Dear Rey(A Letter to my Unborn Child)

16, Shona Street,
Doum Town,
Motor City.
16th July, 1989.
Dear Rey,
Why am I so sure about you? Why am I so certain it is a boy growing inside me and not a girl? I don't know. I can't exactly bet a thousand bucks on it, but deep down, I have a feeling, a knowing that you are there and waiting for when the time is right.
Then you would start kicking me. Hurting me.
Just like your father.
You would bring back memories. Memories that slashed at my chest like a murderer's blade, leaving fresh wounds on my heart. Maybe you would have his dark, curly hair, his piercing brown eyes and mischievous laughter. Maybe you would inherit the deep, rumbling voice like a rolling thunder or the cold, hard heart which made me weep.
His name is Hakeem and he's your father.
His name is Hakeem and he hates you.
And so do I. More.
You ruined everything, Rey,you threw spanners into the works. It was going well and I was in cloud twelve. I don't blame Hakeem for running.
Nobody likes unwelcome visitors.
I am writing you this letter. A letter you are never going to see. That's because you won't be around that long.
Rey, I am writing you this letter to tell you that you are going to die.
To tell you why you have to die.
I have nine reasons, Rey. Nine why-Rey-must-dies, and they are not excuses. They are not. No matter what the righteous gangs say.
Reason number one, you turned my dad against me. Daddy always called me his little lovely angel. You have no idea how much he loved me and how much I valued that love. You broke his heart, Rey, your coming poured cold water on the fierce love he had for me. Not that he totally switched to hating me. No,he never did, but the hurt,betrayed look on his face whenI stood by the door, ready to bolt, and said I was pregnant told me I had just suffered one of the biggest losses of my life. Thank you,Rey. Thank you for coming.
Number two, I am eighteen years old and it is my first year at the Motor City University. My life's just about to begin, for God's sake! You can't just show up and threaten my dreams. If I have you, I would never get my life back. I would be bound to your life, keeping you breathing. Shit, what was God thinking? Perhaps Heaven's so overcrowded that he decided to burden us mortals with little pieces of shit like you.
I wanted to kill you earlier, but I couldn't do that with you inside me.I am too scared of killing myself while killing you. Yeah, my life sucks but I can still make it work. You? Sorry,sonny, nothing for you.
A third reason: I don't accept what I can't handle. What I have no use for. The Bible says children are the heritage of the Lord. You see, Rey, I am not a common whore or some cheap black trash. I know the Bible. Dad and mum made me attend Sunday school faithfully for years. Even at school, I still went to church. Not that I am crazy about God. It is hard to keep rooting for what you can't see, when around you, doors are closing and walls arecrashing down. What's that song I heard yesterday? "All Falls Down" .
Your dad doesn't want you. He swore on any Bible handed to him that he wasn't responsible. Of course, what else do you expect from a chicken-hearted fool? Yes, he had his own dreams to pursue, expectations to live up to....... So what? At least be a man and clean up your own shit.
Because no matter what you think, it is still your own shit.
My dad and mum? I don't have the heart to burden them with you. Like me, they would look at you and see a living, walking, talking embodiment of their daughter's betrayal of mutual trust. Whenever I am not within sight, they would be picturing me at wild parties, booze parties, orgy parties, any party. And why not? I have given them every reason to.
I wonder if when you're still in heaven, God asked you to make a wish. One wish. Only wish. Any wish. Last wish. Death wish. And you said you wanted earth, and God sent you to me? Ha,ha, Rey, the joke is on you. Our Father up there granted you the death wish!
Reason number four: I am poor.
Dad works as an ironer in a dry-cleaning outfit and mum has a kiosk just outside out house. As the only girl in a family of four, I can only take whatever is given to me. And what's given to me isn't much.
Do you understand? Rey, do you understand?
Five: I am afraid.
I am so afraid that I won't be any good to you. What do I know about being a mama? About changing diapers? Sucking snot out of noses? Mood swings? Nothing. Nil.
Six..................
Seven.............
Eight..............
Nine...............
I have run out of reasons, and like I said earlier, they are not excuses. Can you give me one reason why you should live? You are six months as I write, and already, you've started hurting me: breaking my back, swelling my feet and keeping me in bed all day long with a bottle full of spit.
I am writing you this letter because of the dream I had last night. I bet you already know. How could you not? You were in me and you came to me.
In the dream, I was forty. Wait,was that really a dream or a foreshadowing masked as one? I was forty and surrounded by a circle of children- my children-, their ages ranged from fifteen to three. There were six of them.
Except they were not really six. Somehow there was a feeling of incompleteness in the circle. A senseof not being. Something hollow hovering around a gap.
I remembered looking round and round and then gazing up. There're no clouds in the sky, but there was no sunshine either. It wasn't dark,the sky was grey. For some reason I can't explain, I thought it was going to rain.
Then the circle began to move. Round and round they went. Faster and faster. Till they were just blurry whirlpool figures.
