Upon my return home after graduation, my father treated me as an equal; I was involved in every decision making and my advice was always sought after in regards to the well being of the cattle.

As for my brothers, they had each taken a portion of the cattle and headed in different directions to carve a niche for themselves. All three of my sisters had gotten married in the nearby homesteads, as such  the household had thinned out and I came back to a small nucleated family consisting of my parents, my infant brother, and two temporarily adopted teenage boys.

It is normal to find such boys in every nomad's household. They are hired to rear the cattle at an agreed price or terms.

I spent most mornings taking a walk around the bushes. That was mainly to familiarise myself with the area. My evenings was spent in the company of Bayero, who had surprisingly taken interest in what I had learned concerning the cows. He will bombard me with questions , some of which are ridiculous and others quite meaningful.

Both he and my father had no idea of my intentions to lead a modern life in the city for I gave them not the slightest hint.

I made some contact in town and when I was sure everything was in place, I decided to make my move.

On that faithful morning, I had walked up to my father and made a request. I told him I wanted to take the cows out to pasture. He however declined, telling me he thinks school had made me soft and I can't bear the burden of herding anymore. I told him I might look a little modern from the outside, but I was a still a herdsman on the inside. With so much pride in his eyes, he relieved one of the teenage boys of his duties for the day and I took charge.

I led the cattle through the thickets of the bushes to the plains ahead and in no time, we were headed towards the newly constructed Saminaka road where as planned, I had some men waiting for me.

They were merchants who dealt in the transportation of cattle to the southern parts of the country for meat production. As Agreed, they all had their monies ready and the transaction was done as quickly as any shady transaction of its kind is carried out. They had readied their lorries and loaded all forty-six of my fathers cattle as soon as we were done.

I held so much money as I had never seen in my life in a brown jute bag. The highest denomination at that time being twenty naira. So I had wads of cash filling half a jute bag as I tucked it fearfully under my arm.

I couldn't hitch a ride with my business partners because they were going towards the direction of kafanchan from where they will take the road to Abuja and then drive all the way south. I, on the other hand was headed West to Kano. So I waited by the dusty road clinging the jute bag like my life depended on it.

I finally got on a lorry headed for Saminaka where I will get a car to Kano. I clung tightly to my bag which made the conductor a bit suspicious as his eyes kept wondering from my face to the bag all through the journey. Finally, we arrived the motor park where I boarded another lorry to Kano.

I thought of my father, how he will panic at first, and be disappointed later when he learns that instead of his prior fear of me being killed by cattle rustlers, I had actually did away with his cattle. I at that time felt no remorse for my actions as I was consumed by hunger and thirst for success and modern living that nothing else mattered.

I was going to pay him you see. I was going to get him things he had never dreamt of; return his cattle tenfold, send him on a pilgrimage , fill his pockets with enough cash that he will be forced to forget what I did. I couldn't sleep a wink throughout the journey.

I arrived late in the evening. I brought with me my small adress book where I had entered a few addresses including that of Muhammad's uncle. I was to stay at his house until my friends were able to join me.

His uncle, an affluent man, lived in the the outskirts of the old Kano city in the Bompai area. Bompai, was then a bustling industrial area dotted with factories and modern houses.

After a week, my friends joined me. They were according to plan going to match my money kobo for kobo and we will start our business.

We secured an old warehouse with Muhammad's uncle's help of course and placed an order for some electrical boilers, coolers, mixers, as well as other things needed for our business.

Production started after seven gruelling months. Apart from a short rut where we incurred some losses, we started making money. The business  did very well that we started making plans of expantion the very next year.

Four years later, when I was sure I had made enough money, I made the journey back home in my newly acquired 1976 volkswagen beetle.  I filled it with so many goodies I was sure will appease my family...my father most especially.

I reached Zango in the evening. As I neared my homestead, the thumping in my heart increased, it was a kind of an adrenaline rush. My home was pretty much as I remembered it. Nothing has changed, from the four small huts that formed a crescent around a bigger one, to the stripped corns that hung by their husk attached to the thatched roofs, to the half buried earthen pot under the tree, nothing has changed...well, except for my father.

He had sharper features as the skin on his face hanged loosely, allowing his jaw and cheekbones to be more prominent, and he was wearing socks too. He sat on a crude looking rocking chair by his hut and squinted to have a better look as I eased the car into the compound. I coudnt help but smile, I have made it!

My mother was pounding some grains in the mortar and and had paused a bit as she watched the car cruise in. A little child, my brother, ran from his stack of bottle caps and hid behind my mother.

