1
Edobor wasn’t as old as he looked. Life had imprinted her palms on him and the wrinkles that etched on his head became the new color on his face that followed him everywhere till he slept. it became his shadow in the light. Edobor sat in front of his compound with his face balanced on his palms. His children were running under the blanket of the moon and his wives had assembled a coven behind the compound to spread their gossips. Today, his house was enveloped with cries and the moans of pestles kissing the mortars. The little children danced naked around him, hoping to catch his gaze and seduce his attention so that he might play a little with them or bark at them even. But Edobor sat still, enveloped in his own web of travails, with life’s imprint balanced on his forehead. Earlier in the day, Edobor had visited a friend and found out that the man’s son was going to Benin to further his studies in the higher college. Edobor, on hearing the news had jumped and drank palm wine happily with the man and his kin, camouflaging his depression under drunkenness to hide his disappointment at the slow progress that his first son was making.
Collins, the first son of Edobor’s first wife had grown up far from Edobor’s shadow. In his youth, he had been an obsessive truant and now, that he was a man, little had changed. Collins was a man whom the gods had denied the gift of patience. And so he was very impatient with learning and listening to others who cared to throw wise words at him. Many who cared to attend to him in his youth left with huge walls of regret.
Many times, Edobor went to powerful medicine men on behalf of his first son who was so determined to bring shame and disgrace to his name. One of these men that he had went to was named Obebo. The friend who had recommended the medicine man told him that Obebo was the kind of man that boiled water on wet wood without lighting a fire. Edobor had gone to this man with high hopes of redemption. Obebo’s shrine had skulls of humans and different animals placed in front the entrance. Edobor stared ghastly at the shrine before entering. He had gone alone because of the shame in his reason.
‘Some of them I have killed. Some of them my father killed himself.’ Obebo said when he realized Edobor had been staring at the skulls intensely.
Edobor went on and told him the reason for his visit. After Edobor had unburdened himself, the medicine man asked him to bring an offering of a goat, sheep and white cloth before any pacification could be made to appease the spirit who had tied down Collin’s destiny. Edobor went home and returned the next market day with a huge percentage of his harvest. The first son of a man is the extension of the man’s own legacy and so Edobor did everything he could to untie his son from his predicament. That was fifteen years ago. Collins was now a grown man and now Edobor sat in his compound, enveloped with noises and cries, deaf to them. What filled his head was the dilemma of the son, who had two women pregnant for him.
That evening, after Edobor had taken his meal, He summoned Collins mother and the man himself. The men sat while the woman stood behind her son, around a dim lantern, blanketed under the dazzling moon. Edobor stared at the fire for a long time, wondering what to say. He was not good with words but he wanted to approach the topic without fueling any burning desires. Too many words had been said in the past days and hearts had broken. Many times, he doubted if he was the father of the son that sat before him. The mother tortoise cannot have thick skin like the coat of an iron while her baby has feather skin like the hen.
Edobor cleared his throat, spat and began,
‘Trouble does not sprout from the dust nor from heaven. I shall not restrain my mouth’. And so Edobor spoke in the anguish of his spirit and from the bitterness of his soul.
‘I have tried for you. If anyone says I have failed as a father, let him come to my house and see my palm if they are not scarred. I sacrificed for you. I sent you to school, but you always preferred sucking your mother’s nipple to learning in the class room. You are a grown man now and you have to take care of yourself. In one month, two women have knocked on my door and swore that your seed is in their womb. Two of whom you have denied. I have asked you many times and you have sworn to the skies and the seas that you know neither of them. Whether they be truth or lies, that is your own peace. I have arranged for you to go to my brother’s place in Agbor to learn a trade. I cannot keep on feeding a grown man under my own roof. You must leave and make a man of yourself’.
Edobor spoke into the night. Many times, his son grunted and his wife hissed. But he denied both the response to fuel their anger and reverse his decision. Tonight was a moon of peace. Before midnight, he dismissed both mother and son and rested on his mat.