“Call your brothers; I want to teach you guys a song.” I drop my book on the couch with the pages face down so I can return to it when we finish learning. It is Saturday evening, the only time my mother gets to spend considerable time with my brothers and me. The weekdays are hectic, we only see when she drops us off at school before the sun wakes, and by the time she returns at night, we were already in wonderland.
One day I decided to stay up until she returned from work. I just won a competition in school, and I held my prize all evening looking at the door expectantly. Every squeak of the door made my heart lose its rhythm. Grandma begged me to sleep, “you would see her tomorrow morning, and she would be proud. Sho gbo? Her words were nothing to an adamant 7-year-old boy. I slept off on the center rug and didn’t see my mother till the next day.
“Yes, Mummy. Bolu said you were calling us.” My brothers’ chorus. I have interrupted their game of biro soccer, and family bonding doesn’t seem important.
“I wanted to teach you and your brothers a song I learned when I was serving.” Her smile had stories in them. She has told us more times than I can remember of her wonderful experience in Calabar. These stories came with pictures as she would bring out her photo album and walk us through the memories each held.
“Hope it is not one of those your Calabar songs.” Adeolu, who is just three, struggles to pronounce the word Calabar. He replaces the la with W, and it’s the cutest thing ever. His lips curve in an awkward position to show rebellion. My mother drags his folded arms and sits him between her lap. “You’d love this one, I promise.” She kisses his forehead, and he smiles reminding everyone that he is three.
“Okay, repeat after me. Lord make me pure in heart.” Yep, she is using the same method she uses to teach us everything. Bit by bit till we get a hang of it. We sing after her, but Sola is off-key.
“Sola, you’ve started, o. Sing well.” We all laugh about it. Sola has a voice only a lover would love, and we tease him about it. In his defense, he was a wonderful artist, and we all draw like vultures with pencils. Everyone is special in their way. I dance like music passes through my veins, Adeolu could sing like the fallen angel, and Sola was Da Vinci and Angelo in one body.
We learn the song for 30 minutes, getting a key Adeolu can sing on wasn’t easy, but we did it. “ Oya, let’s sing it together for the last time.” Mother kisses Sola on his cheeks to wake him up, he has been sleeping for a while now, and every time she wakes him up, he sleeps back within seconds.
“ Lord make me pure in heart
Make my life faithful and true
So when You look at me
It’s Your righteousness you see
Lord make me pure in heart.”
“ Alright, that would be all for today. It’s time to go to bed my loves.” She plants a kiss in each of our heads and watches us as we go to bed.
“Love you, mummy.” We repeat after ourselves.
“Love you too, my darling.” She says in response to us.
I stay up waiting for her to sleep. Sleep eludes me this night, and cartoon network looks like a fine option. Thirty minutes ago we all went to bed; everyone should be sleeping by now. So, I open my door with caution so it doesn’t make the squeaky noise it did the other day. I was hungry at night when I was meant to be sleeping.
That night I refused dinner because it had fish in it, and mother said if I didn’t eat what the whole house was eating, I would go to bed on an empty stomach. As I scrambled the kitchen looking for a snack, someone switched on the light. I was in trouble; later she would tell me it was my door that woke her up.
I’m successfully out of my room, the journey to the parlor feels like forever, and I’ll have to pass my mother’s room. She would scream if she catches me watching television by this time, but I can’t sleep. I’m about to pass her door, and I’m hearing someone sob and little whispers. I move closer to the door, and I can hear mother clearly; she’s praying.
“ Father, you know you took my husband from me, so you need to help me raise these boys. I cannot fail, and I don’t know how to beg. Oluwa, help me get through this. Allow me to be their father and mother, and help me do this perfectly…”
Her prayers have not changed for the past few years, the tears aren’t as frequent as they used to be. But when it comes, you can feel it ravaging through her core. I open the door-
“Who is there?” She wipes her face with the back of her hand immediately she sees me and puts on the widest smile I’ve ever seen.
“It’s me, mummy. I can’t sleep.”
“Oh, darling, come here.”
She folds me in her arms and starts to sing.
