“Is everything alright?” Etim whispered.
I did the only thing I had the strength to do, which was fall into his arms. He worked off the knots in my shoulders, lifted my chin and just sipped from my lips. I’m sure he wanted more from the ways he looked at me but both of us were being careful to keep the baby there. He kissed me some more.
“Considering how weak you have been lately and because I don’t want you stressed, I thought it’d be ideal for my mum to come stay over.”
I snatched my fingers from his, from where he had been caressing them. “No!” The thought of both his mum and Baba Buray meeting here, my house, while Etim was at work, with me so vulnerable from the pregnancy made me cringe. No way!
“What do you mean `no’?”
“Your mum coming over? Etim, this is not good. This is so not good.” I was pacing in angry steps.
“Jola, you need to calm down, this temper is not good for your condition.”
Temper huh?
I slumped on the chair and just went all tears. “Do you want to kill me Etim?”
His forehead wore a pleat of frown. “What?”
“I don’t want this Etim. This won’t work.”
“She wanted to come in a month’s time, but I begged her to come this week, because of your condition, she suggested arriving in two days.”
“Of course she did. If indeed you love and worry a tiny bit about my condition, your mother would be the last person you would have called. Why didn’t you call my mum, ehn?”
The next two days were hellish. I tossed and turned all night. Semirah had to come over for a few days. I wasn’t sleeping in our room anymore, I started staying up late to watch movies with Semirah and sleep off in the guest room with her. Etim wasn’t having it from his reaction, but I couldn’t care less.
The day finally arrived, I asked if Semirah could go with us to the airport and Etim yielded to it. I jolted just as her plane arrived from JFK. By that time, I had sighed like a dozen times. Though he was rubbing my shoulders, his mind, his eye and his brain were focused on the arrival exit door. It was as if I wasn’t there. When I saw the multi-colored, shiny bou-bou with the neatly tied gele, I took the longest of all sighs and guess what, hubby didn’t even notice. He just dropped my arms gently and rushed for the door. He looked like a school boy on visiting day. I wobbled my way towards them, hoping for some reasons they would finally realize my presence. That was after she had pulled the life out of his cheeks and kissed him twice!!! She gave me a side hug, objecting my not kneeling down in public. When I offered to help carry her bag, she refused whispering,
“O ma woni ti e. Kan ma sope emi ni mosen kan fun e nisin.”Never mind, I’ll make do, let me not be blamed for what I know nothing of.
I made sure Etim’s eye caught mine as she said and his embarrassment made me chuckle. It was going to be harrowing, for us all. I promised.
Semirah knelt down all the way, and made sure she gave her the bag to carry. I was astonished; I couldn’t believe this was Semirah. I immediately knew she was up to mischief. She chatted with MIL all the way till we got home and after MIL had dinner; Semirah bade her goodnight and told me she would see me the next day.
“Are you kidding me? I asked you to come over for a reason and now you’re bailing out?” I called her on her way home and asked for an explanation.
She laughed so hard, I got confused. “My dear, first impression matters and your MIL had to be reminded that I was the nice reasonable friend, but don’t worry, my joblessness has turned to busy with your MIL”
I prayed so hard that night; Etim wondered what had come upon me. I didn’t stand on time. Even after he had hit the bed, I couldn’t stop.
The next day, Edidiong, Etim’s brother came over to see his mother and as they were chatting away, she called Etim and handed him a bag that Imabong had sent to him. I was curious. Why would Imabong send Etim a securely wrapped package that big? My eyes never left that package the moment he received it from his mother. Luckily for me his phone rang and it was his father, they started chatting away, while I falsely started cleaning up and took the package into the pantry to check its content. It contained locust beans, unprocessed Shea butter, bathing sponge and black soap. Just as I grew more confused, a piece of paper fell to the ground. As I bent down to pick it, I heard footsteps approaching the pantry. I immediately tucked it in my underpants; the fastest and safest place to protect it.
It was Edidiong, he came to give me the phone, my father in-law wanted to say hello. I put the things away.
I retired to my room for the night and I wasn’t having it with my husband. For some reason he seemed to be very passionate and tried to get his hands busy on my body. I gave him the silent treatment and monosyllables. I went as far as turning the other direction to sleep.
