The morning the stream began to die, Uncle Zuru stood in the middle of the yellow field and drove his shovel into the earth like he was killing a snake. People gathered, with hands on their hips and mouths open in amusement at what Zuru was upto this time.
“Zuru, are you digging a grave for your sense?”
Mama Caro shouted as she looked down, her voice echoing through the 4ft depth Uncle Zuru had reached while still digging.
Zuru wiped sweat with the back of his hand as he raised his head. “If my brain dies, I’ll bury it right here, and then water will rise in its place.”
Laughter burst out among the people as they scattered and giggled at Uncle Zuru's dry jokes. I was fifteen, barefoot, holding my mother’s smallest pot. I laughed too until the stream showed us its ribs that afternoon.
Mama Caro sold water now, bucket by bucket from her Well. “One Hundred naira per bucket,” she shouted, increasing the price by 30% within the last 48 hours. Women groaned and murmured, but still paid.
Some of the women that came with 3 buckets had to go back home with 1 empty bucket as price of water had changed. That was the first time I felt the village stream might be tired of us, as it was already dried up.
Day and night, Uncle Zuru was seen digging, as shovel rose and fell. Sand flew, rope tightened, bucket climbed.
The children made a circle and chanted “Foolish man, digging for pepper, the pepper will burn your tongue!” He answered with a grin and kept digging. I followed him after errands carrying palm wine, fetching cold water, learning the language of blisters. He never asked for help but I decided to keep him company atleast.
It was day five and the hole was already above my shoulder level. “Jump in” he said, as I jumped into the hole where the sand tasted of rust. We dug together, sweat mixing, no words. But above us, voices floated like smoke.
“Two fools in one pit. Buy one, get one free!”
Zuru chuckled and muttered “Free still cost transport." I didn’t understand then but I laughed anyway.
It's week two already and the villiage stream thinned to a silver thread, as women walked farther, returned slower. Mama Caro has raised her price again and it was quarrel every morning in the queue beside her Well.
Meanwhile, at the pit water seeped in, brown first, then clear, then cold enough to make your teeth dance. Zuru scooped a cup, climbed the rope ladder, and walked straight to Mama Caro;
“Drink,” he said.
She sniffed, sipped, swallowed, as her eyes widened, then narrowed. “It has a taste,” she admitted.
“Taste of tomorrow,” Zuru replied, and for the first time Mama Caro had no comeback, only a second sip.
Words spread fast and before evening men brought stools, women brought groundnuts, children brought new songs. It was all noise up there as everyone was busy with one entertainment or the other. Some of the men gathered together and drank palm wine, while the women and children divided themselves into groups to play and gossip.
We hit stone at 27ft and by this time I felt the crowd lean inward, fear mixing with fascination. That night no one left, as we listened to him chip, chip, chip like a woodpecker arguing with the earth. I fell asleep to the rhythm and dreamt of water rising higher than mango trees.
The rock cracked on the 33rd day, as a sigh of cool air rushed out, followed by a ribbon of water thin and clear. Uncle Zuru shouted up;
“Who wants baptism?”
Mama Caro was first to descend the rope ladder, as she drank and for the first time in my life I saw her shoulders drop.
We built a wall of blocks, lined it with cement donated by the chairman’s rival. We painted it with green and blue colour, and Uncle Zuru carved a sign that says “DRINK, THEN DIG YOUR OWN.”
Amidst the excitement and celebration, the chairman called a meeting under the mango tree. He seems angry as he spoke;
“That water sits on communal land!” he declared.
Zuru stood, clothes still dripping, as he countered.
“Land yes, water no. Water belongs to the hole that found it.”
They told him to lock the pump until rules were made and he brought out his padlock and locked the new borehole. Queue became protest and protest became prayer, as the women and children sang hymns and praises to Uncle Zuru, yet the pump stayed locked and throats stayed dry.
The night came with hot wind and I found Zuru rubbing oil on the pump rod. “Why not open it?” I asked. He said, “So they can taste the value of a drop.”
I thought that was mean and he said, “Mean is letting them think water will last forever when it won’t.” I carried that sentence home and it dawned on me that Uncle Zuru might just be the wisest man in this community even though the people have failed to see it all this while.
Every adult gave one hundred naira and the lock clicked open, as water rushed out like it had been waiting to speak. People laughed and splashed and forgot the price they had just paid.
I watched Zuru watch them, and I saw the smallest sadness in his eyes like a man who wins a race and realises no one remembers the starting line.
Rain returned the next year, but the villiage stream didn't. We fixed the handle when it broke, and we added chlorine when the water smelled.
Every April first we gather, pour libation of clean water and retell the story because April first is the day we remember that fools can be right.
