Juliana just moved from her old shop to the new one. Her business boomed so fast more than she even expected so she decided to change her shop. On getting to the new shop, the woman behind that shop, Mama Ope sells pepper, chicken, turkey or any kind of frozen food you can ever imagine. She even sells Rice, Beans and othet foodstuffs. Her shop is basically for foodstuffs while Juliana sells hair accessories.
On the first day Juliana resumed at her new shop, she met Mama Ope crying but pretended not to see her because she didn’t know how to ask Mama Ope what was wrong with her and she didn’t want to be shunned so she kept quiet.
Juliana thought in her mind and said, what could possibly make this old woman cry like a baby?.
The day went by and on the next day when Juliana resumed, she met Mama Ope scolding her daughter, Iyabo. She pleaded with Mama Ope so she could leave Iyabo alone.
Ma, please just leave her alone because it won’t make sense for people to start asking you both what happened, Juliana said to Mama Ope and the woman thanked Juliana enough for that.
After that day, Juliana began to take a close watch at Iyabo. She got to know that Iyabo steals her mother’s money and gives it to her boyfriend. If she does not give her boyfriend the money she steals from her mother, she will gamble with the money. Despite the fact that Iyabo knows that her mum buys goods on credit all the time, she never stops stealing her mother’s money and putting her at loss all the time.
What a callous act?
Sometimes when Mama Ope is not around, Iyabo goes to buy fuel, lock the shop and go home to watch movie with her boyfriend.
Whenever Mama Ope finds out that her daughter has done that as usual, she breaks down in tears.
One day, Mama Ope shouted at Iyabo for stealing her money as usual.
Immediately Mama Ope entered the shop to take something, Iyabo locked her inside the shop and ran away. Mama Ope began to bang the gate and walls of her shop and so many people rushed to rescue her but all their efforts were futile.
Eventually, Juliana called a welder and he came to unlock the door by breaking the padlock. By the time Mama Ope could come out of the shop her daughter locked her in, she already lost her breathe, sweating profusely and about to faint.
Juliana and the people around rushed her to the hospital but Mama Ope didn’t make it. They lost her.
After thorough findings, they got to know that she was asthmatic and there was no window in the shop that could even provide ventilation. By the time Iyabo came back, a lot of people told her that her mother has been rushed to the hospital.
Iyabo, go to Mercylink hospital. That’s where your mother is, a woman around Mama Ope’s shop told Iyabo. Immediately, Iyabo boarded a bike to the hospital and met Juliana and her mum’s friend at the reception. They both were crying and sweating profusely and Iyabo knew something was wrong.
Aunty Juliana, where is my mum? What’s wrong? Please talk to me, Iyabo was kneeling on the floor begging those two women to tell her what has just happened to her mum. She was sweating badly, shivering and looked so disturbed.
We lost your mum, her mum’s best friend said to her. Iyabo screamed and even woke the sleeping patients up. She was so pained and could not even say that she was the one who locked her mum up in the shop and she could not breathe so she died. She knew if she said it, she was going to be in trouble or even get arrested by the police just for the scoundrel act that eventually led to her mum’s death.
She could not tell anyone this even after her mum was buried. The guilt kept eating her up everyday of her life. At the end, she started to live the life her mother has always wanted her to live when she was alive. She stopped having multiple boyfriends and got married. Iyabo lived a beautiful life but was never happy for even a day because the more she remembers that she was the one who mistakenly murdered her mum by being a scoundrel fellow, she feels bad all the time.
