For all I have lost,

For all that have lost,

I’ve always found it hard to explain how I feel when people die

As a kid I used to think it was a bit hysterical when I used to hear the elders pray against death when someone died.

I never fully understood the concept of death you could say, it was odd to me that someone who once walked the same soil I currently stand on, ceased to exist?

That was it? I always knew that there had to be more.

Maybe the people that died, never existed. Maybe they were here on a mission, angels of some sort.

It was a concept that was very distant to me, yet whenever someone no longer was, I would always hide away and stare into the sky, praying to the God my grandmother told me about, that He would bring them back.

To my family it was strange, that at such a young age, I often would withdraw into some state of delusion when a church member, whose peculiarities I couldn’t spot in a crowd of faces, a parent’s colleague, whose name I must have only heard when mummy attended to business during dinner, or maybe even a well renowned TV presence, whose presence I was only made aware of at the death announcement, would pass away.

I remember always feeling it in the pit of my stomach, I would think about their families, what it must feel like to have a seat at the dining table vacant till eternity, cold and sacred.

What it must feel like to never feel the warmth of the embrace of someone who’s hands you once held, clothes you once stole, shared a cup of water with. Do they now stare at the front seat with guilt, wishing that they had just let them have it instead of fighting? Do they pause and think of them whenever they scrolled past their favorite channel on tv? Do they look at throwbacks and still smile, or do they wish that they could freeze the picture and save it from the funny tricks of time?

Do they ever wonder where they wondered off to when their bodies became cold?

I guess that’s why our family stared at me in something thicker than worry on the bright Saturday morning that we found you sleeping soundly on your bed, because I did not cry.

I was not sure how to cry, how was it that the person I shared a womb with, no longer existed?

It had not yet made sense to me, I asked that they take me to the home where they took cold bodies, I told mom, that it was selfish of them to take you to the home where they kept cold bodies, I told them that you would be scared, that you didn’t have your favorite red sweater, which was actually mine. You had always said it was the only one out of your dozen, that kept you warm.

Didn’t you need it now, Dojei?

I didn’t speak to Jesus until the morning we left Jos for Ugep.

I hadn’t even looked up to the sky to pray that He would bring you back. Until we got to Ndayi, and granny pulled me into her very soft arm, that had a homey scent of spices and old lappas ,before she even spoke to anyone else, and she said,

“Wen omi,” my child, “tawa eten, Obase obongoke,” be strong, God understands why.

It was then that I looked up, and prayed to God, to bring you back. That was the first time I cried after you ceased to be. Because it was then I was reminded that Jesus was my friend. I knew Jesus, but in that moment, that you were in that white box, that fit your 5’11 figure, I didn’t want to remember Jesus.

Because to know Jesus is to know what isn’t Jesus.

I was inconsolable that evening, as I watched our relatives swim into the house in Ndayi, our cousins in pairs with their siblings and yet I sat alone.

As I cried, I saw relief in mom’s eyes, she was relieved that I was now mourning, I was happy she didn’t understand the agony I felt, knowing that Dojei never really read the devotionals she gave us, that every night I forced him to pray, that he preferred Mondays to Sunday mornings, that he once ignored me for weeks because I told him he was proud for thinking 30 was when he could take Jesus seriously.

“Man proposes, God disposes, who told you you’d get to thirty?” I will never forget how you looked at me that evening, while we shared a plate of fried yam. I became the enemy.

You got up from the bean bag in the living room, leaving me with the yam that was originally your favorite, and walked away. I watched you walk away, hoping that you would have think of that conversation in retrospect the day you gave your life to Christ, and then you’d hug me.

I never thought it would simply be my memory and my memory alone.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have said that to you. Perhaps if I didn’t, we wouldn’t have found out about the leukemia, when we simply went to confirm if you had malaria or not. That was the next time you spoke to me after I upset you, you cried in my arms,

“Am I going to die, Efa?” I shook my head, placing my finger over your lips,

“Obasekadeya,” God forbid, “You won’t die, Jesus died not just for your sins, but for illnesses too.” I spoke with such authority, yet my stomach was warm, warm because I knew that you needed to believe that too.  

