We Are Able

Episode 2

I watch as mother and father argue over the matter.

My father moves close to her and pointed a finger at her
eyes. I feel blood rushing to my head.
Mother tells me that two weeks pay will be deducted
from father’s salary. I laugh.
“Good for him,” I tell mother. Father sees the smile on
my face and he was suspicious.

Why should I not be glad that my dad is going to lose
part of his money? If I am not glad about it, who then
should be? That man isn’t the one paying for my school fee. He has stopped doing that since the year before.

From the onset of my schooling, he objected to my schooling, believing it is an effort in futility.

John won’t see anything good in having a handicapped
educated.
“What is the usefulness of a disabled child?” he would
tell my mother.

He began to militate against my remaining in school. He wants me out by all means,
complaining that it is a sheer waste of money.
I feel useless when John gives me the reasons why I
shouldn’t remain in school. It was the first time he would communicate with me through letter:
What do you intend doing after school? Doctor? Nurse?
Lawyer? Engineer? Pilot? You can’t do any of those or anything in life without your ears and mouth, I hope you
know. Rose, I hereby want to advise you to pull out of
school and master house works because that is the
only thing you can do without your ears and mouth.

I have wanted these ever since; only that mother
insisted I should remain in school. I am not an
education enthusiast, but I am not bad in school at all.

Now, father says he won’t pay my fee, so what is the
essence of arguing with him now?

I know John is only trying to hurt my feeling, but he was
shocked when I laughed for the first time and wrote back to him, “Thank you so much. I have been looking
forward to that.”

I had only stayed two weeks away from school when
my mother came with a big shock.

“Rose, you are returning to school?”
“What!” I responded in my sign language. My oval-
shaped mouth also synched the word. I have learnt a
lot from lip-reading my teachers in school, such that I
could figure out some things people are saying with
their mouths.

“You have won a scholarship!” Mother said.
“How?” I asked, puzzled. I haven’t applied for any
scholarship.

“Last year when your father began threatening to pull
you out of school, I decided to apply for a scholarship
for you and…”

I held my mother’s hands. I didn’t want to see more of
her speech. I didn’t buy the idea of returning to school.

“Please tell the scholarship sponsors to stop wasting
their monies on disabled like me,” I say. “No matter
what they spend, I will remain disabled in life.”

I rushed to my room and held tight to my pillow. Tears
was soaking the soft pillow in my grip. I took a little time gazing at the wall. My thought began to speak out:

They teach us that God is kind, but here am I…I can’t
speak. If he is kind, why can’t he make me like the other people? I came to the world, useless. How am I
different from the animals in the jungle? I learnt that animals can’t speak too. Little wonder Bayo keeps
putting leaf inside his mouth every time, just to show me that I am a herbivorous animal…

My nape felt a touch. The s£nsat!on slid down and
rested on my left shoulder. I have shut my eyes long
ago, only feeling the seepage of my tears on my cheeks.

It was mother’s touch. If I knew she would be coming
in, I would have bolted the door. I don’t want to go to
school.
“You are able, Rose,” mother says.
“A proof or I don’t believe it,” I respond.
“A proof?” Mother said. She was confused.
“Tell me what a deaf person can do that a normal
person cannot do. Tell me the job I can be offered
without my ears and mouth functioning. After then, I
might reconsider schooling.”

Mother racked her brain. She scratched her braided hair for answer such that the bobby pins on them began to
fall off. Still, no answer to give.

“Tell the sponsor of that scholarship to transfer it to a
normal person. I am done with schooling,” I say.

Mother sat on the bedside. I could see her throat moving up and down like a jangrover. Her red lips come
out to lick her tears intermittently.

“For how long, Rose, for how long will I keep begging you to stop being inferior? Rose, just…just…”

I have buried my face in the pillow. I don’t want to go to school. Period!

In the end I decided to comply. Ever since, I’ve been on scholarship, so John’s salary could keep on decreasing, how should I care?
But I still want to know what brings the disabled at par with the normal people. If my mum and my class-
teacher can’t give me the proof that I am able in three weeks time, I shall go on personal strike.