We Are Able

Episode 48

…continuation
They fastened their eyes on me as they looked towards us. Just
then, I felt a vibration and they scattered different direction.

Even Biodun’s head fell from la!de’s lap. I was the only one
who didn’t have a clue.
The whole world had turned upside down. Some people
rushed into our compound and rushed out again. Toyosi had
signed to me to ask where Bode was and I told her that he
rushed out some moments back. Toyosi didn’t think twice
before jumping into the street herself. Mrs Omotayo was in
tears as she saw her restless children. She somehow managed
to ask me where Taiba was and I rolled my index fingers before
her. She understood what I meant—that she had run away too.

John was just roaming around the house. He was confused. It
was as though he would run mad if Bode wouldn’t return to
the house. I thought the end of the world had come, going by
what I saw; cracks on our walls. A window pane had even
fallen from our own apartment.

Mrs Omotayo was scared to go inside her apartment, so also
was John. They feared that the building could collapse on their
heads.

Toyosi returned late into the evening, around 10pm and asked
my father where Bode was. As a matter of fact, the two of
them asked each other same question at the same time. They
put their hands on their heads and wept.
I didn’t know if my deaf and dumb status was a plus or a
minus. Till late in the night, I still couldn’t get a clue of what was
really happening. For the rest of them, it seemed they now
understood, having sat round their rechargeable radio, listening
to the breaking news there.
Biodun and la!de had also fully regained their consciousness.
He was the one who wrote a note to me to tell me what
actually was going on, yet there were three able people in the
house unable to do that.

That night, Biodun just walked up to where I was standing and
gave it to me. Then immediately, he turned back and began to
go to where her mother was sitting. Mrs Omotayo must have
seen him come to me, but she had nothing to say now.
Afterall, I was the one who fed her dying children with tea a
while ago, something Taiba was not around to do. Who knows
if they would have died if I hadn’t done that? I thought.
I opened Biodun’s note and began to read; writing in Braille was
such a wonderful type of writing that you wouldn’t need light
for while reading. I traced the letters with my fingers and got
the message in the dark.

A news from the radio says that the armies in the cantonment
were only testing their bombs. So, all is well! Thanks so much
for saving our lives.

“What!” I thought hard in my heart. Testing bomb! How come
they were doing such things within the city? I thought mother
said the intense sound of bomb could deafen someone. Does
that mean that everybody in Lagos right now are deaf and
dumb? Of course no, because till this moment I still saw Toyosi
and John speaking to each other with their lips and rolling on
the floor, crying for Bode’s absence. Mrs Omotayo was trying
to console them. I guessed she hadn’t heard what Bode was
doing to her children when the bomb blast occurred. If she
knew, she wouldn’t have taken it lightly with them.

I reached for my poem book in the middle of the night. Then I
wrote the date, January 27, 2002.
BOMB BLAST!