Silence comes in different forms, there's a silence that comes with joy, there's a silence that comes with sadness. But there's another silence that's not much talked about, it's the silence that comes with mischief. Not just any kind of mischief, but one from children.
The only time you should really be worried about children is when you can no longer hear them playing
"Adeeeee" came the voice from their house gate. It was his mum calling him back into the house. Grumbling back into the house but without choice, he soon left us playing football.
"Maaa" Ade answered
"I'm going to the market, look after your younger brother. If you like, leave him and go back to the football." she said as he entered their compound and she exited heading towards the market.
The words were worded like he had a choice and could come back to join us. But we knew it for what it was, a threat. Ade was one of the most skillful player amongst us and it was sure we would miss his presence in the fun.
Another player came in to replace Ade and match soon commenced. We were already lost in the thrill of playing, when we heard Ade pulling his younger brother outside the gate.
Apparently he didn't want to miss the fun and decided to instead bring his brother outside where he could easily watch him, it seemed like the perfect arrangement.
There was only one problem with the so called perfect arrangement, only one party was willing. The other party which was Ade's younger brother Femi wasn't so cooperative.
The boy wanted to stay inside the compound and play.
"Ade remember what your mum said before she left, I don't think it's a good idea for your brother to be out here" I warned
"What if the ball mistakenly hit him?"
The others also warned with various portrayals of the doom that would follow If anything happened to the boy. Ade wasn't interested in all our fortune-telling, he was only interested in the football and all we agents of doom would take have to take a chill pill.
The match commenced after a brief argument on whether Ade should continue with his team or wait for another turn. The rule was always the same, once a goal was scored, the team who conceded would have to leave for another team to resume play.
Ade continued with us his old team as the other substitute had to join his old team and wait his turn. With Ade in our team, we scored goal after goal and were literally unstoppable.
From time to time, Femi would walk towards us crying to be carried and we would have to stop play and carry him to the sidelines.
Eventually the boy stopped crying and didn't disturb us any more, so we were enjoying our football unhindered. It got to a point that we didn't bother checking on him anymore, after all what was more important than scoring the next goal.
The match eventually ended with everyone begining to disperse to their various houses, but Femi couldn't be found. We searched everywhere but without success. Ade was already in a state of panic, remembering his mum's warning before she left the house.
"Go check inside the house, he probably went inside" someone suggested.
Personally I couldn't picture how the boy could've walked past without us seeing him. We walked into the compound and there was Ade's brother beside the tap. The boy was under the open tap playing and the whole compound was overflowing with water.
From his face, Ade must've been thinking of spanking the boy, but his mum unfortunately or fortunately (depending who you were asking) chose to show up at that moment.
We all knew he was in big trouble, but didn't wait to know what would happen next as we all fled to our various homes.
I didn't see Ade come play football for a few days and realized he must've been under strict orders not to come outside to play. When I did see him though, he confirmed his mum had banned him from playing football for a month.
I didn't mention that we did warn him about joining us, it seemed like using medicine after death. But it didn't stop me from thinking that our star player would've been available if only he listened and stayed away for only one day.
