AREWA MY DAUGHTER

It was a bright Thursday morning... The students of Lasfaye Community Academy just filed into their classes after the usual Morning Assembly routine. The S.S 3 students (the most senior class) in the school were the last to leave the assembly ground as usual. They sang the marching song with a renewed vigour after they had been threatened by one of the strictest male teachers in the school that if they refused to sing and march the way they should, they would spend the rest of the day under the sun. Having heard that, they dumped their proud and arrogant spirit and sang like their whole lives depended on it.

"The day is bright, it's bright and fair!

Oh happy day, the day of joy!

The day is bright, it's bright and fair!

Ooo-ooh, happy daaaaaay!"

They sang the song zealously... The male students among them used their baritone voices to give the song a unique melody while the female teachers on the assembly ground laughed at them.

After the last student had entered the class, the teachers gathered for a brief meeting before they would begin their work for the day. Mr Ajakaye, the school principal was there to address them. As they were about to disperse after the meeting, one of the female students in S.S 3 trudged into the school tiredly. She greeted the teachers casually and headed to her class.

"Hey! Arewa, come here!" Mr Ajakaye called out to the student.

Arewa was scared. She wasn't ready to be lashed with either some hostile words or Mr Ajakaye's big cane which was dreaded by many of the students.

"Wait, what exactly is the reason behind your late coming everyday? Tell me, you live just three streets away from school, yet you come late every blessed day! Do you want to be serious with your life like this?" Mr Ajakaye said as soon as Arewa came closer.

Some of the teachers were already headed to their different offices and classes while the few that were around only glared at Arewa disdainfully.

"That's her normal routine. She would never change. She has been flogged severally, yet she would still come late. Her mother has reported her that she would never wake up early." Lovina, one of the female teachers put in.

Arewa was embarrassed. She wanted to defend herself but she kept quiet on second thought. Little drops of tears escaped from her eyes but she quickly wiped them...

Arewa was the most beautiful student in Lasfaye Academy. Her always rumpled school uniform, her tattered sandal and her ever rough long hair never for once succeeded in hiding her natural beauty. She was fair and beautiful with a nose like that of a Caribbean princess. She has all her body features in the most appropriate size and her stature was like that of a model; a perfect figure 8! Most of the female teachers admire her secretly while some of them display traces of bitterness and jealousy towards her because some of the male teachers drool over her.

"I see..." Mr Ajakaye continued, "You want to be stubborn right? And you know this is your final year in this school... You keep coming late everyday while your colleagues would have attended the early morning extra-mural classes. Tell me, how do you meet up with them? What exactly is your problem? If at this stage of your life, you refuse to be serious, when exactly do you want to get serious? Enh? Tell me! I'm sorry for you... By the time you get your F9 parallel in your final papers, maybe it will awaken just a little part of your senses. Nonsense!" Mr Ajakaye rebuked her.

Arewa kept staring at the floor in shame. "I'm - I'm sorry sir!" She stuttered.

All the other teachers left for their duty posts, leaving Arewa alone with Mr Ajakaye.

"You better be sorry for your life! Those stupid boyfriends of yours that are deceiving you will not be there to save you when you fail. Keep doing rubbish while others are serious.

"I don't keep boyfriends sir..." Arewa protested calmly but Mr Ajakaye was on time to interrupt her.

"Shut your stinking mouth! You don't keep boyfriends indeed! What else would you say? Do you expect me to hear, "Yes, Mr Ajakaye, I keep boyfriends?" He mimicked in the voice of a girl and continued, "You think I'm a baby. I know you would definitely deny it." He moved closer to where Arewa stood and said almost in a whisper, "people like us that will take care of you, you are running from us. You've been giving me all manner of excuses... I can't take care of you abi? It is those useless boys you are following. I'll see where this will lead you to." He hissed and then said loudly and sternly, "come on, run to your class now!"

Arewa ran towards her class with the speed of an athlete, glad that at least she was spared from receiving the dreaded strokes of cane from the Principal. She quickly settled on her seat because she already saw Aunty Lovina, the English language teacher from the corner of her eye approaching her class, so she swiftly brought out her English note, textbook and her pen just in time before Aunty Lovina entered the class.

