Before she could straighten her back, Mama Tade suddenly appeared from the doorway.
She stood in front of Lara with her hands on her waist. Her face looked dark and angry.
Lara’s heart immediately began to beat fast.
“Who gave you food on your way to the farm?” Mama Tade asked sharply.
The question hit Lara like a slap. Her legs almost gave way beneath her. She felt her head spinning. For a moment, she thought she would faint.
“Nobody, Mama,” she finally said weakly, shaking her head.
Mama Tade stepped closer, her eyes full of suspicion.
“Come here,” she said coldly. “You are going around the village begging people for food as if I don’t take care of you. Don’t I give you food in this house?”
Lara quickly nodded, even though tears had already filled her eyes.
“You do, Mama,” she answered softly.
Her voice trembled as she spoke.
Mama Tade hissed loudly, clearly not satisfied with the answer. She stared at Lara for a few seconds more, then turned around angrily and walked inside the house without another word.
A few minutes later, Mama Tade returned. In her hand was a very small plate of rice.
The rice had no meat, no fish, nothing else. Just plain rice.
She stretched out the plate and pushed it into Lara’s hands.
“Take it,” she said harshly, “before you go around telling people that I don’t give you food.”
Without waiting for Lara to speak, she turned and walked back inside the house.
Lara stood there quietly, holding the small plate. Her hands were shaking. She looked down at the food for a long moment.
Slowly, she sat down on the ground beside the firewood she had brought from the farm. Tears rolled down her cheeks again.
She looked up at the dark sky and whispered softly, “Tade, my husband.”
Her voice was filled with pain.
“When you were alive, I had everything I wanted. I could eat whatever I wanted. I could buy whatever I wanted.”
She wiped her tears with the edge of her wrapper.
“But now look at me. Look at what your mother is doing to me.”
Her voice broke as she spoke.
“Tade, I know you are no longer here, but I don’t think I can bear this suffering anymore.”
She lowered her head and began to eat the rice slowly. Every spoonful felt heavy in her mouth. She kept crying quietly as she ate.
Unknown to her, the ghost of Tade was standing right beside her.
He was watching her with deep sorrow in his eyes. Tears flowed down his ghostly face as he listened to every word she said.
He wanted to hold her.
He wanted to comfort her.
But he could only stand there and watch the woman he loved suffer.
That night, the village became very quiet. The moon was high in the sky, and most people had already gone to sleep.
Inside the compound, Lara lay on a thin mat in the small room she used. Her body was very tired, and soon she fell into a deep sleep.
In another room, Mama Tade was also sleeping.
Suddenly, a cold wind moved gently through the room. The door creaked slightly.
Slowly, a shadow appeared near the corner of the room. The shadow grew clearer until the shape of a man could be seen.
It was Tade’s ghost.
He stood beside the bed and looked at his sleeping mother. His face was filled with pain and disappointment.
“Mama,” he called softly.
His voice echoed strangely in the room.
“Mama, why are you treating my wife this way?”
The sleeping woman moved slightly on the bed.
Tade continued speaking, his voice breaking with emotion.
“What exactly has Lara done to you? She is carrying my child. She is pregnant, for Christ’s sake.”
His voice trembled with anger and sadness.
“Why are you making her suffer like this?”
Suddenly, Mama Tade jerked up from the bed with a loud gasp. Her heart was beating wildly. She looked around the room quickly, her eyes wide with fear.
The room was empty.
No one was there.
Her breathing became heavy as she reached for the lamp and quickly switched on the light. The yellow light filled the room, but she still saw nothing.
Mama Tade held her chest as she tried to calm her breathing.
“It was a dream,” she said to herself nervously. “Just a dream.”
She looked around again carefully. The room was silent. Slowly, her heart began to calm down.
She wiped the sweat from her face and lay back down on the bed.
“Yes, just a dream,” she repeated quietly.
After a few minutes, she closed her eyes and returned to sleep.
But outside the room, standing silently in the dark corner of the house, Tade’s ghost was still there.
He watched his mother through the wall with tears in his eyes.
His wife was suffering.
His unborn child was suffering.
The next morning came quietly in the village.
