Bang And Bam

 The pathway that led into the Uku village in Amafor town in early’70s would not accommodate two bicycles coming from opposite direction. Too tiny. During rainy seasons overgrown brushes from both side of the road made it almost impassable for anyone carrying anything wider than his or her shoulders. In that nest rest two love birds by names Julie and Clifford.

 A tale of magnet and nail. Both the apple and pie of each others eyes and maybe something more like narrators of this century will deliver it if asked to do so. In each others company from wake to school to the tale by the moonlight hour whispering and smirking to each others utterances nonstop. The villagers have stopped wondering why the tap of the subject of gossip of those two never runs dry. Such remarks has became a kind of mantra to the villagers.

Teenager item are not unheard of but being seen in public together from three years to teen at times holding hands was viewed as committing cultural and traditional hara-kiri then even to some extent today. There is even racial line one should not just cross in love. To not feel any qualms about those norms are viewed as madness in it’s unique form. Such affiliations must have been the reason the couple no one is sure they knew they were even being viewed as special case and don’t even realize they were changing history never saw what others see and never gave a fart about gluing together in public that doesn’t exist in their world.

The more the parents and public talk and insinuate, the more the glue stock tighter. The cultural and traditional rubble act as natural rebellion both seems not to view as such. Some interested elders suggested that it must have some spiritual angles to it and needs consulting their ancestors to seek their opinion of the issue. People with time become tired of insinuating, prophesying, gossiping and casting degrading glances. They surrendered to reality and gave it a new negative names as seen feat by each.

    HOW MANY TIMES WOULD A MAN GOSSIP And Be Considered Enough?

ALL saw what was happening no matter how they pretend, it was there and seen by many that cared. The elders see it as some janky trend capable of changing the way of the people. No one has ever reported seeing both smooching. Parents, tired of warning their daughters without success, decide that their wards are not copying their age mate and model well.

The people are not known to be versed in dealing with damaged goods. They also don't seem to know of anyone happy in exchanging it for anything. Yet, the rate damaged goods were piling up in the town was alarming to the elders.

The rate of unwanted pregnancies, rate of the bastards, and premature deaths all attributed to the ways of Julie and Clifford indirectly when no other blame-worthy cause was found even a lack of adequate parenting as the cause of death, prompted some to decide that something ought to be done. 

One that the death of his teenage daughter touched where nothing has ever touched her was threatening war on the couple and their families if the elders continue keeping quiet. That was the catalyst that prompted the elders of the town to move fast. They never wanted the family war to starts in their villages and town. They have heard how deadly it was in places it have happened. 

The association of the mourning parent’s numbers kept climbing to the high heavens and the members kept vomiting bitter words no one in Amafor town ever heard in the history of the town. Most braved were tired of getting themselves in the family way to replace their dead for how sure are you that after a decade-plus, the present will not go the way of the past? Some are too poor and too tired of trading the same route over and over.

The elders organized a hurried meeting on the issue and the meeting venue was flooded by the uninvited association of the mourners after some elders expressed their shock at what they viewed as disrespect and threaten some leaders of the group, an apology that never was followed by retraced step over lapsed, the meeting commenced.

   Elders had barracked themselves inside one tiny tarpaulin canopy and association members acting as spectators followed the proceedings from outside surrounding the canopy. 

“My people, it’s true that some mourners lost their manners in their moments of pain to the extent of not respecting our traditions anymore, some of us will attribute it to their agony and reason with them for just today only never any other day. I asking to we find solution to what befall us for that seems to be more deadly than not according respect”

“ Sure, about thirty percent of the families are in pain from one kind of cause that we all narrowed down to the reason that some still are doubting seriously to date especially those from the city. I think it is sound wisdom to find the real cause first before seeking for solution”

Murmuring that followed lasted with no one obeying the call to calm down from the elders.

“ We are all in this together as members of this community but in my Seventy-seven years of existing in this town and answering all manners of meeting calls, I have never seen a time when lawlessness like this one am witnessing occurred no matter the excuse anyone might have. I am trying my best not to be angry with anyone here and I don’t know how long I can tour this understanding route”

“ We reason with all, please wear your manners as you wear your clothes and this the last time anyone in this meeting will tell anyone anything of this nature or we vacate this arena for you”

“We don’t know like the first speaker has said if what many were attributing as the cause is the cause after all, how come what is befallen some of our kids has not befallen the two?”

