst his state, Obianuju needed a moment to compose herself.
“It’s nothing, my husband.” She said after clearing her throat loudly. Obianuju like many typical Umueze women referred to her husband as ‘husband’, di’m or di’m oma, with di’m meaning ‘my husband’ and di’m oma meaning ‘my good husband’ in the Igbo language. But recently, Obianuju had formed the habit of referring to Odikannaya as di’m alone or my husband alone, because he didn’t seem good to her anymore.
His eyes soon revealed themselves from its former closed state. His eyeballs were pure black, cornea; red and stressed and decorated in a much deeper shade of red veins. He had a suspicious smile teasing his lips. He was in bed five seconds longer, observing her while fondling his manhood. Suddenly, he stood up, heading for where the kerosene lamp was placed and turned it off. It was dark, but Obianuju could see his masculine silhouette pull down his sleeping shorts to reveal an appropriately shaped horizontally placed rigid figure, suspended just around the supposed pelvic region of his silhouette. She rolled her eyes in fatigue, just in time to feel rough harmattan dried hands all over her.
“Di’m, please...” she muttered.
“What do you mean?” he asked, his tone rising.
“The children...” She muttered again.
“It doesn’t matter.” He said pulling her thighs apart and her wrapper away.
“No, it matters.” Obianuju said, her tone rising this time around. She could not continue this way. They shared their tiny room with all of their six children. The room smelled of too many disgusting things all at once. There was the damp smell from the million and one times Tochi and his other tiny siblings poured water on the fading red rug that covered half the worn-out terrazzo floor of their bedroom. The smell of infant urine had long married their children’s mattress. Old sweat was another smell that was locked on the atmosphere. Piles and piles of torn travelling bags with faded clothes hanging from them filled the room. Nothing was arranged in any particular order, because nothing could in such a small space. Her older children, apart from Adanma had relocated to spending their nights in the sitting room, for want of space, but that still didn’t make the room uncongested.
It mattered a lot. She couldn’t take another scenario of Odikannaya growling in pleasure with her children, who happened to all be minors; barely half asleep. It was embarrassing. They needed more privacy. Once Obianuju caught her son; Ifechukwude spying on them. She had long suspected him, but had no proof. This entire situation had left her with children who were fast developing distorted ideas about sexual intercourse. If anyone should give her under aged children porn to watch, it definitely shouldn’t be their parents. And although it was her duty to satisfy her husband sexually, she needed to cater to her children’s psychological wellbeing as well. The house was never empty, so they never got enough privacy. And Odikannaya would not stoop so low as to try to reason with a woman, so a compromise could be drawn. He was the high and mighty head who couldn’t tolerate dialog with the neck. Marriage had made him forceful. Obianuju could remember how easy going the young Odikannaya was. Those old good days when his touch made goose pimples rain on her. He didn’t need to do much to get her in the mood, but somehow, that man whom she died a million times at his sight had faded, leaving unrecognisable debris.
To be entirely truthful, she too was now debris of some sort. She had become a very weak woman. She had lost her beautiful melanin glow to lack of maintenance. She had lost her figure-8 curves to child birth. Her once firm breasts, round and pointing, with black nipple positioned in the middle like stew on white rice; had taken a sagging downward position, with long stretch marks replacing the once glowing tight skin that ran across her chest. They had been pulled down like the walls of Jericho by a suckling husband and six suckling children, as well as with the numerous times she tied wrappers very tightly across her chest to carry her crying children on her back, while she worked under the sun on her farm. She had become less and less aware of her feminity. Obianuju now smelled of cassava because of the long hours she spent processing cassava to get garri. Her children smelt of fufu, because they hawked them too frequently in the market. This was now her life. The beautiful, intelligent and promising Obianuju fell for love, and lost an entire lifetime of aspirations. Was it love’s fault? Obianuju didn’t exactly think so, but she knew she made a decision while submerged in blindness. This was why she was scared for Adanma.
“Di’m, the children are partially awake. We can’t do this now.” She said, trying to make her tone levelled.
“Obianuju, they aren’t kids anymore. Did anyone of them tell you that they do not know what happens between a man and a woman? I bet that big head; Ifechukwude has been burrowing into small-small girls in this village. After all, he is a man. And can you convince me that Adanma has never been teased by a man?” he paused from his high pitched voice to sigh loudly, and continued on a higher tone. “...But God rescue her the day I catch her myself. I will deal with them badly...” Obianuju had to interrupt him, because she was filled with disbelief at his words.
“Odika! What father speaks the way you have just spoken?”
This was another challenge in Obianuju’s marriage. They had different views on child upbringing. They had different mentalities in general on some level, but Obianuju didn’t ever think it would get this bad.
“Woman, do not talk to me in that manner if you do not want me to finish your face with slaps. You are my wife, I paid for this. It is my right to have you by the cunt whenever and however I want to. In the presence of children or not.’’ At this juncture, he paused to observe her, and then levelling his voice, he continued.