The sun rose slowly over the small mud houses, and the sound of chickens filled the air. Mama Tade woke up and stretched on her bed. For a few seconds, she looked around the room. The strange dream she had during the night had already started fading from her mind.
She did not think about the voice she heard.
She did not clearly remember that it sounded like her son.
Instead, she stood up and walked outside as if nothing had happened.
In the compound, Lara was already awake, even though her body was weak and heavy with pregnancy.
She had started doing the morning chores very early. She swept the compound slowly with a short broom. She washed the plates from the night before and arranged them neatly. After that, she fetched water from the drum and cleaned the kitchen area.
Her back ached badly, but she kept working.
When she finished sweeping, she sat on a small stool beside a bucket of clothes and began washing them one by one.
The water splashed around her hands as she scrubbed the clothes slowly. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she worked. She tried to wipe them away, but they kept coming back.
Her heart felt very heavy.
She looked up at the sky and whispered softly, “God, when will all this suffering end?”
Her voice was weak and broken.
“I am only enduring this because of my baby, but I don’t know how much longer I can hold on.”
She lowered her head again and continued washing the clothes quietly.
Far away in the city, Lara’s father was sitting in his living room. The house was big and comfortable, but his face showed no peace.
He held his phone tightly in his hand. He had been dialing the same number again and again. It was Lara’s phone number.
Every time he tried, the call would not connect.
He sighed deeply and leaned back on the sofa.
Just then, Lara’s mother walked into the living room. She looked worried too.
The man looked up at her and spoke slowly.
“I don’t understand the dreams I’ve been having since the beginning of this week,” he said quietly. “In every dream, Lara doesn’t look well. She looks weak and unhappy.”
He paused and looked at his wife carefully.
“When was the last time you spoke with her on the phone?”
Lara’s mother sighed sadly.
“We haven’t spoken for months. Since the last time,” she answered. “I’ve been trying to reach her too, but her phone has not been going through. I was even planning to travel to the village to see her because my heart has not been at rest.”
The man nodded slowly. The worry on his face grew deeper.
“Then let us not wait anymore,” he said firmly. “By this weekend, we will go and see our daughter ourselves.”
Lara’s mother agreed immediately. They both felt something was wrong, even though they did not know exactly what it was.
And so, when the weekend finally came, Lara’s father brought out his car early in the morning. He and his wife packed a few things and started the long journey to the village where their daughter lived.
That same morning in the village, Lara had already finished most of the chores.
Her body was very tired, but she was still washing Mama Tade’s clothes beside the well. Soap foam covered her hands, and the bucket of dirty water stood beside her.
Her stomach was very big now, and sometimes she had to pause to catch her breath.
As she washed, tears quietly dropped from her face into the water.
Her voice trembled as she whispered again, “God, please help me. I am trying to be strong for my child, but this pain is too much.”
Just then, the sound of a car engine was heard at the gate of the compound.
Lara slowly raised her head.
Cars rarely came into that village compound.
The car drove in and stopped near the entrance. Lara looked carefully, confused. When the door opened and she saw who stepped out, her heart almost stopped.
Her mouth opened wide in shock.
It was her father.
Her mother was also stepping out from the other side of the car.
Lara slowly stood up from where she was sitting, her body shaking.
“Daddy,” she called softly, almost as if she did not believe what she was seeing.
Her parents turned their eyes toward her.
For a moment, they could not speak.
They stared at their daughter in complete shock.
The girl standing before them looked nothing like the happy, healthy daughter they remembered. Her body was thin, her face looked tired, and her clothes were old and worn.
Lara’s father pointed at her with a trembling hand.
“It’s a lie,” he said slowly. “Is this my child?”
His voice was filled with pain.
“What happened to your phone?”
Lara lowered her head.
“I… I lost it,” she whispered quietly.
Lara’s father could not believe what he was seeing. Tears filled his eyes immediately.
“My God, what happened to my daughter?” he cried. “Look at you. What is all this?”
His voice was shaking badly.
“And you could not even borrow someone’s phone to call your father or your mother?”
Lara could no longer hold back her emotions. She ran forward and hugged her father tightly. Her body shook as she cried loudly.
Her mother quickly joined them and wrapped her arms around both of them.
The three of them stood there crying together.
