The herbal treatment

Thank God for your little boy, and what a resemblance, no one will think you participated in his coming to this world, everyone would think your husband opened his mouth and the boy jumped out, just looking at him should comfort you.’ Everyone laughed but I didn’t. I was not expected to even smile, having […]

Thank God for your little boy, and what a resemblance, no one will think you participated in his coming to this world, everyone would think your husband opened his mouth and the boy jumped out, just looking at him should comfort you.’

Everyone laughed but I didn’t. I was not expected to even smile, having just lost Ricky, my husband of five years. Many women and men from the neighborhood came and sat in the living room, some in silence, others will shake their heads in sorrow and the women folk would clasp both hands across their chest and groan in loud voices. Some will start a loud wail as soon as they step into our living room; throw themselves at my feet where I sat on an arm chair cushioned on both sides by women who believed with all their hearts that I will harm myself if I wasn’t so guarded. I kept looking straight, with the air of a wife pained beyond tears, beyond what anyone could describe, it was this lack of an emotional outburst that made all fearful, thinking I might do something desperate to hurt myself.

It was an accident. He was going for a weekend in Jos to attend a friend’s wedding. My best friend was traveling with him. She needed a ride and it was just a coincidence that both were going the same direction. Now they are both dead.

Most evenings, Ricky would leave the house about seven o’clock, holding a long walking stick which, to me, seemed odd and funny. He was just about thirty years old. But then, I have heard him explain it off to some other people that you need to carry such sticks as a weapon in case you come across a snake in your path. I must confess that at such nights, I felt a little happy and comforted that he was not going too far away from our home, our matrimonial home. I used to think foolishly that the way he dressed and with that stick, he could only visit the boys in the neighbourhood, share a bottle or two of beer, discuss the latest topics of non payment of salaries by the state government, the bad roads and the general lack of infrastructures in the country after many years of independence.

Truthfully, he comes home before midnight, by which time I would have started wondering whether he was actually in the neighborhood or had gone beyond our estate, taken the commercial  motorbike popularly referred to as ‘going’ and gone on to see his girlfriend. My mood will fluctuate between sadness, anger, jealousy and self pity. How could a marriage of less than five years suddenly turn into a circus of deception?

Ricky and I had always been friends since we met at our place of work. He was the most respectable looking of all the boys, not given to too much alcohol like the others who would drink away their salaries in exactly two days.

Ricky was not like that. Even with a pay package that wasn’t much, he dressed well, always tucked in his shirt with a good hair cut. He was naturally handsome. He was very attentive and loved to show me off when I agreed to become his girlfriend mostly to his friends and especially his townspeople. They all agreed that I was very beautiful. I was very good at my job. But I didn’t know how to cook except to make coffee in the mornings and spaghetti every night. This was easy because all I had to do was empty a tin of Geisha into a pot of boiled spaghetti as soon as it was soft enough. That did not require any special skill. The truth was that I didn’t like cooking, I didn’t like eating either, I would rather read or do up my house. I loved making my home beautiful, everything spick and span. And my bed used to be so well made I feel reluctant to lie on it so as not to ruin it. Many times when we entertained guests, I swept and rearranged my guest room as soon as they left.

Ricky was everything I wanted in a man and I was everything he wanted in a woman. He was also very religious even though I was not and I used to envy his purity. A practicing catholic, we would go to church together on Sunday mornings, even though I would stay in the car parked under the shade of a tree and wait for him to finish mass. Every Sunday, he wore a white shirt tucked inside a white trouser and he doesn’t make love on Saturday nights no matter the temptation. It was very amusing to me that anyone will pursue purity that far, even with one’s own spouse. I used to wonder if God would make such a demand on a young married couple.

Ricky changed when he became a man overnight. By this, I mean he got a new job that increased his pay package three hundred percent. It was a good job with a film company and it came with a lot of publicity and fame. It also meant that he was away from home a lot but most weekends, he managed to come home. In fact, our first child came in his absence but even though he was a bit aloof, I thought it was becoming a father that changed him; a man has to be a bit hard sometimes. He also bought us a lot of presents, perhaps to make up for his absence. But I had always preferred his person to money or material things. The real change came about a year later, when he finally came back home from location, the site where they were shooting a film. He had bought a car, a Gallant, which was a lot more luxurious than my Volkswagen, which used to be our car. Now, my Volkswagen became my own, he would not touch it anymore and his Gallant became his, with an unwritten law that I may not touch it judging by the way the car was treated as if it was our second child. The first visual change I noticed was his use of sunglasses, morning, afternoon and night. All of a sudden, he couldn’t do without this instrument, hiding away his eyes. I had always thought that people who wore such dark sunshades as they are called in this part of the world, are dubious people like money doublers, petty thieves, or callous men who date different ladies at different locations in the same town. Now my husband cannot do without sunglasses even inside the house and somehow we can’t discuss it. We talked less even though I talked very loudly in my mind. I asked him what it was he was hiding, is it a defect in his character or something I am not supposed to know. Where is it that he went to every minute of the day that he only comes home to sleep and he could hardly wait for daybreak before he left again? I asked him all these questions in my mind.

One night, as he left again, I gave him a little time and then followed him. I did not carry any stick, as I did not expect to see any snake in the bush path connecting our house to the next street. Besides, there is also a motorable road from the house to the next street and to the highway and that is where I chose to follow. I knew he did not feel that I was very intelligent; he just thought that I was a pretty head, happy-go lucky girl, so he did not imagine that I would follow him. He weaved his way fast through the bush path without using his walking stick at all and, as soon as he burst out on the next street, he waved down a commercial bike, jumped on it and off they went. I quickly ran to the next street, thanking God that I brought my purse with me, looked up and down the road and was lucky to see some two bikes coming down the road. I waved one down and asked that he should follow the one that my husband took. We could see it as the tail light was going farther away. If the bike driver suspected anything, he did not say but I could sense that he was a little excited from the way he took off and chased after the bike. It could have been the urgency with which I bade him to follow the bike. There were many other lights from oncoming cars and even vehicles going the same direction but my bike driver was able to keep them in focus. When they turned off a narrow street, we followed more slowly and carefully. About thirty yards ahead, I saw him payoff the bike man as he walked to a house facing the road directly; at this point I asked to be dropped, thanked the driver profusely and paid without waiting to collect my change.

Thankfully, the streetlights were not working but one could see from the security lights on the residential houses. I noticed the way my husband’s steps changed. There was this spring in his steps, and his carriage wore that of a liberated animal who had suddenly regained his freedom after being chained for long. I gave him time, as he rapped on the door, musically. I just sat on a nearby culvert, just a few yards away as I stared at him, unbelievably. Then I recognized the house. My mind was in turmoil, has the occupant changed? Wouldn’t she have told have told me? We meet everyday in the office, we work together even though we don’t visit all the time, we spend enough time together at work! But, what can this be? My mind refused to think and I was suddenly very tired. I must have been sitting there on the hard concrete of the culvert for more than ten minutes before my head cleared.  I got up sluggishly and moved towards the house. I still couldn’t think, what will I say to them, my husband and my best friend?

When I got to her door there was no need to knock. It was a one room apartment. The bed was squeaking all right, the grunts of pleasure were loud and clear, the quick gasps of breath and finally, the long drawn out heave of satisfaction as he collapsed on her. I walked away with a resolute resolve. The two must die! But they will never know it was me. I will never go to prison on account of two lousy fools who don’t know the meaning of loyalty; Never.

So, when their journey came up; the coincidental travel, it gave me the chance to equip them with a food flask  full of Jollof rice, cooked with the best herbs that will have them drive happily to heaven, or hell.