Vanity (Short Fiction)

Painful screams jolted Amobi out of his trance. He shook his head, trying without success to clear his fogged mind. His wife was about to give birth to their fourth child. He had watched with blurred vision as two elderly women led her into a small hut, at the far end of his compound. He never wanted to put her through the pain and heart break, again. He was ready to die childless, but traditions wouldn’t let him. A titled man must have male children to continue his lineage, especially when he’s next in line to the throne.

He shuddered as he remembered how his first three children died mysteriously, just before their fifth birthday. Being a man who wouldn’t condone any form of maltreatment toward his wife, he had to visit Agbala, the oracle after the death of the second child. That was when Ezemuo, the chief priest told him that the child was an ogbanje, a spirit child, and would come back again. Amobi wasn’t totally convinced. The conversation he had with his father’s younger brother, Chijindu was still fresh in his memory. Chijindu was the only educated person in the family. The only adult still unmarried because according to him, he wouldn’t want to beget unhealthy children. Chijindu had explained to him the implications of marrying without going to the hospital for proper tests. He told him of a disease called ‘sickle cell anemia’ and how perilous it could be for a carrier, whether young or old.

Though Amobi didn’t understand fully what Chijindu said that day, he knew the symptoms were the same with that of his dead children, but he couldn’t do anything. He was barely out of his teens when he married his wife, just after his father’s death.

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“It’s a boy,” a woman’s voice drifted towards him, followed by the faint cry of a baby.

“Nno nnaa,” she cooed.

Amobi watched the door of the hut open. The woman approached his Obi with the child wrapped in her arms. He blinked back threatening tears. The memory of what happened to his third child tugged at his heart. Ezemuo’s instruction was to watch the child closely and to let him know whenever he fell ill. The ailment had come when he least expected, worse than what he had ever witnessed. He had watched his son suffer. Ezemuo’s efforts to save him yielded no positive result.

Amobi understood perfectly what his wife was passing through. He almost lost her as well. Left for him, he didn’t care what anyone would say. Let them point accusing fingers all they want.

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“He shall come back bearing the mark, and he shall not die again because we have identified him. When he’s old enough to talk, I will come and find when he buried his Iyi Uwa,” Ezemuo’s voice rang in Amobi’s head. Those were the words he heard before he buried his third child.

He took the child from the woman and opened the woolen blanket with unsteady fingers. The child stared blankly at him. He turned his right ear cautiously, his heart thumping. There was no mark. Chijindu was right after all. He wrapped the child up and held him for a very long time.

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Thank you for reading!

Ogbanje is a popular myth in the Nigerian Igbo culture. The belief is that a child is born and when he gets to a certain age, he dies and then come back, only to die again at the same age. It continues until the child is identified and given a physical mark on the body. The child will then come back bearing the mark and knowing he has been identified, will not die again.

There's been a lot of arguments on this. While some people believe it's only a myth and the children died from sickle cell anemia because there were no hospitals and no education, others believe it's true and it actually happened.

There's a detailed version of it on Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart.

Iyi Uwa is an object that binds the spirit of the dead child to the world, causing it to return again. Once the child has been identified, the Iyi Uwa is dug up and destroyed, and they won't die again.