My Father's last words: My Siblings Belong to Another Man
My name is Abdoulie Camara, I was born in the Gambia's capital City of Banjul. The tale from my Family has it that, we moved from the congested city of Banjul a few months after I was born to settle in the bustling town of Serekunda, not far from the busiest, lively, and bustling Serrekunda Market.
My father Pa Kebba Camara was a trader who sold Second hand clothes. He has a tiny shop inside the Serrekunda Market where he will unveil two bales a month and gather a few hangers to hang the clothes on display to catch the attention of potential customers.
When I turned 15, time was not on my father's side anymore and he went from being the strong, tall, dark handsome man with a black shiny bushy beard to a frail, thin, wrinkled-faced-looking old man with gray hair. He looked exhausted and sick and soon his shop closed down because there was no one to help continue the business. My sisters, five of them dropped out of school and married.
As young as I was, I could constantly see them coming to the two-bedroom house complaining of not having one or two things in their marital houses. The stress was just too much for my dad to handle. I have seen my dad, empty our bag of rice on several occasions and share it among my sisters which was sometimes accompanied by a D50 or D100 note. To my surprise, it does not take them long before they come knocking again.
As a teenager, I kept wondering, why they were married and still came for food and Money from Mom and Dad but I was too young to understand.
My father's health was deteriorating and the pressure was getting too much on my mom.
My mother, Kaddijatou Kanyi, is a virtuous kindhearted woman, beautiful dark-skinned who shines brightly even in the dark. She has a pointed nose with beautiful large rounded eyes that sparkle when she blinks. She is calm and collected and no matter the situation, she never loses her cool. This woman never laid a finger on me all these years but she was strict and had a unique way of punishing me when I misbehaved which included making me do the entire laundry for the house.
However, on this fateful day, I closed from school, while the sun was at its peak and it was burning hot and I could hear my stomach rumbling from hunger. The moment I neared the gate of our compound, I heard voices, as I stepped further and opened the gate, I saw my calm mother, raise her hand, and slap my elder sister so hard that she spun and fell in a loud thud to the ground.
I couldn't believe what I saw, I had to rub my eyes with both hands and open them again to make sure that I was not hallucinating due to the hunger. I watched my sister lying on the floor for 10 minutes in silence before she placed her hands on the pillars of the veranda and helped herself up. Her eyes and cheeks are red from the slap.
My mother burst out, You are an ingrate, all your father did was to work harder and send all of you to school, feed, shelter, and clothe you. Took care of medical bills and incidental costs. But you never cared for him or asked about his health, instead, you came here with one problem to another ripping him of his food and money. Have you no shame?
My sister remains quiet, the only sound from her is her sobbing lowly.
What I heard next, rendered me speechless. It turns out that, my sisters are my half-siblings. Their mother was my Father's first wife but she divorced my father and married her lover who was a businessman man in Banjul. This was the reason my father relocated to Serrekunda after marrying my mother and having me. She abandoned her daughters too and my mother was left with the responsibility of taking care of them.
I also understand that this was why they called my mother by her name and they refused to partook in doing the house chores or helping my mother around the kitchen. At my age, I can even cook better than them.
Everything makes sense but what I do not understand is why they treat Dad the way they do. After all, he was their biological Father, well, so I thought.
I was lost in thought while my mom was glaring and rolling her eyes at my sister, the awkward situation was broken by a loud thud on the floor inside the house. We all snapped out of it and rushed inside, my Dad was lying on the floor gasping for air. My mother shouted for help and neighbors rushed in to help us take him to the Serrekunda Hospital. Hours later, my Dad was stabilized. When we got in to see him, his eyes were rolling in his head staring at the ceiling. He reached for my mother's hand and whispered something to her. My mother's eyes widened in disbelief and before she could say something, my old man gave up the ghost. My mother was trembling and her hands shaking as she tried calling the name of her husband a few times before the nurse broke the news of his demise to us.
I looked at my mother, and tears came running down my cheeks but she kept on calling my dad's name and saying "My husband please allow me to serve you water for the last time before you leave". All I could do was hug her and cry loudly.
Days passed after we laid my father to rest, and my mother called for a family meeting inviting my Father's Ex-wife and her Husband. When everyone was seated, my mother blurted out a secret, that stunned everyone except my father's ex-wife.
It turns out that before my father died, he whispered to my mother that he was not the biological father of my five sisters but because of his pride as a man and the shame it would bring to him, he decided not to tell his family about it. He asked her to confront his Ex-wife who had answers about the paternity of my sisters.
There was a long excruciating silence. After a few minutes, the silence was broken by the woman with sounds of sobbing, and at that moment no one could tell whether she was faking it or she was being remorseful for cheating on her ex-husband for five good years, and letting him raise another man's children and sending him to an early grave. My stomach churned with disgust, anger, and hatred for this vile and vicious woman who made my father live such a miserable life.
She explained that her current Husband was the father of her girls and that she kept it from him because that was the condition given to her by my father. She said, my father told her that she would be a bad mother to her kids and would not want them to end up like her, and since they grow up calling him dad, he cannot bear to see them suffer.
My supposed sisters burst out in tears, placing both hands on their heads with regrets written all over their faces. They blurted out that they hated Dad because they thought he divorced their mother and married my mother to take her place.
The Father, Mother, and daughters all fell on their knees and apologized to my mother and me for their wrongdoings. Seeing how complete they are as a family, I feel disgusted and betrayed by their action which led to my father's misery and death. I stormed out of the house into the open space of the Compound gasping for air and panting.
Suddenly, I felt my mother's hands rubbing my back, and when I turned to look at her, she forced a smile and said."Son, your father forgives them, let's forgive them, we can only heal when we forgive them."
When I think about everything, it feels like yesterday. I am a 35-year-old, successful businessman who is single and scared of marriage. At the mention of Marriage, the incident replays in my mind like it was reoccurring once again. I know that all women are not the same because my mother is proof of that but I cannot shake off the fear of getting married to a woman like my father's ex-wife.
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