The first time I heard the word ‘War’, I was six years old. Although I was old enough to attend the Village School as it was prestigiously called, Papa insisted I waited until I turned seven. He had told Mama that seven was the perfect age to start school and so it made perfect sense that I did not know what the word meant. Every night, I dreamed of turning seven, this mysterious age when I could count, solve arithmetic, read, and hold my head high, grateful it was missing a water pot, especially on cold harmattan mornings. More importantly, I would know the meaning of the word war and why it made Chinelo’s mother so angry.
“War”. I repeated it to myself severally in the silence of the night, testing the weightiness of the word on my tongue, the way it unfurled something deep in my stomach every time I heard it. Later, I would come to understand that unfurling as a sense of prophetic doom on our changed lives, forever tinged by a sense of loss so deep and unnerving. Chinelo had heard it from her mother too in hushed, frantic conversations that slipped through the sitting room, cascading in the air before it nestled in Chinelo’s ears. We could tell it was something bad, Chinelo and me. It was evident in the way Chinelo’s mother’s mouth rumpled in a twist, like someone who had sucked on a sour orange, her eyes wide and frantic as she tied and retied her wrapper multiple times. The talks of war spread like wild fire on a harmattan day. In the village, a descending pall seemed to settle on everyone, etching perpetual frowns, worry lines and wrinkles on the faces of many. Old men hobbled in small groups, discussing, and chewing kola. Younger men argued fiercely, wondering if Ojukwu would be brave enough to announce a secession. The women talked nervously, eyes too bright, laughter never quite reaching their bellies as they all watched and waited. Slowly, the news started to trickle in, disconcerted blends of gruesome stories…harrowing tales of grief followed by large trucks of distraught men and women, eyes wild, faces ashen, bodies mutilated and limbs missing as they recounted mass killings, bodies burned beyond recognition. Years later, the face of one woman wailing in the dust, hair askew, voice shrill and riddled with grief would remain ingrained in my brain as she recounted how even days after, the streets reeked of death, decay, and unwashed bodies.
While it was true that our lives went on, it was tainted by this air of uncertainty where everyone moved quickly, greetings were hastily mumbled and market days lost the vibrant cacophony of women shouting, laughing, and chatting as they haggled and displayed their wares.
Even the village playground was not spared from the descending pall which settled on everyone like a plague of locusts. Mothers hid their children between wrappers and blouses, even on full moons when children would typically worry their mothers for stories, dancing and running in the full glow of the moon, their shrill laughter ringing and echoing through the seven villages. On most days, the night was heavy, eerily still as everyone sat in their homes, windows and doorways bathed in a dull orange light from the glow of the clay lamp.
The war changed us, even before it came, fracturing our family into tiny little pieces. It reminded me of the shredded pieces of ugu leaves that usually floated in our soups. Each one infinitesimally insignificant on their own but together, a huge leaf that formed a stalk. That was us- tiny pieces floating in one big mess of stony silences, Mama’s sorrowful eyes, Papa’s sheer stubbornness and his constant tuning of the radio. All conversations on school had ceased, replaced by stranger words I could not understand, each one floated around, circled me and landed with a thud in my brain, ‘responsibility’, ‘enlistment’, ‘secession’, ‘disgruntled easterners’. Most nights I lay in bed, sleep eluded me as I repeated Papa’s words, as if by rolling them on my tongue, I could decipher their meanings. I wanted to understand it all, to peel the layers of tension and taut silences that threatened to engulf us all. One night when the moon was full, its rays casting a pale silvery light on my window, it occurred to me that although the war had not started, we were living in our own private hell where the flames scorched and chafed at our hearts, leaving a tangled mess of broken hearts and weary souls. We had died even before the war finally came in July, before Ojukwu’s speech came on the radio urging his “Fellow countrymen and women…”
Although the war came and went, Papa did not. News about his whereabouts were far flung, varied, and conflicted. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, hopeless and disappointing. Initially we had thought he died, buried beneath the rubble of collapsed bunkers, shrapnel, decimated bodies, and bomb shells. Then we started hearing different stories- how he had fought bravely, risking his life to protect comrades, women, and children. Others said they had seen him at the forefront resisting the Nigerian soldiers in Enugu before the city fell to federal forces. Later we heard he made it to Port Harcourt nursing a large, bloody gash while Papa Chinelo claimed he had last seen him alive in the forest with his unit. With every news about Papa, Mama seemed to wither, shrinking into herself slowly, eyes vacant and listless. It started with her hair falling, I would find small tufts of hair everywhere, floating around the house. Later she would be too tired, to eat, talk, change out of her clothes, or even get up from bed.
Some days I struggled to recognise this new Mama who barely changed her wrapper, slept in her clothes, and woke up the next morning, cheeks sunken and face pallid. Without Papa, Mama and I seemed to drift apart, empty days bleeding into the next, merely coexisting in the daily routines of nno, ka ke ime? and kachifo. It occurred to me then that Papa had been our centre, the meld which had joined this family together with his twinkly eyes and hearty laughter as he told stories of when he was a boy. In those times, Mama would stand akimbo, a small smile playing on her lips or she would chime in variations of Papa’s stories from the kitchen while she cooked, her slippers making a paa paa sound on the floor as she walked about. Other days, I wept for the memory of us, the people we had been. Mama, with her brightly coloured ichafu and white capped blouses. Papa with his twinkly eyes, booming voice and isiagu which he adjusted many times. Mama had called it a bad habit unbefitting a man, Papa would laugh and say she should wait until she was a man before deciding what was befitting or not. Those days were long gone, neatly buried in the periphery of my brain. Sometimes, especially on days when Mama sang quietly in Igbo- sad songs about love, grief, and pain- they would jump out, hovering in the corners of my mind. In those moments I would wonder about Papa, if he was lost, hovering, or simply buried beneath the rubble. It wasn’t very long after the war when Mama died, she wasn’t very good at living without Papa. So when I prodded her gently, discovering her skin stiff and a small smile playing on her lips, I knew instinctively that she had gone. At the funeral, I tried to cry but I couldn’t, hot balls the size of rocks stuck in my throat so that I could scarcely breathe. One early morning, it was decided by the council of elders, I was to go and live with one Uncle Nonso and his wife, Aunty Ebere – distant relatives from my father’s side who had been willing to take me in. Uncle and Aunty had no children despite being married for many years. On the day I arrived, Aunty Ebere barely acknowledged me, taking a cursory glance, eyes veiled with undercurrents of emotions I could not understand, she merely shook her head and showed me my room, simply furnished and functional. Uncle came in a bit later, eyes too bright and lingering with the rest of my belongings as he dropped the rest of my bags down. When uncle held my cheek a little too long and gave me a leery smile, I knew that everything had changed. So, when the moon sent a pale shaft of light on my window, and Uncle came into my room with oily smiles, and gruff whispers I cried. My soul longed for the days before the war when our feet pattered on the ilo sand and we laughed with our hearts as the dust coated our skin, casting our skin – my friends and me in sand.
