ONE DAY, I WILL WRITE MY STORY (Episode 4)

I knew John was right before me, as my anger increased, I reached out for my walking stick which was beside me. With full force and great energy, I swung my walking stick to hit him. He let out a very loud cry. A cry that sounded very similar to the one I also let out some months ago when he pressed the insecticide into my eyes. To a very large extent, a feeling of satisfaction came upon me. The shout had made my mum run to the sitting room from the kitchen. From afar, she was already shouting my name as she thought something had happen to me. Maybe I had stumble or something, but she later discovered that it would have been better if I had stumbled, because if I had stumbled, I could not have got injured compared to the way I injured John. My mum didn't bother to ask any question when she came in. I could hear their footsteps as she took John to the bathroom, maybe to wash off the blood that might have gushed out from his head. As they both walked away, I could hear John crying and also trying to explain what had happened. It was after they both left that the cartoon began to make much sense to me. It was after they left that I understood that Jerry had just injured Tom's tail, and he had let out a loud cry, again, which also is a little bit similar to the cry I and John had let out on different incidents.

I am not sure if I would have acquired the courage and energy to progress in life if I had not injured John. I can't not be so sure if his loud cry had a way of helping me forgive him after that day. And also, maybe his loud cry helped me to walk up to him with the aid of Titi, our last born, the next day to apologize for my actions. John, in his usual nature did not hesitate to forgive me, and later on, he became my closest friend and brother. The blind school my parents made me attend had a lot of positive impacts in my life, as it helped shape me and gave me the reasons to live, eventhough life may have put shackles in my hands and thrown me into an inferno with little or nothing to offer to a young boy like me in terms of hope and even continuity. In the blind school, I learnt how to read and also how to write like the blind do, and by the time the result of my SSCE examination came out, I cleared all my papers with outstanding grades. The fact that I could see in the early years of my life helped me a lot to understand somethings about life, compared to some other students in the school who were born blind, and had not for once seen the ray of the sun. Hassan was one of the students who were born blind in the school. He had no idea of what his immediate environment looks like, and he could not provide any information about colour, size, height, and a lot of others. The basic things he knew were the things he was told by his parents and teachers, and one amazing thing about Hassan was the fact that he was never downcasted. He was always of a high spirit, and hardly will you stay around him without laughing. "Why don't you ever feel sad about your sight." I asked him one evening as we both sat down waiting for our parents with my hands caressing my walking stick. "Because I have no reason to feel sad." He said, in his usual funny mood. "Or maybe because I have never seen anything in my life before, so, I don't know what it's like to be able to see." Hassan finally added, and I can imagine him smiling, eventhough I don't have a clue of what he looked like. "Do you know they say I look like an half-caste?" He asked rhetorically, and then gave a brief chuckle. Hassan served as a source of encouragement to me, and we were always beside each other during recess sessions. But, during one of our recess sessions one afternoon, we sat under a cherry tree. We were talking and laughing when we heard a female voice say, "That's him", and the next thing we heard was footsteps coming towards us. Those footsteps were so unfamilar, and those footsteps brought an abstruct end to our friendship and companionship.

(c) 2015. Austus Ofmat Nwanne

No doubt, some footsteps bring goodluck and fortune, while some come with tears and agony. The aftermath of some footsteps are quite catastrophical, while some end up putting smiles on people's faces. Which category of footsteps did you think approached Hassan and Akin? What feeling would be left when the footsteps depart? Only tomorrow holds the answers to those questions, so, let's meet tomorrow as we finalize the story. ONE DAY, I WILL WRITE MY STORY.