“Jolaade, are you okay?” He paid me no further attention after I ignored him. Hours’ later while still awake, I realized I had something unattended to in my underpants. I walked into the bathroom, pulled the piece of paper out and read it. I let out an awwww and a smile. Waoh, it was addressed to me, though the handwriting was an apology, but it was well composed. I was shocked this was Imabong. Apparently the stuff was for me and not Etim. Poor Etim, I’d treated him badly for no reason. I folded the piece of paper, walked back into the room, nudged my husband and started kissing the sleepy man.
“Is everything was okay?” he turned to me asking.
“I apologize.” He nodded, kissed me and we slept. I guarded the note with my life. I was ready for my MIL whichever way. Tough I didn’t know what Imabong’s intentions were; it looked like she was trying to say something. Hmmm…
***********************
I was the pregnant one, the one with the swollen feet, nasty appetite and constant drowsiness, not my mother in law. So how come I was the one doing even more chores? I had plans to just grin and bear it and I think she knew and wanted to, by all means, frustrate the patience out of me. Etim was working late, he had called me to say, and I had gotten even more worried. All I did was count the number of hours he had to get home. Just so I could be out of her way and she can direct her attention to her beloved son.
“Jolaaaaaaaade.” Her again. She had a way of drawling my name to the point of exasperation. I strolled to the living room. She had called me to dish her food alongside water, since she didn’t like `our’ fruit juices. She called again from where I was sleeping that she wanted the juice. I served her, and then again to slot in a Nigerian Home video. It was when she called me again to change the disc I heaved.
“Ki ni yen?” What is it? Her voice raised a decibel.
“Ma?” I gave the blank look.
“`Ma’ ki lo wan’n so. Kini gbogbo breaths to’n take yen? Shey o’n try ati ma so pe wahala mi po ni?”What `Ma’ are you reiterating? What’s with the sighs? Are you trying to say, I’m too much trouble?”
With a plastic smile… “Mi o je so be Ma.” I dare not say so Ma
“O better.” You know I could have sworn I was exchanging meaningless banter with my course mates, Semirah especially, with the way MIL kept flinging her head in different directions.
I changed the disc, boiling with so much fury, yet swallowing it.
“Where to?” She sounded like a principal berating a stubborn pupil.
“Mo fe lo rest ni ma.” I want to go in to take rest
“Have you not been resting lataaro? Iyen naa to. You sit down there.” She pointed at the couch.
My eyes formed some big round circles at this new development. This woman honestly thinks she can push me around huh?
“You are not the first one to be pregnant. We all have passed there at some point.”
She spoke so well from living her formative years outside Nigeria yet she was so hung up on the master/slave ways of mother/daughter in-law. I kept watching the uninteresting film and the mumu characters repeating their lines. No storyline! I spied at her, she kept laughing hysterically and murmuring `film yi ma funny gan ni’
“Baba Buray said he saw you.” She dropped it suddenly.
I was shocked but I had rehearsed before she came. I had it on the tip of my tongue to say,
`Talon’jebe?’ Whoddat? But I remained calm, staring at her, furrowing my brows.
“Really?”
“Really bawo? Didn’t you see him?”
“I did not. Where?”
Suddenly she got up, sending me a very irritating look and then dashed in.
Good riddance!
And then she came back again with a small bag, rummaging through.
“I brought you some Shea butter, locust beans, black soap and hard sponge. The Shea butter is to help prevent stretch marks and it helps the appearance of your skin, same for the black soap. The locust beans, since I know you need to consume a lot of vegetables, I decided to get this for you, so it adds flavour to your food and the sponge is for when the baby is born. You have to soak it in hot water for a week, to make it soft enough for the baby’s skin”. I couldn’t argue with her because those items were so familiar, the exact items Imabong sent to me, with the sponge, the same color. I thanked her till she left for her room, heaving yet again, as the mystery was getting clearer or so I thought.
*********************
First came the tip-toe, and then the other side of the bed pressed in so gently. Before Etim’s back connected to the bed, I yanked on the light. He had a guilty look on his face.
“I’m sorry Jola. She wouldn’t stop talking.” He was whispering.
“And that’s an excuse? What is going on with you? I am the pregnant one, not your mum. I am the one who slaves in this house, yet I don’t get the needed attention I deserve. You don’t even ask about the baby. You’re not bothered. Mummy is here after all. It will get a point where I’ll have my fill and naturally burst out. Perhaps then, you’ll act sensibly. And you best don’t talk to me in whispers in this house, ever again” I turned the lights back off trying to simmer before I slept.
photo by african naturalistas
Cheers
Pearls & Oysters 