Love Finds A Way To The Heart - Episode 3

 

She died on a day when the sun did not come out. She died on a day when the wind did not blow. She died after a long battle with cancer. I have memories of her tucking me up in bed when I was a child, reading me stories or singing me a lullaby. She was a dab hand with musical instruments – perhaps it had to do with her being a music teacher. I recall her nimble-fingered hands performing magic – as it were – on the keyboard, conjuring up tunes that lingered in the ears like the sweet taste of wine on the palate . Sometimes she would strum on the acoustic guitar to the accompaniment of her mezzo soprano voice, which filled the house with mellifluousness. She was lyricism personified.

    I’d once asked her to wax a track or something. She’d looked at me then, pushing back the curtain of dark hair from her eyes, her lips curving in a smile, and she was like, ‘Mmm. That’s a thought. I would keep it in mind.’

    Her keyboard and guitar have been sitting gathering dust since she passed on. Just before I went to bed last night I stumbled on a gilded notebook in my closet while I was looking for a picture album of hers. It turned out that the notebook contained some lyrics that she had written. On the first page, the first lines that leaped off the page and numbed my mind went thus:

        One day you’re goin’ to 

        Look Death in the face

        And find that

        The face is mine…

In next to no time I felt the hot prick of tears in my eyes

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. I was so blinded by the tears that I had to blink my eyes, and they coursed down my cheeks. Before long, I noticed a tear plop down on to the page. Closing the notebook and replacing it in the closet, I cried myself to sleep. To say I miss my mum is an understatement.

    I was woken up by a knock at the door this morning. I turned to see the door opening and father jutting his head in.

    ‘Morning, honey.’ He came and sat beside me.

    ‘Morning, dad.’ I sat up on the bed, and folded my legs under me.’

    ‘Gosh! You look bleary-eyed.’

    ‘I’m all right.’

    ‘Sure?’

    ‘Mm-hmm’

    ‘Okay, Um… I’m sorry about –‘

    ‘Forget it.’

    He cocked an eye at me.

    ‘I’m not mad at you, dad.’

    ‘But you were. Last night. And deservedly so.’

    ‘I guess.’

    Despite myself, I couldn’t stifle the yawn that took a hold of my mouth. Dad asked me what plans I had for the day, and whether I would go out.

    I shook my head in response. ‘I’m staying indoors today. I need to brush up on my playing and, perchance, write a song.’

    ‘Good to hear. About time. Since your mother passed on – God bless her soul – you haven’t touched, let alone played, and instrument. For a year and a half now.

    ‘Mm. Take that as my own way of mourning. Come to think of it, when mum was alive you were always clean-shaven but after she died you grew a beard which rivalled that of the late Odumegwu Ojukwu in his heyday. I even had to press you into cutting off the beard finally. Well… I guess your deciding to grow a beard at the time was–’

    ‘My own way of mourning.’

    ‘Mmm. Anyway, I would like my man clean-shaven…’

*  *  *

    Obafemi Johnson feigned a frown.

    ‘Oh. Your man…’

    ‘What are you making a face at now?’ said Gbemisola, her face creasing into a smile. ‘Need I remind you that I’m twenty seven years old?’

    ‘No. you needn’t. At least I haven’t lost my memory.’

    Gbemisola laughed and gave her father a playful nudge in the ribs. ‘I wonder if you mean to keep me in purdah.’

    ‘Doing so has never crossed my mind. It’s a good thing you like your man clean shaven. It’s just that you’ve yet to introduce your man to me.’

    ‘When I said I would like my man clean shaven, I was only thinking out loud. It’s not that I’m in a relationship at the moment.’

    ‘Well, it rests with you not to let a good relationship pass you by.’

    ‘Mm. Tell me, dad, what’s she like

    Femi beamed a warm smile.

    ‘A fine specimen of African womanhood.’

    ‘Wow! So when am I meeting her?’

    ‘How about today?’

    ‘That’s fine by me.’

    ‘Can I ask a favour?’

    ‘Uh-huh’

    ‘I’d love you to prepare a meal and set the table before we come home later.’

    ‘What should I cook?’

    ‘It’s your call. I do trust your culinary skills.’

    ‘Mum taught me everything she knew about music while I learnt a lot from you about cooking. You’re both the best teachers I’ve ever had.’

    ‘You always have been a keen and quick learner, if you ask me.’

    Gbemisola gave her father’s hand an affectionate squeeze. Then she learned towards him and kissed him full on the cheek. ‘Take-care,’ she said.

    ‘Have a nice day,’ said Femi. Just when he got to the door, Gbemisola said:

    ‘By the way what’s her name?’

    Obafemi turned and smiled.

    Ada.

    ‘And that’s short for which of the nominal variations particularly?’

    Adanma.’

    ‘I look forward to seeing her.’

    ‘Time to love you and leave you.’

    ‘All right. Be safe.’

Femi blew Gbemisola a kiss, opened the door and was gone.

                        ***

A sleek grey estate car crawled in the traffic moving up Idimu-Egbeda road. The long file of cars moved at a snail’s pace. The gleam of sunshine lit up the roofs of the buses and cars on the road. Adanma, seated in the passenger seat of the estate car, was sweating. Femi reached out to put on the A/C.

    ‘It’s not working,’ said Ada. ‘It went kaput last week. I should have had it fixed since.’

    Femi had since wound down the windows and was resting his elbow on the frame at his side.

    ‘Thanks for offering to drive,’ said Ada, giving Femi’s knee a quick rub. 

    ‘You’re welcome, luv.’

    The traffic finally thinned out, and they made their way to Egbeda. Before long, Femi veered the vehicle onto Karimu Laka Street. No sooner had Femi driven halfway than he nosed the car towards an iron-gate - the front entrance of this one-storey building. On getting out of the car, he went and opened the gate, got back in the car, and drove in. Ada saw the shiny white Beetle that Femi had been wont to praise whenever she suggested that he should buy another car. He’d taken her out a couple of times in the Beetle, and she had jokingly said his Volkswagen seemed to have stepped straight out of that film titled The Love Bug. Not that she looked down on the Beetle, she’d told him. But there was nothing, she’d added, like a four-door car. ‘Car is a car is a car is a car,’ Femi had said in response.

    Amused, Ada had replied, ‘How apt to twist Stein’s quote and apply it to your car.’