CHIBOK (COMPLETED)

CHAPTER EIGHT

AMINAT...

It was a long way back to the Benda Hamlet, a place too small to warrant a location on the state map. Someplace near Maisaimari, among the few villages that still stood and about two days walk away.

The journey was long under scorching sun and weeping sky, but Aminat felt light and happier. She felt hope, hope that as Mallam Usman had promised to stow her away to Damboa where she would go by road to Chibok.

Luckily, the group didn't meet any returning herdsmen who may have found her presence strange. It did seem that the plan was working, it was working well.

But Aminat's health had other plans

Her symptoms began at noon when they drew near Bulamoutu, it first started as headache, then her limbs began to feel heavy, she had had little appetite but had not seen that as any reason to worry.

Little Usman and mallam Kabir had been questioning her about how she felt, she had always pretended to be well, and they were decent enough not to even touch her to note that she was running temperature—she kept her distance.

Throughout the journey, they had tried all they could to make her feel safe and alright, and she actually appreciated their effort. Hunting animals to make meals and giving her a large share of the piece, a share that she secretly would give to little Usman whenever the two men are away. Time and time again Mallam Kabir would catch crickets and hand them over to her to roast over dinner coal, she had always rejected and it did turn out that Little Usman loved roasted crickets next to mangoes.

Her stomach felt empty and her lips dry, but she tried to be strong, feigning a smile when they look and acting like all was well. "I know you are not used to this kind of travel, quite a shame that cows are not such beast of burden." Mallam Usman would say now and then in an attempt to lighten her spirit. At even light he had engaged them in the stories of his adventure in his youthful days, then ended with the story of a ghastly accident that almost took his life but resisted on taking his leg after further struggles and negotiation. She could remember how Little Usman snorted at the use of the word "negotiation". The embellish story rang through to tell how half of his face was badly damaged and how a leg that was to be amuputated was treated by a local orthopedic till it regained full function. And that was thanks to Aminat's father, and that was at least one of the reason why they had chosen to help her. Mallam Usman never ceased to lament Kabir's refusal to be Mallam Warkarwa's apprentice.

The next night was when she felt the worst, her joints ached as if she had gravels between them, her head felt heavy, this was accompanied by a forceful expulsion of sick all over the grass. It was half way through the third vomit that night that she lost consciousness. The voiced that called on her felt so far away, she found comfort eventually and for the first time in the entire journey Aminat wanted to rest awhile but there was no rest, she had deliriums that stretched the few horrors she'd known.

*******

It was morning, Aminat knew it was, the cocks were crowing into the distance widening their small airway to spread the news round. She rolled over on her bed. It's been days since she saw the sun and she was beginning to miss it. Though her head felt light, her breath was even, the spasms and aches were all gone.

The door slid open and an old woman in white manteau walked in with a smile on her face, she couldn't talk, Aminat got to know when she nursed her, she couldn't hear either, and she was Mallam Usman's only wife. Her sullen look and bright smiles were the only gestures that expressed both worry over her health—during the days she nursed her—and her joy at Aminat's recovery respectively.

Little Usman threw the door ajar, running into the room with a grin. The woman scowled, he went back slowly and closed the door. He walked past the woman and sat on a heap of sack watching Aminat in silence.