And I was trapped within.
Somehow, I sensed the gap was still in the circle. Unbroken. And I was sure if I stepped into the gap, I would get out of the circle. I would be safe.
But, I couldn't see the gap,I could only feel its presence. I remembered turning round and round. Frantic and frightened. Spinning till I fell.
As I lay there on my back, staring at the sky, I heard your voice quite clearly. I heard it in my mind. It wasa desperate cry for rescue. It echoed the cry in my own heart.
"Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!"
I closed my eyes, certain I was going to die while your voice wailed in my head, "Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!"
That was when I woke up screaming, "Mummy! Mummy! Mummy! Mummy!"
It was funny. I was screaming for my mother.
When I was a child, Rey, I had nightmares. I would dream of the bogeyman I saw on TV. I would dream he was in my room and trying to force live worms down my throat. Or I would dream of the six-headed monster I saw in brother Benny's comic, and whenever I woke up screaming my mother's name,she would be there in an instant. She would stay with me till dawn broke.
She made me feel safe.
I am tired,Rey. I can't go on. I have a paper to write tomorrow and I have to do some last minute cramming. In three months, you would be born.......................to die.
I hope you won't hold a grudge. Sure, it is easy to feel aggrieved, but then, you would never understand until we trade places.
Do I feel guilty? Of course, I do. I still have a conscience, but what could I do? I am not even a woman yet. I am just a baby having a baby nobody wants. Better for you up there than this life I lead.
A life of misery.
I have no more to say.
To my unborn child.
Mum,
Dara Yewa.

THREE MONTHS LATER.
Dara Yewa gave birth to a baby boy at the Heritage Hospitals, Doum Town. It was in the early hours of the morning and no cock had crowed.
Later, that same day, ignoring the outraged howls from the elderly nurses, and the doctor's protests and pleas, she discharged herself from the hospital and took a taxi home.
Home was a tiny room outside the university where she stayed with a friend who had travelled to the village to attend a funeral.
Rey cried on the drive home but she ignored him. She hadn't even so much as taken an inventory of his features. What's the point? He was a born-to-die kid and it was best she didn't know what he looked like.
They arrived at her destination and she paid her fare. It was nearly dusk and not many people were about. Her friend would return and ask about the baby, and she would say she had given him to a distant aunt to look after.
She walked to her door, carrying the baby as if she was carrying a parcel under her arm. Her palm was clamped over his mouth to stiffle his cries. If anyone saw her, they wouldn't guess it was a baby she held.
Unless they were looking too closely.
Getting into her room, she locked the door and turned on the battery-powered radio, its volume soaring above the persistent cries of the unloved child.
She placed him on the mattress. It was dark inside, but she didn't light a candle. Instead, she felt her way around the room.
She didn't want to see how he looked when he died.
She filled a large basin with water from a keg in a corner and picked up the child. Though the radio's static fuzz cloaked most of his cries,close up,they were loud and unnerving.
Kneeling, she stripped him of his clothes and raised him above the basin. Her eyes on a face she couldn't see in the darkness. Slowly,she started lowering her arms towards the water. Inch by inch. Down. Down. Down. Down.
Unexpectedly and unbidden, there was a restoration of the power supply and the bright orange bulb overhead shone on his face. She tried to look away.
But it was too late.
Her eyes were drawn to a face of indescribable beauty. Dark, curly hair that begged a caress, an upturned mouth which invited soft kisses, dimples on both cheeks that made you want to tickle him just for the sheer pleasure of seeing him laugh. His eyes were her own. Dark and curious.
A lump caught in her throat and she hesitated for several seconds. The light must have dazzled the child for he had stopped crying and was regarding her with a probing look of his own. He stared at the face staring at him. A face he knew but couldn't yet place.
Biting her lips, she resumed lowering him into the basin of water. She closed her eyes so as not to see anymore.
That was when the wailing began.
"Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!"
Her eyes flew open and a scream nearly escaped her. Her fingers trembled violently, almost dropping him into the water. She stared at her son and saw a wonder. A miracle.
He was calling to her.
Ridiculous,she thought. I must be losing it.Babies don't talk. For the love of God,they don't even fart!
In response,he wailed again, "Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!"
She hesitated several more seconds then with a violent shove............she thrust the basin away, splashing water on the cold floor. Her hands- no more a murderer's hands, but a mother's loving hands- carried the baby to the mattress,hugging him to her. Close. So close she could have choked him.
"Baby. Baby. Baby. Baby," She cooed."
"Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!"
And the child quietened and she never heard him speak until he was two-and-a-half years old.
Dara Yewa dropped out of school and got a job teaching nursery classes to take care of her son. People would take one look at him and say, "Gosh,he is beautiful. You are one lucky girl."
And she would smile and mutter her thanks, her mind going back to the night she never told anyone about. The night a day old baby had talked,bringing her a message from God. A message that said in love there's redemption.
There's a future.
There's hope.
THE BEGINNING