Dial - Season 2 - Episode 43

Episode 4 years ago

Dial - Season 2 - Episode 43

Nana b0s0mba looked at me with sad and pained eyes.

“I’m not barbaric, Mr. Biko. The dogs will follow you when they wake up,” he said calmly. “You of all people should understand where I’m coming from.”
“He does, Nana, we do!” Abena Adobea said frantically as she looked at me with a warning, then turned imploring eyes back to Nana b0s0mba. “We have something to ask of you, Nana.”
He sat forward on his white cloth and looked at Abena Adobea with kind eyes.
“I do know what you’re going to ask, my dear,” Nana b0s0mba said softly. “Believe me, I don’t even want you to beg me before I give you my answer. I have, indeed, witnessed how Mr. Biko’s heart has changed for the better.”
“You can’t call me Yao, even now?” I asked quietly. “You still want to call me Mr. Biko.”

“Yes, Mr. Biko,” he said gently. “I don’t want to like you, Mr. Biko. The time to call you Yao may come, yes, but not now. This dear girl reminds me so much of my Akos. Her fiery temper, her determination, and her protective character. Above all, the way she readily accepts her faults and apologizes rather gladdens my heart. If there’s a goodness I can do her, I won’t hesitate.”
Abena Adobea looked up at the Fetish Priest of Wowo with tears in her eyes.
“Oh, Nana, there is a favour!” she said in a broken voice. “Yao was a hateful bastard, no doubt! When I heard of the way he treated your only daughter, Akos, I was so furious and angry with him! I hated him even! But he has changed, Nana! He isn’t pretending. He has really seen the world as it is, and his pompous, irresponsible and despicable attitude has changed! Just a few minutes ago, when I thought he was going to die, I found out just how much I love this man, Nana! I love him with all of my soul!”

Nana b0s0mba rubbed a hand across his face, and then he sighed heavily.
“Oh, I did badly, Nana b0s0mba!” I said tremulously, and although I fought it, the tears cut tracks on my dirty face. “I was a beast in the way I treated innocent women. Now I know that if any man treats my daughter like the way I treated Akos, and if I had half of the powers you have, that man would not live. Yes, I don’t think I deserve to live.”

A very sad look came into Nana b0s0mba’s face, and his lips opened, and for a brief moment a look of sheer pain crossed his face; obviously he was remembering his dear daughter again.

“Buy you gave him a second chance, Nana,” Abena Adobea said in a trembling voice. “Although you put a curse on him, and he’s growing old, it was still a chance. And within that period, he has found peace, and has become a new man. And we’ve fallen in love, Nana! Please, I beg of you, have mercy on him, and reverse this curse on him.”
I leaned forward and fell on my hands too as my heart beat with pain.

“The Dial List is useless, Nana b0s0mba,” I cried with genuine regret. “It was just the vain and stupid plaything of a boy who lost his father and didn’t know how to deal with the pain! I’m going back to Accra, and I’m going to delete it without a second’s pause, and then I’ll marry Maa Abena. I beg of you, have mercy on us!”

Once again he sighed and rubbed his hand across his face, and then he shifted on the white cloth so that his legs dangled over the edge! Once again, I marvelled! It was as if he were sitting on a piece of wooden plank and not just a piece of cloth.

“I have seen more than any of you know,” he said softly, and an expression like shame crossed his face for a moment. “Believe me, I have seen the folly of my ways. I won’t lie to you, no. If I were able, I would’ve removed this curse on Mr. Biko the moment he helped your mother and that little girl Aba. But alas, I’m not in a position to remove the curse.”

It hit me with the force of a bull’s kick. My whole body went numb, and sweat broke all over me.

“What?” I whispered with horror. “You can’t remove the curse on me?”
“Why, Nana?” Abena Adobea wailed with anguish. “Surely, something can be done?”
Nana b0s0mba looked really down-hearted and in pain as he looked at us.

“When I put the curse on you, Mr. Biko, I was a wounded father, filled with revenge for the injustice my daughter went through,” he said painfully. “The curse I put on you has no reversal spell, unfortunately. There is only one way that it can be broken.”
“What way?” Abena Adobea asked earnestly as anguished tears fell down her face. “Whatever it is, tell us, Nana, and we’ll do it! I can’t live without Yao’s love, please.”


“How can the curse be broken?” I asked painfully. “Tell me, Nana b0s0mba, please. I will do anything!”
“Would you, Mr. Biko, would you?” he asked softly. “The only way to break the curse is to get married, Mr. Biko, to Akos…”
“But she’s dead and buried!” I screamed with pain.
“You didn’t let me finish my sentence, Mr. Biko,” Nana b0s0mba said calmly, his eyes turning cold again. “Either Akos, or someone Akos approved and loved. In this case, her aunt, Dede. That’s the only way the curse can be broken. You must marry Dede, my sister.”

Abena Adobea grabbed her heart, and for a moment she could not breathe as acute pain washed through her.