Dada: Baby Boys And Dreadlocks
“His name was Ezenwa and he had dry matted hair, just like me!”
I have always known that I was not an ordinary child. Apart from the fact that Mother would always ring this into my ears now and again, the perpetual stares I got from people was enough clue already. Everyday, before I left for school or anywhere at all, Mother would dole out a litany of dos and don’ts that I must cautiously abide by. The restrictions were always more. She never skipped any nor did she miss the chronology.
“Remember, don’t allow anyone to touch your hair for whatever reason and no matter how much you’d love to, don’t play football during break. “So gbo, oko mi?” she’d say.
“My husband,” she would call me. Even though in Ibadan, it is commonplace to have older women, even strangers refer to boys and younger men as their husband, an undertone of intimacy could be perceived in my mother’s case. Ever since my father passed on, when I was just two, I had been her only source of succour or as she would rather put it, the apple of her eyes.
I was old enough to understand the reasons for these restricting rules, so I never questioned them anymore. Moreover, past experiences had given me a better understanding. On one occasion, a neighbour’s visitor had commented on how beautiful my hair was and had requested to touch it. Not wanting to refuse him, I gave in. When Mother discovered, all hell broke loose and she shook the foundations of the house for minutes until the matter was resolved. A cowry was permanently tied to my locks that day. According to Mother, if that hadn’t been done, I would have fallen terribly ill afterwards. On another occasion, I had fallen really sick and after much probing, Mother discovered I had played football with the neighbours’ children two weekends ago. Since then, I was not allowed to leave the house on weekends without her consent or a close relative accompanying me.
Not everything about me was negative. There was more to my specialness still. Mother said I possessed spiritual powers. She would tell me never to be stingy with my abilities, neither should I be boastful about them nor use them to harm others. So as I grew older, I became used to being approached randomly by strangers requesting in the most polite tone that I lay my hands on their sick relatives. Many of these encounters did not go unrewarded, either in cash or kind. As opposed to popular expectations, however, I did not like any of these – the never ending stares, the unnecessary attention, the catcalls of “Dada!” from people I barely knew on the streets. I did not want to be special, if all these were what it meant.
In school, it was worse. I attended a boys only public school. There, I was treated like an egg by both teachers and students alike. I was exempted from any form of laborious activity and corporal punishment. I did not partake in the cutting of grass during the first week of resumption and it was customary to walk into a class of students serving punishment and find a boy with long dry tangled hair sitting comfortably, unperturbed. That was me.
I had no friends. Everyone wanted to be friends with me not necessarily because I was likable but rather, as a result of what they stood to gain, but I chose to keep to myself. For one, the impunity I possessed was capable of saving other boys from trouble once in a while. Many a times, I had been called upon by the school’s most notorious boys to accompany them on dangerous escapades and play the role of the sacred cow who would likely save everyone’s asses or lessen their punishment, should we be caught. On those occasions, I always responded with a blatant no. This infuriated them so much that they always wanted to beat me blue black but it pained them that they could not lift a finger on me. For this and many more obvious reasons, they hated me.
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Things began to change during the long school break of 2000. The school had organized a special holiday coaching for all students and it was compulsory for those of us who were about to gain entry into JSS3 and SSS3 respectively. I fell under the former category, if not, I would not have attended. I came out top of my class all the time and the holidays was always a nice time to take a break from all the hullabaloo that go on at school. So hesitantly, I went on the first day, prepared to purposely avoid any form of interaction and stay away from trouble. Then, a teacher entered the class with a boy trailing behind her. The boy was a sight to behold – very lanky that I wondered if he fed well, but that was not all. After we had customarily greeted the teacher, she told us about our new classmate and asked him to introduce himself to the class. His name was Ezenwa and he had dry matted hair, just like me!”
In a matter of weeks, Ezenwa and I became very good friends. It was as though we had always known each other. He was like the brother I never had. I even discovered that our houses were just a stone throw from each other. We shared a lot in common. We discovered we were born on the same day, both our fathers had died, we were both an only child, we enjoyed almost the same hobbies and to cap it all up, we were both born with natural dreadlocks! Unlike mine, his was thicker, more tangled and filled with numerous cowries. According to him, his name means “child king” and it is the name given to children born with dreads by the Igbos.
Ezenwa and his mother had just moved over from Kaduna due to the religious crises that had occurred there earlier in the year. Ezenwa’s father had died in one of the riots. His father was a policeman who had been at the forefront of the peaceful protest organized by the Christian Association of Nigeria to openly reject the recent introduction of Sharia law in the State. When the protest metamorphosed into a bloody one, his father had tried to quell the upsurge and was killed in the process. According to Ezenwa, the Police force did not give his mother a dime afterwards as they claimed that his father had died a rebel and not a hero.
“Even his body was not found,” Ezenwa had said, in between sobs. “We lost everything! Everything! My mother’s shop got burnt in the attacks. If not for a kindhearted neighbour who gave my mother some money which she added to her meagre savings with which we transported ourselves down here, we would have returned shamefully to the village.”
