FRAGMENTS

DIARY ENTRY.

23rd January, 2019.
                                          Dear mom,

I hate grandma.

Do you remember how we used to make fun of her, the way she ties her headgear so big and so large, it was always a struggle to get past our door. We'd stifle laughter when uba says James, the housekeep should open the second door, just so she could get in and immediately get down on our knees when we see her, and she would eye you nonchalantly and scoff, while she hugged uba and I, checking him thoroughly and complaining about our weight, our hair or our skin as though you weren't taking care of us enough. Then she would sit on one of the sofas in the large living room and adjust her buba and wrapper, touching her expensive jewelry.

"I got this on my trip back from Paris, very expensive and costly. It could buy a house on the islands. Ummu-Kaira, I hope you are taking your French lessons seriously. I am going to take you there when you're done with secondary school. Tu comprends?"

Obviously I did not know what that meant, grandma knew that too but then she would smile smugly, her over-baked makeup creasing in the process, and say, "It means "do you understand?" See, once you're fluent enough. We could even gossip about your own father, right under his nose and he wouldn't even notice!"

Grandma wouldn't eat your food, she would call her own help from France, Adil, who always followed her anywhere she went and tell him to bring the foodstuffs she brought from Abuja, where she stayed. She preferred to cook food for her son and her grand-daughter.

"What does a mad edo woman know?" She would hiss and start preparing tuwo-shinkafa. You always smiled, ummi. I thought you were being polite but i never saw the unsmiling eyes, the strain on your stretched lips, how you kept your hands together and your breathing always seemed measured. I didn't know then but i know now, you were under some kind of control.

But that was not why I hated grandma. She might have been obnoxious, boastful, words as sharp as a fired knife but it was nothing.

Grandma made you cry, at a family meeting, any mistake always found its way to you being the cause. She called you mad, mental, crazy, she called you a witch that had used a potion on her son and was going to eventually kill her only granddaughter.

You would usually smile and keep her quiet and apologise for a non-existent crime. I don't know what happened that day in our family house at Abuja,  I was in the kitchen with my little cousins, munching on a baguette and eavesdropping on the adults. You made a brilliant suggestion during the meeting, uba was proud and he held your hand and grinned.

Then grandma hissed and harsh words began to fly out of her mouth, about how you refused to discipline her granddaughter with the rod and how you only told me stories of the great Queen Idia and not Alhamadu Bello. You had mental issues and tried to kill me and her son, she said. Family members supported her especially Aunt Tipmichit, seemingly scared of what grandma would do if they dared say otherwise. Uba could only bow his head,  then he dropped your hands. You looked at grandma dead in the eyes and a tear fell from your eye. Grandma looked satisfied, she thought she broke you but she couldn't have been more wrong.

You were the embodiment of strength, radiating an unstoppable energy that inspired awe. Your unyielding resilience was palpable, a force that even Grandma couldn't ignore, though she often tried to diminish it. She saw you as a threat, a shining light that exposed her own vulnerabilities. But I knew the truth: your fortress was self-built, and only you held the key to its destruction. Mom, you never let Grandma's toxicity break you, you'd never let grandma win.

Well, that was until you took your own life...

***

Q. A- What's your favourite genre?

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