Before you go

Chapter Two

Ruqayya Ibrahim Tahir.

I sit by the dinner table, breakfast being served around the table. I yawn, covering my mouth the moment I feel the yawn coming on.

"Ruqayya, how is your project coming together?" Abba asks. I nod, yawning again. I really need to get some sleep.

"Everything is going well, Alhamdulillah." Ummi is looking at me like I'm doing something wrong. And I know that look too well. Before I can take my plate and leave, her voice comes.

"You didn't sleep last night, did you?" I shake my head, yawning again. Ummi shakes her head at me as she pours the honey on the pancake.

"Ki cigaba dai. You'll have wrinkles more than your father before you are even forty." Abba turns to Ummi with a frown.

"Kai, Salma. I don't have any wrinkles." Ummi nods as though to say "Whatever sails your boat". Abba doesn't say anything. He simply picks the first from the stack of pancakes on his plate and folds it into a semi circle then bites into it.

From the corner of my eyes, I can see Ummi glance at him, her nose scrunched up ever slightly before she rearranges her face and goes back to eating like a civilized woman —with a knife and fork. They have talked about him eating pancakes like this more than a hundred times. Ummi has now given up on him ever eating like a normal human.

"Where's Fa'iza? Did she oversleep again?" Ummi's face is contorted in a frown. She says I'll have more wrinkles than Abba before I'm forty but truly, she'll be the one having the wrinkles. How can one frown so much so early on a Wednesday morning?

"Salma cut the girl some slacks, she just got back on Sunday. Psychology is not a child's play." Fa'iza, my cousin and best friend was studying psychology at Nile University up until Saturday when she had her send forth and graduation party.

Lucky girl is even done with her project while I'm here stuck with some novel called withered soul. I haven't been able to go through the second hundred pages, I just don't like it. I could've been given a novel by Chinua Achebe, or by Chimamanda Adichie, but Professor decided it was best I did my project on some arewa novel by some sucker who is from Kaduna. How incredible!

"That doesn't mean that she should be oversleeping." Abba picks another pancake, I think his third one and folds it the same way, pushing this one all through his mouth.

"It just 9am, ki barta ta huta dan Allah." Ummi folds her lips in, a sign that she has given up. She doesn't ever argue with Abba.

I focus on my food and when I'm on the last piece, Fa'iza's small voice comes.

"I'm sorry Ummi, wallahi I didn't realize goma yayi." Ummi simply looks at her before she turns back to her almost empty plate. Abba is already done and is pushing some grapes into his mouth as he scrolls through his iPad, doing God knows what.

Devices aren't allowed at the table, but Abba is an exception. He's always one.

Fa'iza takes a seat beside me, nudging me with her elbow.

"Sup." She says with a lazy wiggle of her brows. I know what she wants to say so I flip her off with my middle finger ever so subtly and stand up, leaving the plate there, the maids will clean it up.

"Ruqayya, come back." Abba says just when I go up the first step. I almost stomp my feet childishly but refrain at the last minute. I walk, no drag my feet back to the table and slump on the chair.

"Karya mana kujeran dai." Ummi says with a hiss but I simply ignore her. She's always complaining about something. And sometimes, you just have to ignore her.