We Are Able

Episode 37

I punched something at the back of the special paper
Biodun gave me earlier. I had to do that so that Biodun
wouldn’t have to wait till eternity for my reply:
If I don’t love you, Biodun, who else should I love?
Infact, I will love you till death…
Since that day I was despised by that teenager, I had
made my mind strong again, settling for the thought of
rejuvenating my relationship with Biodun. A bird at hand
is worth two in the bush, I thought.
Taiba was our middleman. She would take my note to
Biodun and bring his reply back to me on daily basis. As
a matter of fact, it was only one conversation we were
able to do per day through the note because of his
school and my own hawking business. I often returned
from the streets around 7pm daily and Toyosi would
have returned from wherever she had been by then, so
there wouldn’t be any opportunity to see Biodun.
Taiba brought a note as a reply to the one I sent to
Biodun. I read it:
Now I am happy again, my dear Rose. I thought you
want to leave me alone. Perhaps you have seen
another boy in the streets. How is your hawking faring?
I replied him:
Nothing shall separate us, Biodun. Till death do us part
we shall be together, if not in body, then in soul.

The hawking business is not going well at all. I don’t sell
well and my mistress and her husband beat me up for
this everyday.
How dare she? And why don’t you sell well? My Rose,
you are able as you always sing, but why are you not
able to sell well?
At this juncture, I halted. His question was beyond the
blue. It was such a great challenge. Our conversation
had spanned almost one week already. We only get to
do one conversation daily.
In my next reply, I made Biodun know the reason why I
was not able to sell well. If only I had voice, then I
would do well. If only everyone in the world could
learn the sign language, then the communication gap
between the deaf and dumb and the normal people
would be bridged, I thought. Yes! Eureka! If I could only
become the Minister of Education, I would incorporate
sign language in the school curriculum of the normal
people and the solution would come.
Biodun replied me:
My Rose, I will help you out. We are able! We are able!
We shall sell well together. We shall not only sell all
the eggs in the tray but we shall also return home to
get more. By tomorrow we shall do it together.
Taiba gave me this one around 7pm when I was
returning from my hawking business. I was surprised at
the content. The next day would be Thursday, so I don’t
seem to see the reason why Biodun was saying that
we shall do it together because he had to be in school
by then.
I began to compose a poem:
BLIND AND DEAF BUSINESS
Wonders shall never end in the land of the living
Where the blind dates the deaf and do all things they
believe in
The blind on bicycle without anyone to be leading
The deaf in her earphones tell me what she has for
hearing
Can the blind lead the blind?
Can the deaf hear the deaf?
Oh, so impossible! But a solution is here
The blind can be the voice of the dumb
And the deaf can be the sight of the blind
They complement each other
Like a lover and his partner
Or like brothers and sisters
And much like partners in business
I couldn’t sleep in my little confinement. The garden
forks and the rakes in there had taken much of the
space in the store room; John just bought them new the
day before. They were so huge that they took up
almost all the space on the floor of the store room
where I hibernated.

I could remember asking Toyosi where next to sleep
the day before.
“Are you insane?” Toyosi asked me harshly. “Still in the
store room of course!”
“But father had just stucked it up with new tools,” I
signed back.
“That’s none of my business,” she said. “Go right there
and sleep!” she pointed towards the store room.
That night I had to push the standing tools aside: the go
to hells, the rakes, cutlasses, hoes, watering cans and
so on. Some of them were leaning against the wall.
They fell suddenly on the floor. I was tired already,
having trekked the whole streets, hawking. I just had
to lay my back on them that way, feeling much pain on
my back. That was the only day I had nightmare despite
the fact that I did my normal little prayer before
sleeping.
My eyes flashed open. It was morning already. I
yawned. It was time for me to do my hasty bath in
preparation for hawking.
My former room was where Toyosi put the crates of
eggs. She had them so many there, but I go with two
crates everyday. Toyosi had even threatened to add
one more crate to my daily sales and I was scared.
Even the two crates I couldn’t sell up to half let alone
adding another to it.
I sighed when I remembered Biodun’s promise to me. I
waited outside the house and Taiba rushed to me. She
made a sign to me that I should wait a little bit, then
she returned to their apartment. My legs shook as I
waited. Toyosi mustn’t step outside the house to
discover that I was still standing there.
It was five minutes and I was still within the
compound. Toyosi would be mad at me; I had to leave
right now. Just then, I saw Biodun being led out of their
apartment by Taiba their housemaid.
So, Biodun kept to his word, I thought. Okay, what is his
intention? Is he going to hawk with me? That would be
somehow ridiculous.

Taiba led him to me. Biodun smelled me and was happy.
He was ready to go out with me; hurriedly, we took our
leave.
Now I knew communication between us would be
impossible while on the streets, so we stopped at a
walkway on the busy road and punched all necessary
communication into the papers Biodun brought with him:
Biodun, how did you do it? You skipped school for Christ
sake!”
Not for Christ sake, Rose. I skipped it for the sake of
the love I have for you and I will do this for you for the
next one week.
Ha! Biodun, why? What about your mother? Won’t she be
upset that you are hanging out with me playing truancy?
That is if you tell her yourself, Rose. I mean how would
she know that I am hanging out with you? I have told
the taxi driver and la!de that they should not tell
mummy that I would be skipping school for a week.
Taiba will be enjoying my pocket monies, so who will
tell her? You?”
“Biodun, you are a small devil. Ha! Ha! Ha!”
We burst into laughter together. Biodun pulled me to
himself and gave me a tight hug. We were close to
kissing each other when his walking stick leaning on
the wall suddenly tilted and knocked our heads, calling
us to caution.
When I looked round, people had made us a tourist
attraction. All eyes were on us, leaving us in the middle
of a large crowd.
I wrote something to Biodun:
Biodun, do you see what I see?
Maybe not, but I can smell people around us. Are we in
the middle of a crowd?
Yes!”

Biodun laughed. Then to my amazement, he began to
say something I didn’t hear. Going by the muscular
movement I saw on his neck, I could easily conjecture
that he was shouting. As he told me later, he was
shouting, “I am blind, she is deaf and dumb, but we
have to sell all our eggs! Come and buy your eggs, one
for #15, three for #40! Buy your fresh eggs! Buy your
fresh eggs! I am blind! She is deaf and dumb, we need
to sell our eggs! Buy your fresh eggs!”
In a flash, all our eggs had been bought.