Gudun Aure Part 5 Complete Hausa Novel

bintaumarabbale: 100 After two years. Hauwa has two children, Khalil and Mai Sunana, because from the day she gave birth, her husband gave her a sermon and said Amina, so we call her Minal. By then Hassana and Husaina had become very clever, walking everywhere on their own feet.

I became pregnant again, but it developed complications as a result of a severe fever I had, one that was extremely hot, and all of this had not even been up to six weeks. But by the power of God, when the pregnancy came out after a month, I became pregnant again while I was with him in Lagos. Then he said I should return to Abuja and Hauwa should come. When I asked him why, he only said that in Baby Nana’s house someone had died; likewise, in my own house I had suffered a painful illness, so the pregnancy had miscarried and his mind had not settled. Even the way he spoke made me laugh, but I held myself back and did not laugh, because I was afraid he would turn it into an argument. I was only reflecting on his thinking, as though there was some lack of proper faith in it. Baby Nana, look at what caused her death.

As for the pregnancy I lost, he and I would never say there was a cause for it; it is the power of Allah. And in that house, after all, I had Hassana and Husaina, and now four months have gone by since you came, Hauwa will take up the matter, because the truth is that now we are living in understanding. He said he himself would explain the reason to her. Hearing that made me tell him that it was not sensible to do such a thing; that meant she was not a human being. If he was accusing his house of having problems, then he should change it; it was not right to say that because I became pregnant, things became difficult, and then he said it was from the house if not for conflict and seeking trouble. He said when she too got pregnant, she should come back.

Seeing that he refused to understand me made me leave him alone, because even after a person’s state, dignity and the burden of age had begun to press in, if he became confused now it would only become a problem for us. Luckily, Hauwa did not argue. Five days after we returned to Abuja, they turned back with him. Khalil had long since been left with Minal only, and she left because she was breastfeeding.

***

Baba Tabawa continued helping me with the housework and the children’s care, even though they too shared it half and half. They were there and there at Momi’s house, only coming back at night; sometimes they even slept there, since after the miscarriage I had weaned them from the breast and they had begun eating a lot of food. I used to sit and keep wondering at how Allah had joined together the children she had given birth to and those she had not given birth to, and made her keep all of them. The kind of care she gave Yusi, even me, his mother, I should bless her. She also took Kamalu from my hands.

No matter how my heart kept telling me evil intentions about what she was doing, it was not for the sake of Allah that I refused to believe it, because there was no sign of wickedness she had ever shown toward the children that would make me accept what my heart was suggesting. I used to sit and think about it, sometimes even wiping away tears when my heart kept feeding me suspicions. So what has she done to me if not good? As long as I am truly an upright daughter, no matter what my heart keeps suggesting about her, I would leap up and say it is not like that. But at times, strangely enough, I would begin to feel intense anger and deep jealousy toward her, especially when I remembered how much importance the husband attached to whatever concerned her. Because of the good she had done to me, I would push myself aside and make everything seem like nothing, but Hauwa could not manage it; they often quarreled over her because she could not bear it. Sometimes I would step in and tell him that whenever he wanted to praise his wife, he should stop doing it in front of us, because the heart has no bones. But he refused to stop.

Hauwa did not resent what he did any less than I did; I was only holding myself back, and she was not more jealous of him than I was. If we said we would join forces and attack her, it would not end well, which is why I kept enduring it. But I had begun to believe the words she always told me: that everything she did concerning our children was not for the sake of Allah. She had even tied up the husband himself, and he never once came to tell us she had wronged him, even though they were having problems, especially in the area of marriage; I could see that. ***

Salim’s return from school is where things began to go bad. He was her second child after Nusaiba, who was the eldest. She had only ever come in once to greet us. Now it had been more than a year since she had come again, even though she often visited her mother. From time to time, when she came, Yusi and her children would come in, but she herself had no face and no cheer, like her mother.

Two days after the boy returned, we were sitting in the sitting room, Baba Tabawa and I, chatting, while also glancing at the television, because Baba Tabawa loved watching, which was why the comedy show “Dadin Kowa” did not appeal to her. Right then they were showing it on Arewa24. Kamalu came in looking neat in a Pakistani outfit, since those were the kind of clothes their foster mother sold; even half the clothes they wore were those kinds, along with jallabiyas. Some time ago I had seen that she had sewn them new shadda and fabric outfits. He was wearing one on his body, and on his head a white cap with a net.

From the moment he entered, I kept studying him. When he sat beside me, the scent of his perfume reached my nose. I looked at him without saying anything. He looked at me quietly before saying, “Mama, did we spend the day in peace?”

I replied, “Very well. How is Momi?”

Briefly he said, “I left her at home; she is very well.”

He looked at Baba Tabawa, who kept teasing him, since she called him sheikh, the same way she had heard his husband call him. Momi also called him that. He gave a small laugh as he greeted her, and she answered, saying, “What will you eat here, though I know Momi won’t leave you, scholar, hungry.”

He touched his stomach and laughed, saying, “Indeed, as if you knew, wallahi. We even ate lunch together; I’m full. But at night I will eat moringa soup.”

She said, “If that is all, it is easy enough. I’ll make it for you, in sha Allah.”

He said, “Thank you, Baba.”

After that he fell silent and said nothing again. He took out his new Samsung phone, the one Momi had bought for him, and began looking through it, his face without cheer. The sitting room became quiet. It was only me and him, because Baba Tabawa went into the kitchen to prepare the evening meal.

Even as a child, Kamalu had had a certain black-hearted and angry temperament. These traits in him had weakened, though, and it had to do with his going away for school and with the years of growing up. But the Hausa says...