Thorns In My Boot - S01 E22

Story 2 years ago

Thorns In My Boot - S01 E22

Read Story: SEASON 1 EPISODE 22

It was like Childhood days again but this

time around, not in penury but in

abundance. I spent over a month with Mama

and Baba Miko, freedom is sweet! It takes

people like us to appreciate the importance

of freedom.

Imagine a situation where I wake up in the

morning and take my bath and eat Mama’s

or Baba Miko’s delicious meal, then I decide

on how to spend the day; do I go to Mama’s

Shop? or do I go with Baba Miko to work?

or do I just enter into the Campus of Ebonyi

state university and feed my eyes? It was

1998 and Ebonyi state had been carved out

of Enugu state so they have their own

university now. Abakaliki had become a

Capital City and the prospect for

development in the town had made Baba

Miko changed his mind about going back

home, he planned to set up a furniture

making business in Abakaliki because he

envisaged that the demand for Wood works

would increase with the influx of People

into the new Capital City.

Sometimes I just sit at home and watch

movies as long as N.E.P.A permits, the

generator Baba Miko bought had been

transferred to Mama’s Shop but they

planned to buy another for home use. I was

indeed enjoying myself here with Mama, I

determine the food that we eat in the House

as Mama would always ask me of my choice

of food before entering the Kitchen to cook,

if it was Baba Miko that wants to cook too,

he does the same. Baba Miko was never

married so he had been doing his own

cooking all his adult life.

The family bond that eluded me as a Child, I

began to experience at adult hood. Baba

Miko was a natural Father figure to me and I

took him as such immediately, the

relationship between him and Mama was

like that of two Pigeons in love.

The two of us were always teasing Mama in

her pregnant state; we assisted with the

house chores and in the Kitchen too. I do

the dishes after our meals and I clean up the

house in the Mornings, that is if Baba Miko

does not beat me to it, but it was generally

fun and peaceful, I never heard the two

raise voice at each other through out my

stay with them, Baba Miko has a very large

heart and he still sees my mother as that

sixteen year old Girl he wooed twenty six

years ago, he adored her and now that she

was expecting his baby, he practically

pampers her like a baby. This is what my

mother had missed all this years for

marrying the lazy handsome honey coated

tongued Man called My Father!

I was excited with the fact that I was

expecting a younger Sibling, mama and I

wished it would be a Boy because we

thought it would make Baba Miko happy but

Baba Miko insisted he preferred a girl as he

already had a Son in me, he said he needs

just a daughter to join me in the family and

after that, he doesn’t want any more

Children, he wanted Mama to rest. But Mama

told me in secret that if God permits, she will

bear him three Kids within three years, she

said she cannot have just one Child for him,

she said he needs Children that would bear

his name.

The first day I followed Mama to her Shop

was a Friday and I was over whelmed. The

way Students trooped into her Shop to

make their hair for weekend runs was

alarming; there was no more space to sit

down and the Students were collecting

numbers as they waited for their turns.

Mama had two paid assistants that helped

out at the Shop yet they could not rest

because the Students kept pouring in.

The Students say Mama’s hand does not give

them headache couple with the fact that her

job was very neat. Mama had no choice than

give them value for their money because she

knew where she was coming from. In the

Village where she was, she could plait

someone hair and at the end they resort to

quarreling because the Person would not

tell her from the onset that she does not

have money. In the Village the hair she plaits

for one hundred naira, she collects three

hundred naira at Abakaliki. Washing and

setting in Abakaliki is done at three times

the price in the Village so why won’t she put

in her best?

I had to assist in plaiting and fixing weave-

on for some of the Students that day and I

received a lot of tips. The Girls were

confused as to who should make their hair

between me and mama because our works

are exactly the same. They said we were

apprenticed under the same Tutor. Mama

was to them my elder Sister for no one

could ever believe she was my mother so

there was no need telling them otherwise.

Even though they heard me calling her

Mama, they thought it was her pet name

from Childhood.

Mama’s level in Abakaliki had actually

changed and for the fact that she does

business in a Campus environment, she had

to change and adapt to the fashion en-

vogue, she never wore Buba and wrapper

to work, she wears jeans and T shirts or

Skirt and blouse, her graying hair now looks

dark and lovely courtesy of the several

sheens and hair treatments she applied for

she changed her hair style weekly, mama

had a Baby face naturally so she passed for

a young educated lady in her twenties. The

only handicap was that she could not speak

fluent English and she has a strong Yoruba

accent so she settled for the Pidgin English

she could speak well.

I started to frequent her Shop regularly for

the next two weeks, first because I needed

to help her make more money and secondly

to flirt with the Girls. It was not easy for me

to take my eyes off the girls that came to

mama’s Shop! My Gawd! Igbo girls are

beautiful! In all my life I had never been in

company of young girls like this, I had never

being in a position where I interfaced with

so many girls, I had not gone to the

university by then so it was very difficult for

me to see a skimpily dressed beautiful Lady

without losing concentration, I tried not to

stare by could not help it, how could one be

plaiting a lady’s hair and just below my eyes

her cleavage is open and gaping at me? My

heart beat was always running fast.

And just as one girl is leaving another

beauty comes in with her charms. I was in

bondage, a bondage I did not want to be

free from. It was at mama’s shop that I came

to understand the term ‘beauty is in the eyes

of the beholder’ and beauty comes in

different sizes and shapes!

It was mama that came to my rescue, she

had been watching me all this while as my

mouth dropped open and my eyes pop out

at the sight of any beautiful or skimpily

dressed Lady. She said I should voice out my

thoughts instead of staring like the severed

head of a cow on the butcher’s slab.

Pay them compliments! She had told me; tell

them what you admire in them, if it is the

eyes or the dress or the hair! Tell them how

beautiful they look and flatter them, tell them

they are torturing you and you would have

loved to go out with them if not that you are

engaged to their sister! She said if a girl

comes to make her hair I should pay her

compliments and when she is done I should

flatter her more.

That was how I earned the name “Ogo” or

in-law amongst the girls and I was free with

all of them, I was free to stare freely and

openly while paying compliments while the

girls purposely flaunt it for me to see the

more! Jeez I missed mama’s Shop in

Abakaliki. But that was when I started to

respect male stylists everywhere in the

world. They are actually living in self

imposed psychological bondage.

Some of the Students wanted to know my

department as they thought I was a student

of Ebonyi state University helping out my

elder Sister at my lecture free periods, I told

them I was in E.S.U.T Enugu.

I started going to mama’s shop earlier than

mama while she comes later with my food

and we work together till 5.30PM before

going home to prepare and eat dinner with

Babe Miko if he is on day duty, but if he is on

night duty, he prepares dinner for us before

leaving for work, he leaves the house by

5.30pm till 6.00am the next day.