EAGLE FROM THE RUBBLE: CHAPTER 37

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Later that week, Oyibo visited Nwamaka and informed her of what happened at home and their mother's condition. Tony seized the opportunity to let her know that he was becoming really worried about Obioha. In Nwamaka's presence it was agreed that Obioha should be shown his father. She neither agreed nor disagreed with them. She just sat through the discussion like a robot. The only time she betrayed any emotion was when Oyibo asked her who Obioha's father was. She just hid her face in her hand and wept. Tony calmed her down and advised Oyibo to drop the matter then, promising to talk to her at a more appropriate time.

Information filtering in from Obioha's school confirmed that he was no longer in school. It was rumoured that he joined a cult group which specialised in armed robbery. Nwamaka heard all these but never discussed or mentioned Obioha whenever she was with Tony.

She recovered a bit from the shock of what happened but she seemed to have withdrawn further from everybody. She stopped caring about her children and her household chores. She became depressed. Tony watched her and decided that the best thing to do was to find out from her who Obioha's father was and save everybody the pain it generated.

Every Sunday in Tony's household, it was a tradition that he took his family out to the amusement park or to the zoo after lunch. This particular Sunday was a special one because it was Ruby's birthday and Tony had promised a special treat to them all.

So by the time they returned from church, the excitement had already built up. Immediately after lunch, Tony Jnr, Henry and Ruby all prepared and waited for their father in the sitting room. He came out and after waiting for a while, he asked them to wait while he went into his wife's room to find out what was delaying her. He was long in coming and when he did emerge from her room, he was visibly angry and noticing the waiting children, he told them that the outing had been called off. Before they could reply he excused himself and left the house, alone. The surprised children were still wondering what went wrong when their mother walked in. They stared at her silently asking for an explanation.

"What are you staring at?" she asked angrily.
"Haven't you got anything to do?"

"Today is my birthday and daddy promised to take us out," Ruby complained on the verge of tears.

"So what do you want me to do about that?" she snapped.

"You are the reason why he wouldn't take us out," Ruby accused her.

Nwamaka stopped in her tracks and turned to look at her daughter.

"Go to your room now!"

"You don't care about us and you wouldn't let him care about us either," she retorted, as she ran to her room closely followed by her brothers who could find no word to express their disappointment.