My father's eyes narrowed as I approached, He uncrossed his legs and stood up, as I came closer, I saw it in his eyes ...fire and brine

His eyes stopped me right in my tracks. I felt myself shrivel inside my well starched shiny brocade babban riga as he took slow deliberate steps toward me. He was still a few inches taller than I am. With both hands clasped behind his back, he took me in, from head to toe and at other angles.

"Tah!" He spat,  "the look and scent of a thief!"

A thief! He had called me a thief! It was exactly what I was, but it took me four long years to realise it. What was I thinking? He will welcome me with open arms like the proverbial prodigal son? No, I was what I am and there was nothing else to call it.

He shouted my mother's name as if she was somewhere far as opposed to her being just a small distance from where he stood. He returned to his chair and began rocking in it. Even the creaking sound seemed to be making mockery of me; a thief garbed in finery, trying to pass off as a prince.

My mother refused to make eye contact with me. She stood a safe distance from where I stood as she faced my father with bowed head.

"Tell the man, whoever he is, that what he comes looking for here is no more. Tell him to go back to the city of theives and betrayers." He said.

"Father please..." I began, but was cut off as he raised a hand and sat boldly upright.

"My son is dead to me, Woman! Tell this man, he has no place in this house,  he shall not try to keep relations with any of this household member...none! He is nobody to me for my son had died the same day he brought shame upon this family..."

"Father please..." I tried again.

"Woman! Tell him to leave my sight before I do something he won't live to regret!" He said to my mother.

"You should leave, please...you have made your bed, and now you shall lie on it." She said softly with her eyes downcast.

It was the first ever moment of regret for me. I stood there with no one to intercede for me. My mother was so ashamed of me she coudn't look at my face again.

Not even a tear of damnation to ease the pain I felt, just a hollow empty feeling from the inside.

I parked my car at the last bend that will connect me to the main road and tried to compose myself. It was not how I planned it, nothing was going how it was supposed to. Then I remembered Bayero and without further hesitations,  I drove towards the direction of his house.

Upon reaching his house, I realised it was occupied by total strangers. On further inquiries, I learnt that Bayero had left after my stint, for my father couldn't bear the sight of him, as he reminded him of me.

I reached kano in the early hours of the next day. As late as it was, my friends were still up and entertaining some guest in the house. They were surprised to see me as the plan had been for me to stay a few days before coming back. They became worried when I didn't explain what had happened, but they had an idea it was bad, they just didn't know how bad.

The next morning I told them. They sympathised with me until Abdul-Jabbar ask the next important question for me.

"What then will you tell Maryam's parents?" He asked.

"Yes it's important to know how to go about it because you could lose your girl. Nobody want to give their daughter out to a man with no background." Said Mohammad.

I have thought about that too. In the end, I decided it was safer to tell the lie I did; my family are nomads and I had lost contact with them, all attempts to contact them has been futile.

A year later, I attended a friend's wedding in Jos and was on my way to see to some business in Abuja when I stopped to pray at a quaint mosque in a sleepy town called Nisama. I was about to start my car Engine when I heard my name. The callers voice was  hesitant, but it sounded awfully familiar. And indeed it was, for the caller was non other than Bayero.

I was so happy I broke into tears when I hugged him. He patted my back and I must say we made quite an odd sight of two grownup men embracing and crying.

He asked me to come with him to his house. It was typically deep inside the bushes, but unlike the familiar shrubs and trees that surrounds the normal fulani settlement, his was acres of cultivated land that stretched for miles around the homestead with a fairly large aluminium barn from the far end.

I was amazed, "How did a farmer allowed you to settle right in the middle of his farm?" I asked.

"Because the farmer owns the cattle as well." He smiled.

Slowly it dawned on me, he owned the farm!

"It's all thanks to you my friend. I took your advice and sold some cows from my herd and bought this land. I got hired hands to cultivate my land, I get year round stack of hay, chaff and fodder for the cattle, I have so much food I have to sell most of it, so as not to let it go to waste. It's all you my friend." He said, as he squeezed my arm.

His wife brought a calabash of well mixed fura da nono and left. I forgot my trip, I was awed at my friends success, and he did it from the scraps of knowledge I had thrown at him. After the shock waned, I began to see it all in clear. That was what success looked like.

I noticed the absence of kids running about and on further inquiry, I was told that she had had two still births and a miscarriage. I was shocked that he didn't chose that as an excuse to get a new wife.

He was happy to learn that I was married and my wife was expecting. I also learned that he had patched things up with his parents, even though they are still cold towards the wife. After subtle rebuke on what I did, he assured me that my father will come around.