I couldn’t sleep, I worried I would see you and you wouldn’t be wearing white.

The day that your dust returned to dust, daddy wore his white Usobo, mommy wore a white bubu, our cousins wore the shirts Uncle Ofem printed with your face on it, there were wings behind your slender figure.

And heavy words over your head, “Heaven’s gain, our loss”. Everyone believes that your charitable heart got you to heaven, I wish I could dabble in such ignorance. Is the screaming I hear in my sleep yours?

I almost chuckled at the thought of how you hated that picture. It was the day you represented our house in the relay race during inter-house sports and came first, when we were in SS1, you didn’t even smile. Do you know the man that printed the shirt was the one that made the shirts mom insisted we made last year for our 16^th? Maybe that’s why he made it for free.

I don’t remember what I wore that day. I don’t even remember waking up that morning, I don’t remember the church ceremony, but I remember hearing daddy scream and fall to the floor when you were being lowered by Kepon {fathers people} to the grave grandma had prepared for herself, next to grandpa when he died, and watching the soul leave mommy's eyes while Legima {mothers people} surrounded her, I stood with grandma. She wore shades that hooded her drained eyes.

I felt guilty, for not hugging them and being strong for them, no parent prays for this.

Where were you that day, Dojei?

Where were you the weeks after that, Omono’wam {my friend}?

I struggled with gratitude for some time after you ceased to be, it was hard to be thankful to God for life when I would have given anything to switch places, like we often did in school since we were twins, like we often did when mommy and daddy argued, like when one of us was in an uncomfortable situation?

“For there’s a spirit in man, and the breath of the Almighty gives it understanding.”

After three months, I finally walked into our room and I walked over to your side of the bed, I am happy we both declined having separate rooms.

I sat on your half of the bed, the way you usually did, one knee to your chest and the other stretched out.

I was no longer sure what to do with the love I have for you.

Where to put it.

I could no longer just work over to you and stick my pinky in your ear, I could no longer offer you a plate of food when I offended you, I could no longer.

To mourn you was not just to miss you, it was to wonder what could have been.

The way a believer mourns, is different from the way one who does not know mourns. It can be beautiful, or the worst thing in the world.

I got up from your bed, and I walked into the closet, your clothes were very different from mine, bright colors, I used to complain were much of a contrast from your personality, you once said

“the Archibong boys are an irony”.

I picked a yellow shirt, the one I gifted you with the words, ‘A boy helped by Yah.’ on it. I carefully put it on, it still had your smell, which was really my perfume you stole.

I returned to your bed, and in the pool of my fears, the fear that I would one day forget what your voice sounded like, that one day I would eat yam and you wouldn’t come to mind, I feared that you’re not happy where you are.

I’ve always believed God picked our names, in accordance with the fulfillment of our destinies. The nights that I prayed, for your heart to be softened towards the Lord, I would remind myself of your name,

Obasedojei, As God wills.

I believed that your heart would simply be softened when He wills. I didn’t think it would be if.

But that night, I had the most peaceful sleep I had had in months, cradled up in your bed, and Jesus sat at my head, and it was then I knew where I could put the love I had for you, and surrender the pain I had in my heart.

He is the one that understands.

He told me, to tell the people, that there is a reason why everything in our time moves so fast.

Why people no longer ride donkeys but fast automobiles, why menopause kicks in from ages 35-50, why man no longer lives as long as Noah; it is because we don’t have time.

We are made to believe we do. Just as you believed.

I miss you Omono'wam.

With love

Efa-yobase

To all, whom it does concern,

Time is a man-made construct,

You do not have it.

Revelations 16:15

“Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.”

May this not be you.