The day he narrated this story, I felt so sorry for him. I could only imagine how terrible it must have been for him. Mother and I had watched the news on the day of the first riots and I had looked in awe at the pile of bodies sprawled lifelessly on the floor while Mother had kept screaming “Oluwa o!” As Ezenwa cried that day, I brought him closer and gave him a hug, telling him to calm down, that all was well now. He cried some more and finally stopped. Then something awkward happened. As I attempted to break the embrace, Ezenwa didn’t budge, instead he stayed the same way, locked in the embrace for some minutes before pulling out eventually. The gory memory must have taken a toll on him, I concluded.
That night, I could not sleep. My mind kept hovering around what had occurred between Ezenwa and I. I could not deny the fact that even though I considered what happened somewhat strange, I had never felt the way I felt in those few minutes of intimacy with Ezenwa. The feeling was inexplicable, something too esoteric for my thirteen year old self to fully comprehend. It was as though I had been pushed into an ocean but instead of drowning, I had stayed afloat, swimming cozily.
When I finally drifted off to sleep, I had a dream. In the dream, Ezenwa and I were playing boju boju in his house like we often did in real life. I was the one in hiding and Ezenwa was out, seeking me. All of a sudden, I found myself on the rooftop, in search of a place to hide. Ezenwa, tired of looking for me fruitlessly, came out of the house and shouted my name. His voice sounded so foreign and in fright, I slipped and fell off the rooftop. Just as I was about to land on the ground, Ezenwa ran with the speed of light and caught me. As he held me in his hands, he looked into my eyes, parted my locks so tenderly and planted a kiss on my lips. The next morning, I woke up to a feathery feeling on my lips and a handful of some buttery substance in my private region.
Image Sources: Pixabay
In the days that followed, my relationship with Ezenwa took on a new face. We didn’t have to talk about it. It happened so naturally that I wondered if he also had the same dream. I did not tell anyone about my dream nor about the sticky foreign substance, not even Mother. I was too shy to tell her and felt it wasn’t necessary for Ezenwa to know.
Ezenwa and I became inseparable. We went virtually everywhere together. After school, we would stay back and study together for an hour before walking back home, most times, holding hands, amidst disapproving stares from onlookers. Just because of him, I left Mother’s church and began to accompany him and his mum to their church, the gargantuan Catholic church that stood streets away. Mother didn’t have a problem with this, so long we were praying to the same God, she would say. During the mass, I almost never concentrated on anything that was going on. My entire focus was on Ezenwa, dressed in his smart vestments, assisting the priest on the altar.
Time went by as it always does and soon, we were preparing for the Junior Secondary School Certificate Examination. We studied harder than ever. Ezenwa was an average learner and would sometimes drag us back in the course of our studying but I wasn’t bothered. I wanted the best for him as much as I did for myself. I would explain whatever wasn’t clear to him till he understood.
We made plans together. Ezenwa wanted to be a lawyer while I, on my part, have always desired to be a doctor. Mother wanted me to proceed to the famous Oladipo Alayande School of Science in Ibadan which ranks top among the secondary schools of science in Nigeria while Ezenwa’s mother had saved up enough money and wanted her son to proceed to Federal Government College, Enugu, her husband’s alma mater. I knew what this separation would cause our relationship so I had pestered Mother until she gave in and bought a Federal Government College form for me as well. So I wrote two entrance examinations – the school of science and the Federal Government College’s while Ezenwa wrote one.
On the day the results of the FGC examination came out, Ezenwa was the one who broke the news to me. He had sprinted to my house immediately his mother returned with the news. I was home alone in the sitting room, watching TV when he came in.
“Dotun, guess what?” he had asked, in between gasps for breath with a smile planted on his face.
“What?” I had replied, inquisitively.
“We made it! We are both going to Enugu together!” he had blurted.
It was the way he broke it – his choice of words rather than the news itself that made me do what I did that day. It was the prospect of being together in a new place, being free at last to express this feeling that existed between us that made me walk up to him and plant a kiss on his lips. The feeling was mutual so we danced to the rhythm of our bodies and soon we were on the couch,
exploring every ounce of the other, throwing caution to the wind. Time became an illusion and I don’t quite remember how long it took us to discover Mother, watching us disgustedly.
Image Source: Pixabay
Mother didn’t speak to me for days after she had discovered me and Ezenwa. I know she had expected me to apologise and promise her that I would not engage in such a demonic act again but I just couldn’t. I didn’t feel guilty in any way. I only felt sorry for Ezenwa who told me his mother had spanked him till he began to bleed. When the silence became deafening, Mother finally addressed the matter. It wasn’t a dialogue, rather it was a case of her doling out orders, as she had always done.
Ezenwa was banned from our house henceforth, I was not to go visiting either and I would now proceed to the school of science whose examination I had also passed, just as she had always wanted.
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