"Things like this take time." He said.

The next day I left for Abuja where I spent a few days and came back with a brand new business idea. I told my partners we should venture into the leather business, then the tanning industry in the country was booming.  I felt we should also tap into its riches.

They were skeptical, in fact, Mohammad outrightly refused, he said it was better to be safe than sorry. He didn't want to lose a lucrative business by venturing into unknown territory.  Even Abdul Jabbar tried to make me see his point but in the end I won. Greed I learnt, always wins in the end.

In the process of  building the tannery, our sweets factory suffered. We however kept injecting all energies and resources into the new factory.

In February 1992, the triumph, as well as other national dailies published a disturbing news. There had been a clash between the hausa and kataf (the natives of Zango). Though a minor skirmish with a few casualties, I couldn't take it off my mind.

I feared for my family. The next day, I traveled to Nisama and begged Bayero to go and ask my father to leave the area for some safer place. Ideally somewhere close to Bayero where I will have someone keep an eye on them and increase my chances of reconciliation.

He came back that same day, and as I had feared, my father had refused.

"He told me that the problem is between the Hausas and the local tribes over relocation of the market. That they were neither business men nor Hausas, so it's non of their business." Said Bayero.

Bayero added that even my brothers are back home. They Planned to stay for a few months before going back.  My sisters are married in the neighbouring villages as well which made me panic more.

In the end, I made up my mind, I was going to settle my affairs in Kano and go back to Zango...to my father, and convince them to leave the area even if temporarily. I knew what the place meant to him. He had stayed there longer than any other place in his life. He has found home and it will be hard to make him leave, but I was determined.

After I had everything in place, I left for Nisama. I was determined not to come back until I was sure my family have moved. I didn't care how long it will take, I explained it to my friends and they understood. I asked them to take care of my wife, for I had chosen not to say anything about my family until everything is sorted out

17th of May 1992, I, along with Bayero left for Zango. The first sign of trouble was a military barricade we encountered at Kagoro.  We learned that there had been a crises that morning and we couldn't proceed with our journey, no matter how we tried to explain, the military men wouldn't allow us because of the ongoing curfew.

Hence we spent one of the longest night in our life at a small lodge in town. The next morning, I managed to make some arrangements with the military men. We were assigned two armed uniformed men to escort us to our homestead.

On reaching Zango, the sight that welcomed us was disheartening; burnt houses, corpses strewn and unclaimed by the road. Mutilated human parts and more gruesome sights. I prayed that my family was safe. I prayed that they took the hint and ran before it started. I prayed they had escaped with their life even if it meant me not seeing them for the rest of my life. I prayed...

The road that led home was littered with carcass of cows. It doesn't take much to know they had left the cows behind because they will slow them down.

I saw the burnt huts and my heart sank. The compound smelled of burnt flesh. The body of my little brother laid  a few feet from my mother's, there was an arrow deeply embedded in her back. Bodies littered the compound; my brothers, their wives and children, even my sisters were there too. Perhaps they had come home too thinking it is safer for them, but I will never know. I ran like a mad man looking around, rolling corpses that laid face down to look for my father. The flies where having a field day.

The two military men had to restrain me. Then I saw Bayero standing stiff from behind the tree. I dragged myself to the spot, there I saw a socked foot. There was a ragged wrapper wrapped around his chest and wound round the tree, one of his sock was missing...an eye too. Both arms were severed and hanged limply by the string of tissues that held it to his body.

How they gathered the bodies, I had no idea. I watched my whole family rolled along with hundreds of strangers into a large grave and given a mass burial.

I stayed two more weeks at Bayero's.  Every day, he goes to town and collects healing water from a malam and forces it down my throat. Other times, he brings roots and herbs and asks his wife to boil for me to bath and drink.

He was the only one that saw my scars. It was well hidden to the naked eye, except for the one who knows and the other who felt.

When I felt I had stayed long enough, I went back to home after assuring Bayero I was fine. I wrote down Abdul-Jabbar's address for him, because he had insisted on wanting to check on me sometime and I couldn't risk my family finding out about him.

Life went on. I didn't say a word because I liked to pretend non of it happened, like it was a nightmare that was taking too long for me to wake up from.

Then in 1996, the leather business started to crumble. It was due to ectoparasite infestion at that time which affected the quality of leather we produced, as such its total value plummeted. We started running at a lost.

We took loans from the bank and tried producing more to reduce our losses. In the following years, we were deep down our necks in debt.

Then the week following Muneefa's birth, we were facing foreclosure. It was a huge blow for us. Mohammad blamed me. Abdul-Jabbar is not one to point fingers, so he kept quiet, but I knew it was my fault.