“About children sef, let’s not go about having another one.”
Obianuju was speechless. She watched his slightly visible figure arise in the dark and move towards the wardrobe that stood by a corner in the room, holding out an old metal box where he had placed condoms. The condoms were all previously used. Odikannaya had began the practice of washing the latex-made material after intercourse and saving them for the next encounter, because he felt it was a waste of resources getting a new one whenever he needed to have his wife. Obianuju wasn’t comfortable with this practice, but being the weak woman she now was, she couldn’t be an antagonist for very long. After all, it was the cheapest method of family planning there was, and they still could barely afford it. Why hadn’t she seen her period yet? Several scenarios darted about her mind. She couldn’t exactly place when she must have conceived, if at all she had. It was possible the latex was weak from use and re-use and had torn, letting out some of her husband’s fluid into her. It was crazy. If someone had told her a couple of years back that she would be re-using condoms in her marriage, Obianuju would never have believed. At least now she wasn’t being hunted by the fear of getting some sort of vaginal infection. There was a new hunter in town, and it was a seventh baby.
Odikannaya wore himself his protection and positioned himself on Obianuju.
“I am tired of this marriage, Odika!” She finally found the strength to say.
“What do you mean?” his voice was terrifying, he was in a rage. Chest; rising and falling, beads of sweat raining down on his helpless wife. She was tired of the life, not the marriage, because she still loved him dearly, but there was no better way of expression at the moment. Pissed and totally turned off, Odikannaya pulled his shorts to cover his rigid penis, picked his chewing stick and the sweat smelling shirt he had worn the previous day and walked out of the house. Obianuju knew better not to stop him. It was his method of letting out anger. She could remember when they had their very first argument as a married couple. Adanma was only but a toddler at the time. She had tried to stop him from leaving the house, and her reward was a black swollen face. Odikannaya had transformed into a beast, and he plastered punches on her like a bricklayer did to get a perfect wall. She laid there still crying when he loosened his waist belt and used the iron hooker on it as whip on her.
That was the very first time, and she felt it was normal because she had provoked him. What else would she have interpreted it to be? She grew up in an abusive home, so naturally they learnt gender roles from their parent’s relationship. Obianuju’s father usually asked his wife to kneel down under the sun, raise her hands high above her head, and open her mouth as wide as was possible, like was asked of children as a correctional measure. He did this wherever he was offended, and immediately. Several times, it was in public, before family friends and strangers alike. And he trampled on her sense of self worth so badly that his sons began to do same to their own mother, and at special occasions, their sisters as well.
Obianuju remembered so well. This was why she had taught her mind to detest marriage. She had promised herself that she wouldn’t end up with a man. She had made plans to further her education, because she envied the way the white missionary male teachers that visited her village treated their female white counterparts. The Obianuju of that time wanted to be colleague to a man, rather than wife, but along the line, she found love. When Odikannaya came her way, she was comforted. The love and respect he gave her made her throw away the ambitions she had as a child. This was probably because she only had them because she wanted respect badly, and when it seemed she was getting it, there was no need to keep them anymore. All she wanted at that point in time was just Odikannaya. She didn’t mind at the time whatever she had to go through. It felt as though she would be fine no matter where life threw her and no matter the challenges she faced as a person, provided she had him. Those days, her feeling of contentment even in the midst of nothing was incredible. And then, she hated those women who supposedly fought for gender equality. She argued with them wherever she found them, saying that God himself had designed the woman to be beneath the man. And they each earned the status of a bad mother, a bad wife or a misled daughter to her, depending on the age bracket they fell within. That was the era she began analysing her mother’s marriage, and she began realising that it wasn’t that bad after all. And when Odikannaya began to hit her, she interpreted it as normal too, because she had provoked him. And like some uncertain psychological tunnel with no end, Obianuju soon found herself blaming herself for all the times Odikannaya punched her.
He was the same man she had slept in his arms and told just how scared she was of marriage, because she didn’t want to be treated the way her mother was, and he had expressed disgust and disbelief when she narrated events of her mother’s assault to him. But as the years passed, the frustrations of life made this young man forget his principles. He too had grown up in a home that oppressed women. And he felt the depth because his was a polygamous home, and his mother had numerous girls, and a single boy. Those days, he hated his father. He had promised himself that his wife would never have to go through the same fate, but now he was a resurrected version of his father.