After the greetings, they all settled down.

"Submit your homework everybody!" Aunty Lovina ordered.

"Arewa, did you do your assignment?" Molara, the Head Girl whispered to her.

Arewa eyed her angrily and hissed. She didn't reply her. She knew Molara wasn't asking because she cared. She only wanted to mock her. Molara has always been jealous of Arewa because of her beauty. Molara was the Head Girl of the school but she hated the fact that there was still another girl who had the spotlight on her and gained the attention of both the male teachers and students despite the fact that she (Molara) was accorded the most intelligent girl in the school, yet Arewa was always admired by all. Molara hated this, so she used every opportunity she had to taunt her because she was brilliant while Arewa struggled with her academics...

"God probably used a part of your brain to form your beauty." Molara once told Arewa and Arewa got seriously angry that she had to slap Molara because of her ceaseless bullying; that very act sentenced Arewa into two hours of hard labour on the school farm.

"You don't slap a school prefect; a Head Girl for that matter regardless of whatever she did to you. Why not report her to a teacher?" Mr Ajakaye had said to her the day the incident happened, before he later sent her to the school farm to clear some bushes there for two hours!

Arewa knew that the punishment was borne out of the fact that Molara was dating the Principal and also she knew part of the Principal's bitterness was because she (Arewa) has refused to say yes to him. Arewa would never forget that day. She worked tirelessly under the sun till her backbone ached. Since that day, she avoided Molara whenever she bullied her. She swallowed and endured all her bullying...

After Aunty Lovina got done with the marking of the homework, she returned their notes to them but Arewa didn't get hers. While she was wondering what happened, Aunty Lovina called out her name.

"Yes ma'am!" Arewa responded spontaneously.

"Out of fifteen exercises, you got just two! Imagine! Just two out of fifteen! Tell me, apart from your beauty, what else do you have? So, you think it is your beauty that you will use to write your final exams? Simple excercise, identify the Adjectival Phrases in the sentences, you wrote nonsense! And you were here when I was sweating and shouting while teaching you this topic! Chai! You are such a waste! When a girl has too many boyfriends and has started eating the food meant for elderly women, nothing will remain in her brain again. The day you get pregnant, you will know that this life has part two! You don't do your Homework regularly and each time you do it, you write rubbish and score zero. Just pick this book and get your miserable self out of my sight!" Aunty Lovina said angrily and flung the exercise book at Arewa.

Arewa was totally ashamed. She picked the book amidst giggles from her class members and went slowly to her seat. She cried for the remaining part of the class and she couldn't assimilate a thing from all that Aunty Lovina taught them again that morning... Her mother has been harsh to her at home, her teachers are unkind, her colleagues bullied her. She was totally depressed.

"Since everyone thinks I have boyfriends that I keep, then it's better I get one. I need someone to make me happy. It seems everyone in this world just hate me. What kind of a life is this? Is it a crime to be beautiful? Am I the one that formed myself?" She thought within her on and on as she cried. She could only hear Aunty Lovina's voice from a far away distance...

"Arewa!" Almost all her class members screamed her name simultaneously.

Arewa flinched suddenly as she was rudely jolted out of her thoughts. All her class members were focused on her.

"You see what I'm saying? What the hell are you thinking about?" Aunty Lovina said, approaching her seat. "I've been calling you from here all these while! Are you pregnant?"

"No ma'am!"

"Indeed! We shall soon see! So, what have you been thinking about? Anyway, that's your business, not mine. I'm paid to teach you... Now, tell us, what is a Gerund?"

Arewa looked lost...

"Gerr...Ger-rrand?" She stammered

"No... Gecrol! Idiot! If I give you a resounding slap, your people at home will feel it instantly! I have said it. You are so hopeless! You are just pretty for nothing... They should simply withdraw you from school. Go and learn a trade or become a permanent sales girl at your mother's shop. You are just wasting your mother's money!" Aunty Lovina barked at her angrily.

A round of laughter erupted from among her classmates. "She will do better as a Hairdresser!" Molara started her bullying again...

To be continued...