IYA LUKEMAN’S STORY ( BURIAL)

BURIAL.

The aftermath of rain heralded sunshine but it was as if the heavens understood and kept the sun at bay. It was cloudy and solemn the next day.

Iya Lukeman was not a Muslim but she was buried on the eve of the next day. Her family had concluded that there would be no need for ceremony considering the circumstances of her death. A casket, a minister and an already dug up patch of land in her father’s compound had already been arranged. Her family insisted that she be buried at home because Baba Lukeman was yet to pay her bride price. ‘ omo mi wa ni ile e nitori pe o fun loyun ni. Ile mi ni ama sin si, to ba san owo ori e ni ole wa wu oku e lati sin bose wun e.’ Her father told Baba Lukeman and his kinsmen that morning when they arrived to take her body to their family house to be buried. They each bowed their head in guilty silence knowing that he spoke the truth.

I stood in the corner of the sitting room observing both families as they spoke. Their tones laced with grief, anger, blame, and regret. At times it would get rowdy with one person pointing a finger with a raised voice then it would quiet down. Baba Lukeman just sat there. He still looked like he was in shock. A hand motion from Demola caught my eye. He wanted me to walk to his car to get the envelope in the glove compartment. As I walked out, I spied her children, the five of them ran to me at once. ‘Aunty Chidimma !’ They cried with tears in their innocent eyes. I stooped to my knees to wrap all five in my arms.  Lukeman, Fatima, Taiwo, Kehinde, and Teniola. Soon we were all on the floor crying in the middle of the corridor.

‘Aunty Chi, they said that our mummy will not come back… Is it true?’ Fatima asked. She was the oldest girl and she could understand what was going on. I looked into her eyes and she saw the truth.  More tears kept flowing. After what seemed like ages, I detached myself gently away from them and urged the brood to sit in their grandmother’s room down the corridor. Maybe they would witness their mother’s burial. Her Children had seen enough violence to last a lifetime. A few minutes after, I handed Demola his envelop.                                                       

Soon it’s was time to proceed to her graveside. As the ceremony started, I surveyed the scene – Adunni’s family with the exception of her parents, Baba Lukeman, who couldn’t seem to stand straight without the help of his other brothers and a sprinkling of friends, weeping, wailing, sobbing or downright bawling. Almost everybody was dressed in black.

Her family had put up a pretty picture of their daughter and a register at the entrance of their house. Memories of my late friend flashed through my mind as I stood amongst the small crowd that had shown up for her. I remembered our last conversation… it was almost as if she predicted her own death. I’d come to visit Demola one afternoon when I saw her sitting in the corridor. She was facing the window lost in thought.

‘Iya Lukeman! Iya Lukeman!’ I called out to her ‘Adunni,’ I spoke her maiden name this time touching her shoulder and she jumped out of her thoughts.  

‘Hei! You startled me Chi.’ She exclaimed clutching her chest.

‘I’m sorry but I was calling your name and you didn’t answer me. Are you okay?’

‘Really? I didn’t know.’ She then turned to face me fully and I was hit with a full glare of the black eye on her left eye. I screamed in shock!

‘Iya Lukeman! who did this to you? What happened?’ I asked feeling goosebumps rise all over me. She heaved a heavy sigh and gently pulled me down to the empty seat beside her. In my shock, I began to examine her face but the brutality didn’t end there, it traveled down to her neck and her arms in reddish purplish trails. They were her battle scars from the night before. I was sure that there were many more underneath her clothes. She noticed my stare and smiled, wincing slightly in the process as I touched her.

‘In a few days, it would heal… don’t worry yourself. It’s not the first time.’

Iya Lukeman was fair in complexion, beautiful and for a woman who’d had five children, she still had a lovely curvature with a barely noticeable stomach pouch. Facing the window again, she started to speak before I could ask more questions. It was like she had been waiting for a listening ear just to empty her mind.

‘ Yesterday night, my husband came home drunk with a woman…’ She was trying to choke back her tears as she spoke. I instinctively stood up to wrap her in a hug. After a moment, she pushed me away and tenderly dabbed her eyes, wincing in pain as she did. Both eyes were bloodshot and swollen.

‘They were high on something else other than drink… it horrible.‘  As her next words tumbled out she looked at me again this time letting the tears flow freely. ‘ Do you know that all those times when you first started coming home with Demola, I didn’t like you.’

‘why?’ I asked

‘It was because you reminded me of the kind of woman my husband liked to chase. Tall, fair, young, pretty, with enough breast and bum bum. And yes I know he tried to woo you and that was what made me change my mind about you. I never understood his dislike for you.. it was because of that day that you told him off on the stairs when you were going to see Alhaji. He is still bitter about it because he believes in getting what he wants especially with women.  What he didn’t know was that I was behind him and you didn’t see me too. So I heard everything’

‘You knew?’ Memories of that day flashed through my mind.

‘Yes, and I began to like you from that day. But why didn’t you tell Demola?’ She laughed a laugh laced with painful wincing.

‘It was not necessary at the time…’ I answered as she gravely nodded with understanding.

