Must Read: The Cartel (18+)

Episode 7 years ago

Must Read: The Cartel (18+)

IMA

It’s been almost two months since Mma’s funeral. The realities of being a single mother without any (financial) backing from her baby’s dad or her parents had finally taken their toll on Ima. The moment she pulled a knife on her dad, she knew that was the end of their relationship, and she had vowed to herself and her late grandmother she was going to make it without receiving a penny from her parents.


In not wanting to be a burden for too long on her host, she had returned to occupy her grandmother’s apartment a week after she was buried. Her grandmother was lowered next to her grandfather in his own building. Life had gradually returned to normal in the neighborhood, except Mma’s absence could still be felt in her compound. She was running out of cash as she had spent more than half the money she had saved up all the while and what ever little money she got during the funeral.

Her dad had shown up severally in the compound but both had avoided each other like plague. Her mom never returned after the burial and John had spent the first two weekends after the funeral with her. She needed to act fast because help wasn’t near in sight
The mosquitoes wouldn’t let her sleep as she lay awake thinking on this Wednesday night.



Thank goodness for the fact that John had brought her own cradle for her on his first visit, so Idara was safe from the mosquito bites. She concluded she needed to leave the village and Calabar completely if she’s to make headway in life. But where would she go to? What about her baby?

Remembering Jama’s letters, she stood up from the bed putting on her torch light as she began to search for them. Once she found them, she quickly checked his address to make sure there all corresponded. Ojo army barracks, Lagos.


She made up her mind she was going there to meet him. But what about Idara? The furthest she had travelled was for the FEDCOL games held two years ago in FGC Port Harcourt. Lagos, according to her friends who go there on holidays or live there is a complete days journey and she knew she dared not take the chance of going with Idara on such an unknown journey.

She had sent him a letter on her brother’s last visit but John had since gone back to school for her to know if he sent a reply. Because she was definitely sure her parents would seize the letter if they saw it in the mail box before John. Also how can she just show up in his house with a baby she never mentioned? What if he had another girl already and in fact didn’t reply her letter?


As she thought about this, she then remembered an incident that happened while she was still in school. A girl had dumped her baby by the roadside and the baby was picked up and handed over to a childless couple who were willing to take the child in after settling with the police. But no, she can’t do that. She can’t dump her love by the roadside.


But she also knew what ever she had left wouldn’t go more than two weeks, after which she wouldn’t be able to fend for herself and the baby again. Giving the child up was definitely the best thing to do for both she and the child she concluded. It wasn’t long before she slept off.

Thursday morning, after bathing the baby and doing her house chores, she strapped the baby behind her back and left for Calabar. Her mission was to survey the best area where it was best to keep the baby. Satellite town came to mind.


There are definitely rich people there and the chances of Idara being picked up by a rich family would be higher in such an area. She had been there severally to visit her school friends.


Her plan was to look for the best place where she would place the baby and no one would be see her, but yet would be easy to locate. After about two hours walking around, she finally found a spot. A certain junction that is always lonely, but gets busy from the time schools begin to close for the day. She would drop the baby around some minutes to 1pm and hang around looking out for who would pick her up.


Going back home she was satisfied with her plans. The plan was, as soon as the baby had been found, she would wait around with the crowd that’s likely to gather to see the person that would volunteer to keep the child. After which she’ll return to Odukpani much later in the evening when it was getting dark so the few people in the compound wouldn’t suspect her coming without Idara. Then first thing Saturday morning, she would leave for Lagos. Wow. Very easy she concluded in her naive mind as she parked her bag.



But again how would she identify her child later in the future when she returns to claim her? She decided to give the baby a mark. With tears in her eyes as her baby cried in pains, she used a hot nail to write the initials “IMJ” at the right top corner of the baby’s back by making tiny incisions. Before then, she had already mixed the local leaves used by their villagers for such purposes. This was done in the night just after she bathed the child so as not to raise attention.



It was from this mixture she then added inside the incisions which would later turn out to leave a permanent and visible mark on the child’s back. Fortunately, Idara also took after her light skin colour.


She decided not to do it Friday morning but wait till Monday when the wound would have begun to heal. But this is another Thursday night. For the fourth time that week, she had gotten to the road but turned back home crying as she couldn’t do it. She sat in the room crying as she watched the baby sleeping. “How can she think it was that easy to just go and drop her baby like that. A three months old baby? After carrying her for nine months? A baby whose birth caused the death of Mma. Mma would definitely turn in her grave, she thought as she cried.

Later that night she had a dream in which she saw her child down with fever and she running around looking for help. When she finally gave the baby to her granduncle’s wife, the lady pronounced the baby dead. She broke down in crying and shouting only to wake up to the voice of her baby crying. She quickly jumped from the bed and ran over to pick the child from her cradle. Running her hand around, she made sure the baby was ok, she’ll definitely do it today she concluded as she brëast fed the baby.


Checking the clock on the wall, the time was 4:30 hours.