I heard Taju has finally died. May he die a thousand deaths. You should not wonder why I wish this on him especially as I know we will all die and he is the father of my first child.
It is hard to finally accept that death has taken someone you had plans to revenge against.
I had plans to do him damage but over the years, I had been too busy raising my children, they are more important to me than the vengeance in my heart against Taju. I heard he just died. I heard a lot of things but let me start my story so you understand why I hold such a deep grudge.
Taju was the one my family warned me against. He was the one my mother especially begged me not to get involved with. But Taju had charm, he was a great talker, he was handsome and all the girls we grew up in the same area wanted him to propose to them.
Why he chose me, I didn’t know at that time but he chose me and yes, I was aware that girls would go to his house, begging him for sex. They would write to him and many times, in those days I found the letters because he was quite a careless man.
There was no GSM at that time, I am sure I could have seen nude videos of girls on his phone.
Taju was a Muslim, my family was Christian. They didn’t want me involved with someone we all know came from generations of polygamy. Taju’s family was the largest in the area we grew up in. His uncles, aunts and siblings were all in polygamous households. Aunties were one of several wives to their husbands, uncles were married to more than one wife, his elder siblings were in relationships that included multiple spouses…
His father had seven wives but not all at the same time. Some died, one or two left him…the general idea you get from this is that the man was always with more than one wife. There were several children, all in one huge three-storey building we called “the hostel”…because of course….several wives and children…you get the general idea.
My mother didn’t want me involved with Taju. Friendship was ok with her but nothing more. I was Christened Felicia, my mother said in those days, that I should “not plan to be Fatima.” That was the way my mother used to put it to me then, every time she caught me with Taju either on the road or saw him around our house.
I didn’t listen to her of course. I felt she didn’t know that Taju was different.
I never got to know my father, he died when I was very young. So my mother and her sister, whose husband also died years ago, lived together and they raised me and my siblings and cousins together.
My own family warned me against Taju because he was sure to have other women aside from me, his own family too warned him to have nothing to do with me, being a Christian and raised by “women who will have no respect for their husbands,” meaning, my mother and aunty.
So, we were both forbidden to one another, maybe that deepened our rebellion because looking back now, it couldn’t have been love. Well, for me it was love, apparently not for him.
So what happened?
You know, being from a big home, sometimes you don’t get the best from your parents, there were many mouths to feed and there were often fights among the wives and many times the children would take sides. So many times, Taju would come to me to give him food, money, buy him clothes…I could afford it because you see in those days, my mother and my aunty were one of the few women who drove a car. They both had one minibus they drove then and because they owned shops together at the popular Ojuwoye market, in Mushin, they were quite prosperous, which is why Taju’s family told him to avoid me because I would “not respect him, having been exposed to life,” as they said it back then.
What is life?
Opportunities. My mother traded and travelled, and so did my aunty. We lived well but looking back, we were just a little richer. We didn’t even go to private schools, we went to the same public schools everyone went to but we had a few more things. More clothes, more money…you know and in an era where men couldn’t even afford cars, my mum and aunty drove a minibus. You know. So, I guess to everyone around us, we were rich.
I was determined to marry him. Now, at that time we had begun to sleep together a little before we even finished secondary school. And two years later, I didn’t care if I got pregnant or not. I was not being “careful.” I thought that once my mother found out I was pregnant, she would have no choice but to let me marry Taju.
Ask me where Taju was working or what I was doing, especially as I was determined to get married so quickly and so early.
After my secondary school education and even before then, during weekends and holidays, I was always going to the market with my mother and aunty to trade. I had trade in my blood.
I didn’t want to continue with school. Trading had entered into my system so much that I was making good money on the side aside from selling for my mother. That was even why my mother was planning to get a shop not too far from where she and my aunty had theirs. I had been able to accumulate much and my wares were beginning to eat into my mother’s business. She was so proud of me, she told me she would begin to look for a vacant place to rent for me to start my own trade.
We traded in provisions, wholesale!
I was 19 years old at that time and Taju was 21 years. He was already working at one of those Chinese factories. Though he was not making much, it was better for him to have something than nothing.
Then I became pregnant. When I told Taju, he was shocked. I was surprised at his reaction. I said, “What did you think will happen when you have sex with a woman and you don’t use gold circle?” That was the name of the popular condom in those days.
He said he didn’t have money…I said, “is that news to me?”
He said he didn’t have a place we could move into…I said, “is that news?”
Anyway, I told him the best thing for us to do was for him to bring items of engagement to meet my mother and aunty and tell them he wanted to marry me. As far as I knew at that time, that was the goal of our relationship.
Of course, I knew he didn’t have the money to buy yams or a suitcase full of Ankara or goat…all the necessary eru iyawo (the bridal gifts) that suitors are tasked to bring for the traditional wedding. I knew he could hardly feed on the peanuts they paid him at the Chinese factory…I was blinded by my love and so, I began to buy these items and give them to him to keep in his house until we got everything ready.
I knew my mother would have no choice but to accept Taju if she saw I was pregnant. She might even help us find a place to live and pay the rent for us until we were able to do so ourselves. I knew my mother would do that. But Taju had to show seriousness, he had to bring all the bridal items, to show he was a man and serious about marrying me.
So I worked hard before my pregnancy began to show. I bought everything. I bought the nicest things because…well, they were going to be mine…I didn’t buy the goat, I gave him money to buy that.
Then something happened in my fifth month…ok, even my mother didn’t suspect I was pregnant because I am on the big side, I’m still big. I have always been big, so you wouldn’t have known I was pregnant.
The fifth month…it was one quarrel after another between Taju and me. We would quarrel over silly things. He was often late to meet with me. When we were walking together on the road, he was always way ahead of me and would accuse me of being slow…you know, silly things and I would flare up and call him names! Yes. Maybe because I was pregnant and he was being unreasonable, especially as I was the one working to ensure everything ran smoothly.
There was one time I told him he would never amount to anything in his life…yes, I said that. He also called me names too. He said I deliberately got pregnant to tie him down!
If he didn’t want pregnancy, why didn’t he use gold circle?
Anyway, Taju disappeared!
I went to his house one day and was told they had gone to do an engagement.
Ha!
Who is engaging with who?
Taju. This is what happened as I was to learn later. He had taken all the items I bought to go get married to another girl who I heard had his child!
Who got engaged to marry? Taju
Who had a child for whom?
Some girl we had all gone to school together, who he had told me he had nothing to do with, had his son…and Taju took the items I bought to marry her!
Oh, I didn’t faint. I didn’t faint at all.
Though I tried to get rid of it. I tried to take potassium, (kaun) and “Blue,” you know Blue, that powder we use to whiten clothes. I had heard girls used it to abort pregnancies. I didn’t want the child anymore.
But the pregnancy didn’t come down…I carried it to term and gave birth to a girl.
My mother and aunty didn’t even ask me who was responsible. They took care of me and my daughter and we closed the chapter on Taju. I focused on my life and my child until I turned 28 and married another man.
You know, Taju never came back to me. He never came to ask me, “What did you give birth to? Where is the baby?”
He never did. And I never went back to ask him, “Why?”
I mean, tell me, what would I have gained?
But I planned to do him harm. For years, I haboured a hatred for him. I had evil thoughts against him…I swore against him in silence…for years.
I think my curses got to him.
He never prospered. He never had a child after the boy he had that time. He was separated from the girl years later. He got married, left the woman, never had a child…never held a job for long…I heard he lived alone for years and had died for days before his smelly body was discovered.
I swore at his dead body, “May you rot in hell, Taju!”
(Series written and edited by Peju Akande and based on true stories)