The cock crowed again, telling the beautiful people of Umueze that it was time to let go of their romance with pillows and hit the labour world, but having stayed awake all night long, Obianuju was too dizzy to rise. Despite her state, her troubles never left her for even a second. She was a mother, and had mother instincts. She was worried for her children, especially Ifechukwude, her eldest son. A picture of him emerged in her subconscious mind. He was much taller than her now, but used to be so small and tender and innocent, and he made everyone whose part crossed his to feel this need to always want to protect him. That was her son. The young man probably still sleeping on the rickety brown couch in the sitting room was not her Ifechukwude. These days, whenever she looked at him, she saw nothing but smoke. That was what he had become. He was now astray, unproductive, lacking any sort of strong will, barely had a mind of his own, disrespectful and irrationally stubborn. And this was all because she wasn’t mother enough to him. She had let her weakness affect her children. Obianuju never liked the neighbourhood within which they lived. It had corruption smeared all over, but she didn’t want to be a wife that argues with her husband. Ifechukwude, being male was most affected by this. Obianuju’s eyes were still shut, but she felt them moistening up. She wasn’t blind anymore, but now it seemed too late. She could remember clearly the very first time a neighbour accused her thirteen year old Ifechukwude of attempted sexual abuse on her two year old daughter. But that Obianuju will have no one speak ill of her child. They say a child isn’t raised by a single person, but all of society, and Obianuju understood this, but often than not, society over steps the boundary; and she didn’t want her son dealing with a low self esteem because everyone had the right to punish and scold him. If only she was as wise then as she is now, she would have called him into a quiet spot, reduce herself to a friend, and chat with her son.
But because she didn’t do this, when she caught Ifechukwude a few days ago abusing two of his younger sisters at once, in Tochi’s presence, she didn’t know how to react. It was an abnormal situation to be in. And Odikannaya didn’t allow her discipline her children to her satisfaction. And because his father seemed blind to his faults, Ifechukwude had called her hypocrite and stupid to her face, and she held her breasts and swore never to talk to him again.
Obianuju was very hurt by Ifechukwude’s words. Why was it this way for mothers? Obianuju had undoubtedly made mistakes with her children, but one thing that was never in doubt was all her sacrifices because she loved them. She loved her husband too, and didn’t mind slaving to satisfy him, but nobody cared about her. It was an awful form of unrequited love. She was reminded of how Odikannaya was supported by both children and society when she found out he had a small village girlfriend, and she had no one fight for her, so it died down like it was a normal happening, because she was a weak woman. Whatever was hers belonged to everybody, and she had lost every element of attractiveness she ever had in the pursuit of their wellbeing, but it was the life mothers were called to live.
She would die if anything happened to anyone of them, but she didn’t think her death will have much effect on them, and that was hurtful.
Maybe she should have realised early that life was lived only once. Maybe she would have analysed some of the decisions she took while submerged in blindness a lot more seriously. Maybe she should have held on to her ambitions as she had held on to love. Maybe she should have considered other factors outside only love through which marriage could be sustained. Maybe she should have discovered herself before discovering love, and just maybe she wouldn’t have lost herself in this relationship as badly as she already had. But they were all maybes’.
“Mama, wake up!” Tochi’s voice came; even as he pulled on her coarse African spiral curled kinky hair, turned brown at base and red at tip from the use of numerous cheap relaxing products.
“Tochi, leave mama alone.” Obianuju managed to say in her slumber.
“Wake up, mama!” This time around, Adanma’s voice was heard. She sounded like she had been sobbing. Obianuju had to open her eyes in worry.
“What is wrong, Ada?” She asked. Around her were the six faces she loved most, but one face was missing.
‘”Doctor, she is awake.” Odikannaya said, waving his right arm to a 1.8 metres tall man in a white robe, and his reply was a smile and a nod.
Obianuju was confused.
“What’s going on here?” she asked, barely able to hear her voice.
“Why did you do this, Obi’m?” Odikannaya asked, and the sound of a sobbing grown man amused Obianuju, but she could barely laugh. It had been ages since he called her by that name; Obi’m, which meant ‘my heart’. The days he touched her and goose pimples rained on her.
“What did I do?” she asked.
“You ate a full pack of rodenticide. I know our marriage was tough, and life was changing us, but I am still madly in love with you like I was the very first day I saw you.”
It appeared Obianuju had attempted suicide. Her Ifechukwude was the missing seventh face. He had sexually abused an eleven month old baby girl, and she had died in the process. The mother had caught him; pants down, smeared in released sperm, trying to revive the dead naked torn and bleeding baby girl. And he now spent his days in jail. It took God’s grace to rescue him from the angry mob about to go jungle justice on him. They had broken his legs and his head was bleeding, and they had placed a tyre around his neck, with the dead baby in his arms and a keg of petrol by the side when the police van drove in. Obianuju was too ashamed to walk the streets of Umueze, because Umueze was very small, and everybody knew everybody. She was labelled mother of an infant rapist. And it seemed this was surely the end of the tunnel. She had blamed Odikannaya for not letting her discipline her children, because she became scared of correcting them only to have him correct her too. She blamed him for not considering her early protests for a different neighbourhood and a bigger house, which would have provided them with the necessary privacy married couples needed. That evening, drunk in emotions, she was advised by her tenants who never paid rent to share a little of their meal.
But the good news was that in this second chance, they all were sober, including her children.