The Dreams Of My Mother – Episode 25

Episode 25

Halima sat with Cassandra her daughter, reminiscing of the past. After announcing to her family that she was pregnant and wanted to marry a Christian boy, her father disowned her and never looked back. It was easy for him because he had other wives and children, only her mother was sorrowful about it, but her hands were tied, her husband had forbade any and every one from having any contacts with

Halima. She missed her family and even though her husband had tried to make up for the family she had lost, it was never enough. Every day she woke up and promised herself that, today would be the day she tried to contact her mother, but fear of rejection always won and she never got around to doing it. While immersed in her thoughts, the doorbell rang, she still did not hear, until her daughter Cassandra went to usher in the visitor, it were two policemen and some other well-dressed men.

Halima stood up immediately when she saw them, her instincts already told her that there was trouble. She told her daughter to go into her bedroom so she would talk with the visitors. Then one of the men broke the news that shattered her life. She was told that the plane that her husband boarded from Lagos to UK had crashed, and there were no survivors.

Halima: “Hay God!” she exclaimed and began to shout on top of her voice. The noise brought the servants and even Cassandra, who found out that her father was never coming home. Cassandra cried and held her mother.

Cassandra: “Why are so many bad things happening to me, mother. First it was Dayo, now father too is gone. Are you going to leave me too, mother?” she cried. Halima: “No my daughter, I will never leave you” she held her daughter and they both cried.

After months of preparation, Halima buried her husband with the help of the church and his family, the will was read and the majority had been left to Cassandra, and her mother, to the discontent of her husband’s family. They were against their son marrying a woman from a Muslim background, but he insisted, now they felt she had killed him and carted away all his wealth, leaving the family with peanuts. Halima packed up and left Lagos for Oshogbo. With the death of her husband, who had been her everything for a long while, she decided it was time to seek out her family and ask forgiveness.

When she got to Oshogbo, she found out that her father had died, and had forgiven her before his death, but no one knew where to look for her. He had forgiven her because of what happened to Khadijat’s family. He saw how desolate the family became just because the man refused to forgive his daughter’s mistake, and how the public shunned the Imam because his daughter died as a result of his unforgiveness. Oshogbo became her home once again.

Tania went to see a gynaecologist, and after being told that she was alright, she persuaded her husband to go for check-up also, so they would know where their problem was coming from and solve it. However, the gynaecologist also told him

that his sperm count and everything about his sperm cells were normal and he could impregnate a woman.

Tania: “Then why are we not getting pregnant. I want my own child” she demanded of the doctor.

Damilola was unenthusiastic, Dayo’s case was still at the topmost of his mind. He couldn’t understand why Dayo would run away, he was the most disturbed because he was the one who had seen the horror on Dayo’s face in the CCTV. What scared him so much to run? The last person he was in contact with was Tania, his wife. What had Tania done to the boy? He also thought of the accident, wasn’t it strange that she did not swerve to the left side which was her side of the car, but swerved to the right, where Dayo was seated. Another thing was the sudden enthusiasm to have a child. He looked at her, she looked fragile, but there were times he had found out that she was nowhere near fragile.

Tania: “Ï don’t understand why you are not showing any zeal towards this” she said.

“Why would you care about a child when you already have one?” she mused, looking at her husband, curiously.

Damilola: “A child will come at the right time” he replied nonchalantly.

The doctor told them that the reason they didn’t have children could be because of stress, therefore he recommended a one week vacation for the both of them