THE RIVER WOMAN
Prologue
N dẹ Ị tụbọ bé?
Ị tụbọ bé Ọ tángá émi mọ́ ?
Ị tụbọ ọbụ jụ́ Ị wẹrịsó má
Yéí Ị tụbọ, Ị tụbọ !
Where is my son?
Where are you my son?
Don't leave me behind my son
O my son, my son!
I see her, I hear her song every morning and late at night by the river. She is the first to rise and the last I think, to retire for the night. I wonder if she ever sleeps.
'Her story is a sad one,' my friend and host, Boniface thrust into the thread of my thoughts after observing how I was staring at the old woman. She stepped into the tip of the river, knelt and began a frantic search of something. Her hands rippled the water, cupping them and throwing them right and left as one would, new and disused old clothes packed together.
His smile was radiant and hers a convoluted mixture of excitement and anxiety. her fear that Adonye's mother might not like for her son to marry a white lady. They held hands as lovers would. A contrast of skins but a union of hearts.
The ship was nearing Apapa in Lagos where his mother and several of her age group were waiting to welcome him after a long study in England. He is returning as a qualified Oxford trained doctor with a white girl, Lily William. He met her in medical school and he was bringing her to his mother as his bride to be.
They sang one victory song after the next. These Kalabari women. Attired in white, starched blouses and ankara wrappers. Two handkerchiefs in their hands kiting up and down as they dig into the rhythm of their collectively composed songs. They had arrived a day or two in Lagos and passed the night in a distant relative's home. Early the next morning, after rounds of rehearsals they were at the wharf awaiting an illustrious son.
Someone among them pointed to the distance at the shape of a ship jutting out from the horizon. Its tiny smoke appearing like dots in the sky.
'My son is back. My son, Adonye is here!' It was the voice of Ebidouere, the proud mother of the first white trained doctor, the envy of every other woman. Their voices rose in renewed energy as the big ship gradually came into full view and docked for its passengers to make their exit.
It wasn't hard to see his mother among the other women. He waved at them, all the while holding unto Lily with his free hand. His eyes were misty now. The joy of seeing his mother after almost ten years of his absence. They have only communicated by the letters he wrote and which was read to her by the village letter writer and who helped to put into words her endless questions.
It happened too quickly faster than the snap of fingers. They only saw the white straw hat in the body of water but the body, not even the expert divers could find.
'That was how mother and son never had the chance to hold each other if only for a brief moment,' Boniface said fatally.
I sighed heavily turning up the story in my mind over again. As if reading my mind, he added:
'Since that time, even when they brought her back from Lagos, she comes to the river here in search of her son. Anywhere she sees water there is an irresistible pull towards it.
Epilogue
Her voice rose again with pain and hoarsed with tiredness. She scooped the water, throw them back again. She spread the water, parting them to either side to see the inside for her missing son.
N dẹ Ị tụbọ bé?
Ị tụbọ bé Ọ tángá émi mọ́ ?
Ị tụbọ ọbụ jụ́ Ị wẹrịsó má
Yéí Ị tụbọ, Ị tụbọ !
Thirty years and her search is not yielding any fruit and yet the love for her son is undying.
THE END.
Many thanks to my friend and brother from another mother, Fred Dari Awesome Omosuku for the translation to Kalabari Ijaw/Izon dialect. I must also thank Pastor J.T Kalejaiye who told the story in one of his sermons about a certain woman whose only son drowned in Apapa the same day their ship arrived from overseas. I have used the liberty of imaginative reconstruction and creative colouring to achieve this effect.
Thank you for visiting and reading to the very end. I want to believe you enjoyed the story? Let us make it a date next time. Until then, I still remain,
Yours Truly,
Julius Topohozin.
