After at least three months of homesickness, the last thing Daniel needed was Ofure's silent treatment. Especially on the day he was to finally return home, following twelve months of Youth Service in Taraba.

He probably deserved it though.

Daniel pressed the phone against his ear again, hoping for a different result this time but she still wasn't answering. In need of some respite, he dialed his mum’s number and informed her that the vehicle he boarded was about to leave the bus station.

"May the Lord guide you," she proclaimed.

"Amen."

"All the roads that you will ply today will not be blood thirsty."

"Amen."

"If there must be misfortune, it will happen before you arrive or after you have passed."

His "amens" became more indifferent with every prayer point but that did nothing to stem the flow of supplications.

Mothers.

They are built differently and their love is unmatched. But what Daniel wanted at that moment was to hear the raspy ravishment that was Ofure's voice. The first time he heard her laugh, he decided that, if she let him, he'd find new ways to constantly make her happy. The opposite was what he did yesterday.

"If you needed money you should have asked me, instead of spending the night with that man in his hotel room. Oh you thought I wouldn't find out?"

The post on Twitter had encouraged followers to send that exact message to their girlfriends and screenshot their response. Daniel had no plans of screenshotting anything and he certainly trusted his girlfriend. He was only curious to see how she'd react.

As soon as he put her out of her confusion and told her it was a Twitter prank, she was livid and her last WhatsApp message was “babe, I'm really disappointed in you.” 

It’s been radio silence since.

Mrs. Oloche, Daniel's mother, was in the middle of her third Christmas shopping that week when her phone loudly announced an incoming call. The phone screen revealed the caller to be “My Husband”.

“Hello Daddy,” she said, on answering the phone.

“I'm in the market,” was her next reply.

She stopped chewing the coconut in her mouth and squinted her eyes in a bid to channel all her attention to what was being relayed to her.

“Maybe they are currently where there's no network,” she said. “Let me try his number now. I'll call you back.”

She found both Daniel's numbers unreachable.

Once home, Mrs. Oloche and her husband tried again but couldn't reach their son. And so they reached out to Daniel's two older sisters who both lived in Lagos. They didn't have new or useful information.

Next on the call list was fellow Abuja resident, Ofure. And as luck would have it, their son's girlfriend hadn't heard from him either.

It was now half past four in the evening, and they hadn't eaten since breakfast, so Mrs. Oloche, despite her anxiety, got to work in the kitchen.

“You're not eating?” Her husband asked after she served him.

“I'll eat later; I'm not hungry right now.”

After dipping a few hand-shaped mounds of wheat meal in ogbono soup and swallowing them, Mr. Oloche reached for the hand wash bowl and declared that he was heading to the police station.

“I'm coming with you,” his wife said, rising from the couch.

They returned an hour later to find Ofure waiting by the front door. She was carrying a large handbag and a black nylon bag that contained fruits and vegetables. She had been communicating with Mrs. Oloche on the phone, so she wanted to know how it went at the police station.

“As expected, my dear. They would only process a missing person’s case after 48 hours,” Mrs. Oloche said.

More calls were made, one of which was to Mr. Linus, Oloche's brother, who worked with the Federal Road Safety Corps. He promised to coordinate with his colleagues to find out if there had been any accidents along that route.

Neither the couple nor their aspiring daughter in-law slept a wink that night.

The next morning, after a haphazard breakfast, the women went to see a pastor while Mr. Oloche pursued other leads. None of which yielded any positive result.

The third day the women returned to the church office and this time, the man of the house decided to take a spiritual approach as well, which basically entailed calling Onjefu, his wife's younger brother. 

A couple of years ago, Mrs. Oloche was fatally ill and for weeks, no hospital could detect what was eating her away. And so Onjefu stepped in and requested ten thousand naira of his sister's money. It had to be money she'd earned herself and must not be transferred to him electronically. Someone had to deliver it in person. He proceeded to buy drinks and invited a representative from every clan in the village.

“This drink is from my sister,” he said, while they drank. “Now none of you can say you haven't eaten her sweat. And so whichever household that is involved in my sister's illness is hereby warned. Hands off now or else…”

Mrs. Oloche mysteriously became whole a week later and never experienced a similar episode.

“Let me call you back sir,” Onjefu said, after he was briefed about Daniel's situation.

The next day a strange, haggard woman showed up at the front door pleading for food. Mrs. Oloche was happy to oblige as they had been thrashing food lately, owing to the general lack of appetite in the house. In addition, the woman was sent off with a huge pack of frozen meat, groundnut oil and flour. And why not? There certainly wouldn't be any merriment in her house while her son was languishing in God knows where.

Later that evening, it was announced in church that the Oloche's will be handing out food items to interested church members.

As promised, Onjefu returned Mr. Oloche's call with a simple message. “Tell them to return your son from where they picked him from.”

“Tell who?”

“The kidnappers who have him. They will call when they are done with their delay tactics.”

And so on the night of 22nd December, 7 days after his abduction, Daniel laid slumbering in one of the raggedy rooms in the kidnapper's den when they charged in and thrusted a phone in his face.

“Call anybody you know can pay your ransom.” 

As soon as he dialed his dad's number and said a few words, the phone was snatched out of his hand. After a very brief conversation, the one who spoke with his dad kept yelling “who did you call?”

The next morning, Mr. Oloche picked his son up from a nearby town in Nasarawa, to the delight of his wife and Ofure. Later that evening some neighbors in the estate came visiting to celebrate the good news, bearing gifts like flour, a live turkey, vegetable oil and drinks.

“We understand you gave out most of your Christmas food items during Daniel's abduction,” Mr. Amedu, their spokesperson said. “Today is the 23rd and it's almost too late for you to start Christmas shopping afresh. So we rallied round and got these items for you, to enable you celebrate the season properly with your son whom God has returned to you.”

That night, with the intent to make conversation, Ofure asked Daniel “What do you think saved you, your mum's prayer and daily visit to the pastor or your uncle's babalawo?”

“Both,” he said. “I believe my uncle's babalawo was a vessel in God's hand.”

Ofure laughed. “Well I wouldn't put it past God to do that. He's known to work in mysterious ways.”

“No doubt. In other news, this is the second time my uncle's voodoo has saved a member of this family. It is now my personal goal to get him saved and born again.”

“And what happens the next time a member of this family needs voodoo saving?”

They both laughed.

“I guess God would have to find another vessel,” he said.

After a moment of silence, she said “your neighbors are good people oh. They definitely saved Christmas for you guys.”

“Yeah they did. And I as well, I…I happen to have a gift for you too.”

“Where's it? When did you get it?”

“Before I was kidnapped. It's in the wardrobe.”

“You can give it to me tomorrow. Right now I'm in no mood to slip out of your arms.”

“That means you've forgiven me?”

“With all my heart, because as it turns out, you lose your angelic protection when I turn my back on you.”

Christmas service was awashed with a lot of dancing and jubilation. When it was time for testimonies, the service coordinator pleaded for testifiers to be very brief as they'd run out of time. 

“Please, you have three minutes each.”

When Mrs. Oloche's “Praaaaaaaise the Lord” lasted 67 seconds, the coordinator knew he had his work cut out for him.