"How is maryam taking the news?" Abdul-Jabbar had asked.

"I haven't told her." I replied.

"Why do you choose not to share something as big as this? He asked.

"After the birth of Muneefa, she had come down with postpartum  depression. She's always crying for no reason, doesn't eat much, and hardly sleeps, and dumping this on her will be too much." I said.

"I am sorry, I didn't know." He said.

I began to struggle, it was hard because I was trying to hide it from my family.

One morning, Abdul-Jabbar came to meet me. He told me a fulani man came to his house looking for me. Immediately I knew who it was.

Bayero kept asking me about the company I had told him about. He wanted to see how ordinary hide is turned into leather. In the end, I was forced to tell him the truth, and also tell him why I couldn't let him meet my wife yet. He left the next day and I didn't hear from him for a long time.

Early 2001, he came to visit again. He was very happy as he informed me that his wife had put to bed a baby girl he had named Habiba. He told me he is thinking of moving south with his family. I couldn't understand why he was leaving such a comfortable life as the one he had made for himself. It was then he told me what he did.

He had sold the farm and his cattle except for a few he intended to start over with. He had brought the money with him...all of it, and insisted that I used it to save our company. I was dumbfounded at this benevolent act of his, but in his usual way, he had insisted that farming had become too overwhelming for him, that he has what he needs and I needed the money more.

When my colleagues learnt about the money, they were happy on many accounts. First, we could pay off the banks, keep the business, and don't have to pay a penny back because he said he had no need for it. But I insisted we do it the proper way and sell him a share of the company which after much deliberation, came to eighty percent of it. Reluctantly, he signed the papers on the condition that I don't involve him in anything pertaining the affairs of the company.

When it was time for him to leave, I couldn't let him. He was the only one I had close to a family, so I persuaded him to bring his family to Kano for a few days. I had made up my mind to reveal that other part of me to my family.

We travelled back to his house and I met his daughter. I instantly fell in love with her. She was so bubbly and full of energy, she looked every bit her father except for her smile. She wouldn't let go of my arm and kept trying to bite off my lizard tattoo. She only stopped to laugh when I feign pain and whimper.  There and then, I asked him if he will allow my son take her as a wife in the future, so as to strengthen the bond we already have. He stared at me for a while without answering,

"Nothing will make me happier." He said in the end. Both of us had to fight back tears as we smiled.

The next day I coudn't wait to reach home and tell my family everything. I didn't want to hide anyone anymore. Biba kept making excited noises as she pressed her nose on the window of my car. She sat at the back with her mother and Bayero sat with me in the front.

We were almost out of Falgore when one of the car tires busted, I hit the brake and the car summersaulted. Everything went blank.

Later, I woke up at a hospital in Tudun wada. Except for a sprained feet and a few scratches,and some sour areas, I was fine. Biba had miraculously survived unscathed but she lost her parents...and I lost my family all over again.

A more befitting word for what I felt was emptiness. A void I knew will never be filled, ever.

Broken, I took Biba back to Kagoro to her grandparents and told them what had happened which turned out to be a mistake. But I was not in the right frame of mind at the time.

The grandfather didn't want the child, he said it was the curse of having her that befell her parents. Why I took her there in the first place was because I thought she might be a source of relief for their loss, but no, they didn't want her. Even her uncles looked away.

She kept crying for she was still very young and I didn't know how to pacify her. In the end, I bade them goodbye with the child clumsily drapped on my shoulder.

I was almost out of the compound when I heard Bayero's mother call my name. She was not involved in the discussions, but she heard what transpired. She came and relieved me of the baby at the same time ignoring the warning of her husband.

She told me the child will be fine and I promised to come back and take her as soon as I sort things out.

The next year, I went to bring back Biba but I was informed that Nini has left with her as soon as I had left after a fight with her husband over the child. I learnt that as soon as she left, some dangerous looking men arrived looking for the child and even threatened to take lives if her whereabouts was not revealed.

I knew the child was in some kind of danger, but I didn't know from whom and why.  So I put off looking for her until I was sure she was safe.

************************************

Hajja kept her hand on his and didn't say a word. She was fighting the tears herself. When he was done she looked him dead in the eye...she was seeing him in a whole different way.

************************************

Ignore the typos Dan Allah, I am half sleeping and half typing.

Sorry guys for the very long chappy.  I had to finish it shiyasa.

Hope u enjoyed it.

And I hope to keep this pace InshaAllah.  Updates won't take as long as they used to.

Thanks for staying with me.

Xoxo

Vote

Comment And share