He is your father :: Part 1
Story By Thiyam Ningol, Africa

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For the past few days Mariam was not feeling well.

She was an asthmatic patient for many years. She knew the provoking factor of her asthma. Whenever she drank a bit of ice cold fluid she used to get problems. Her throat would start getting sore. Then she would experience irritation at the throat and later dry cough. The episode had repeated thousand times. She knew the names of the medicines which she was usually given by the doctors when the symptom started.

About a week ago, the weather was very bad. It was a very humid day. The local public bus drivers were on strike. So she had to walk on foot for a long distance. Her shirt was wet with the sweat. Felt very thirsty. She tried to quench her thirst by drinking a packet of ordinary water. It did not do any justice to her thirst. She went to the nearest kiosk and ordered the coldest ever possible coke.

She finished the whole bottle of 350mls coke in few gulps. She burped the gas and allowed to escape through her nose. Felt satisfied. Rested for few minutes and continued her journey. When she reached her destination, she felt exhausted and thirsty again. She remembered the satisfaction from the cold coke. She ordered for another cold coke again from the nearby kiosk. The kiosk owner knew her very well. They all did their business in the same vicinity. Mariam sold fruits –bananas, oranges and any seasonal fruit. Her fruit stall was hardly 2 meters away from the kiosk. She had never ordered cold soda. The kiosk owner enquired twice whether she needed cold or ordinary.

Soon after she settled to her business, heavy rains started pouring. The rainy season was long due but rain was late that time. When the dusty, dry roads were suddenly watered with the heavy downpour, the earth's surface started evaporating, giving out the typical strong earthy smell. It usually gave her a suffocating sensation.

The rain continued for quite sometime. Near their stalls, puddles of dirty rain water had started collecting. Customers avoided the stalls near the puddles. The day did not look good for business. Moreover she had to walk a long distance back home again.

Luckily, a middle aged lady passed by and bought a lot of fruits from 4-5 stalls including Mariam's. At least the day was not a complete lost. She closed her stall early and headed home. On the way, she started feeling mild chest discomfort with dry cough. She knew at home she had enough drugs in stock for her asthma.

The next day, she was still feeling uncomfortable, but as she had started taking medicine, she thought it would subside by itself. She went to her fruit stall to continue with her business.

Two three days passed, no sign of improvement. She had to visit the doctor. She was told she had chest infection. She was given some colorful antibiotics and was told to rest for few days. She realized her body needed the rest badly but resting meant no income for few days. Her daughter, the 15 yrs old girl had just completed primary school and still a baby to her. She would not be able to do much to supplement the income while she was recuperating. The little saving she had might last at least a week without difficulty. She requested her neighbors in business to help her sell out the stocks she had kept while she was getting treatment from the doctor.

Three days had passed. No sign of improvement. She had to go and see the doctor again. She was prescribed more medicines. She had to pass by her stall and see how things were going. Was disappointed to see her merchandise getting rotten. She asked her daughter to collect some of the still healthy looking fruits and try to sell out at home or nearby places.

Fatma tried to sell the fruits as her mother instructed. She was excited in the beginning. When she could sell 2-3 fruits, the money she got made her feel good. To her it was money coming in. She did not realize that her mother spent money to get that fruit. The profit was meager. As long as it was not a lost, Mariam did not mention anything to her daughter.

Fatma thought she was doing great. She wanted to sell more and more. She had met some girls who sold also fruits. One of them suggested that they should go and sell near the railway station. There, the number of customers were more and they had money. Fatma went ahead along with her new friends.

The first day at the railway station Fatma had a good sell. She came back very happy and asked her mother to give her the name of the medicines so that the next day she could buy her the medicines. And she did.

Mariam was worried about her daughter : suddenly how her daughter managed to get the bumper sells! She asked her daughter and later she regretted that she asked. She heard the word she despised to hear "railway station". She had never talked to her daughter about her past life and she was not going to talk. But she had to stop her from going to the railway station. She gave her a stern warning to Fatma not to go to the railway station ever again. She could not explain why. She simply told her there were a lot of bad people around the railway station.

The next day Fatma was not planning to follow her friends. But when she met them, they convinced her to come. One of the friends asked her how she felt when she bought the medicines for her mother the night before; if she would have not gone to the station, from where she would have got the money to buy the medicine. She knew it was true and she would love to continue serving her mother.

She needed her mother to be well so that she could start preparing for her to join secondary school. She joined the friends and lied to her mother- now that she had been selling the fruits for few days, so she got the experience and sold better. Mariam believed her daughter.

To be continued....