‘So as I was saying…’ Her voice had become shaky with tears. She cleared her throat, spat out the window and continued. “He came home drunk with his lover and barged into our room. Thank God, my children were already sleeping in the other room. Before I could ask what was going on he pounced on the bed and held my throat. He told me to cooperate unless he would disfigure my face… ‘Adunni, je ko ori e pe ki ma lo ba oju e je.’ It was not the first time that my husband had raped me but this time it was different. It was not the first time that he had come home with another woman… this time it was different. He was different and she was different.  I didn’t want another beating so I cooperated. He told his lover to undress while he removed my wrapper. I can never forget what she said …”Kunle, I no fit share prick with this one o! You never comot wrapper finish and her ynash don dey smell like a dead rat. Na wetin  you keep for house be dis?’ Ah! Chidimma! Kunle will sleep with the whole world, rape me when he feels like and then leave me with all the rubbish diseases he picks from outside. He won’t even give me money to treat myself. He doesn’t even keep money for food sef… if not for Demola sometimes…’ she wailed. ‘I felt angry… very angry so I began to struggle… to fight back but she slapped me and my husband held me down… He was even laughing…‘  She was now sobbing profusely and wouldn’t let me comfort her.

‘… Chi, kunle na mi pa! He beat and raped me that night till I was numb. Kunle na mi gidi gan ni ale ojo yen to the point that I fainted. By the time I woke up, it was because I was feeling pain. The pain was not from the beating but from what he was doing to me. He took me violently from the back… my anus. I was weak and when I started shouting his lover covered my mouth. As he was doing me, I just kept on looking at him. Esu ni Kunle!’ She spat out with venom.

‘ His eyes were like a mad man… Oju Kunle o da bi werre ni ale yen! After he came, he pushed me down from the bed and continued fucking his lover. They finished and slept off but I was just there on the floor. I wanted to kill them, I wanted to end my life but I was weak…’ she pulled out her wrapper and blew her nose swallowing the onslaught of saliva that filled her mouth.  I just sat there trying to take all she said in.

‘It was Fatima who came to my room to pour water on me this morning. I think I fainted again. Fatima is used to seeing me beaten up but this time it was different… there was blood everywhere and she was afraid… For my daughter to be seeing me like that …hmmm… ‘

Tears began to fall from my eyes. This time she let me hold her hand. The pain of the night before was etched in her voice.

‘Have you gone to the hospital?’

‘Hospital? With which money ke? I will be fine. Chi, Kunle is an animal…I’m bleeding from my anus and my pussy is removing puss. Chi, I am hurting everywhere. I am ashamed to go out…This was not the life he promised me. Asides from Lukeman, I get pregnant for my other children after he rapes me.’ She was sobbing profusely now.

‘But Iya Lukeman, have you reported this to his family? What of your own people? Can’t they do anything?’

She heaved another sigh and stood up to spit saliva outside the window again. I let my eyes roam her form again as she stood looking to see more scars.

‘Family… He is a Muslim and I am a Christian. When I came to this house his people wanted me to convert but I refused. They didn’t even like me. I remember the day I came with my father to tell his people that I was pregnant. I just finished writing my SSCE. His mother said that I was a she-devil, that I seduced their son and that all I wanted to do was ruin her son’s life. It was not until I gave birth to Lukeman before they even accepted that the pregnancy I carried was for their son. They have never accepted me. I have been so lonely and living in rejection all this while. Sometimes, I’ll even greet Alhaji and he won’t answer all because I refused to convert. Up till today, despite the fact that I have five children for him, he has refused to pay my bride price… Hmm! Aiye mi ti baje pata pata!’ She exclaimed hitting the window sill as she spoke

 ‘Iya Lukeman, don’t talk like that… you have your children to think about o!’

‘Some days I want to die. I nearly killed myself when I found about Teniola’s pregnancy. I even overdosed on abortion pill but that girl no gree comot for belle. But I have made up my mind that if he should touch me again, one of us will see heaven because I am tired. On Friday, it will be ten years since we have been together, ten years from the day I came to this house, ten years with Kunle who will not let me do business to provide for my children, ten years with Kunle hoping that he would change, ten years and his family still treat me like an outsider ten years and I will be Twenty Seven years old. My life is hell. I just want to die so I can rest! This is too much for only me’  She was crying with her arms wrapped around her belly. There were greenish and reddish veins on her face and neck.

I was crying with her now and holding her, unsure of whether I held her in the places that hurt but she didn’t seem to mind. She put her head on my chest and cried as a child would. I didn’t have the heart to tell her to stop or to even to say ‘shhh, it would be okay’.I was hurting for her too. After a while, I took her inside to sleep and offered to cook for her brood before they returned from school whilst she rested on a dose of pain killers. Soon evening came and Demola was back from work.

This was two days ago and it was the last time that we spoke before her death. A nudge from Demola brought me out of my reverie.‘ Babe where is your mind?’ He was standing by my side holding me sideways by the shoulders. I looked up at him and for a moment, I wondered if he was like his brother only waiting for the right time to unleash. Just as it came, I shook the thought out of my head.

Finally, the minister got to the part where he would say ‘ Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…’ as if on cue, cries, and wailing erupted amongst the small crowd. We’d all picked up a handful of sand to sprinkle on her coffin. I looked up to see her husband and a wave of deep anger surged within me. Why was he crying? Was it guilt or real pain I wondered. I clapped my hands together to dust off the sand as I  walked away.  She was laid to rest. She’d died on her birthday… leaving this world on the same day she entered it.

The date was October 1^st, 2014.