One mourner member forgot himself and jumped up in refutation of what the elder voiced out.

  “They are witches and we have enough evidence to prove it to….” 

“Ha!, the elderly ones, please, accept my sincere apology. I couldn’t control myself. The pain is excruciating each time I cross my house’s front door”

After eyeing him for about a few minutes, his sincere apology was accepted by a cast of eyes votes of. Never words, not hands. 

“ Those that are in the know have assured us and many of us that listened to their theories were convinced that their words matched our commonsense and therefore must be right which or no witch”

Gloomy poker faces rounded the canopy the elders were in. No noise was heard, not even a sigh.

“ So, what was this witchcraft-proof angle I just heard?”

About fifty-plus percent of the hands up outside the canopy were all women and one elder pointed at the women that initially voiced that out. 

“let me hear you in detail”

“ My elders, I greet you all. It’s my pleasure to stand here today to voice out what I heard firsthand from my dead daughter and her dead friend among many others that those two love birds and their ways many seem not to pay closer attention to were actually why they still stand today looking clean and intact while many are gone. The truth is that even if those two fuck until thy kingdom comes, they will never be pregnant or any part of their being got wear and tear. The thing is that while they fuck like dogs each day inside the bush and lakes, it is our daughters that know no man was getting pregnant and their parts wearing away yet they are all virgins. If you have ever this kind of witchcraft in your elderly existence, tell us. Some serious action is needed.”

“ I never heard of this kind or any other witchcraft kind for the matter. I am now a Christian and believe in it’s teachings and so should you all. You dead daughters all pregnant virgins?- I am still confused”

“Who will not be?” one man among many women chimed in.

“You truly mean to tell me that it was dog fuck, duck bears the geese witchcraft at work here?”

“ Exactly my elder. It is dog fuck, rabbit bears piking witchcraft at job6. Imagine the number. One girl gave birth to five last two weeks. That will tell you the rate those two goes at it and intensity too. Christ forbid.”

“ What are you people suggesting we do about it?”

“ Ha!, elder ones, those two needs to keep away from this town. from this two, more heinous atrocities are bound to follow”

The elders who were paying attention more to what wasn't being said than what was dropping there and manners each was said and the venom that accompanied felt that they have gotten enough information to be right in their own decisions and asked the association mourners to go home and expect their answers in three days time. They all went home with the hope of getting their wishes fulfilled and their failure shifted. 

It took the elders about twenty minutes afterward to reach a consensus and they sent five of their members each group to go to the houses of both love birds afterwards to talk to them and their parents and deliver their messages to the families.

Finding out that the lives of both the love birds and their families are not that safe considering the thickness of the venoms in the mourner's utterances. So, the two love birds were told to go to the city where arrangements in the house of the one wealthy man had been organized for both, and a school found for them there too. 

   Mourners never were told where they were being sent and what was to be their fate and more importantly whose partial contributions those two love birds will be enjoying in the city. There were to be there for two years for elders to view whether truly they were the source of the pregnancies or bad parenting, quack doctors, deadly local abortion concoctions and teenage madness the cause?

The parents and some mourners accompanied the kids most believed were heading to their purgatory to the make shift bus parks near the town’s market. 

The love birds once in the bus fixed their eyes at the back window at the receding figures of few mourners that saw them off and burst into hefty laughter to the chagrin of the few passengers that didn’t miss the hand holding and eyes gazing none blinking into each other.

“Would you have accepted their initial proposition of one of us remaining behind and the other leaving for the city?”

“Over my dead body, maybe in another life to accept such arrangement. I told the elders to turn completely 360 from that route and they never hesitated in doing so” the boy Clifford said.

“ Shit. Imagine that fucking theory of theirs. I have never seen the color of your pants and where did that idea entered their heads from?”

Another burst of lengthy laughter followed the moving bus and passengers gaze and frown out of sight.