Chapter 3: Sickness and Hope

When I opened my eyes again, I was sixteen years old once more.

The room was bathed in dawn light, the rooster crowing outside, and the smell of fried yam floating in from the kitchen. I touched my chest—alive, young, whole.

In this life, Auwalu was still the crown prince, never reach the throne yet.

He was always busy, always surrounded by elders, but now I watched him from afar, wondering if he’d notice me this time. My heart beat double whenever I heard his voice across the courtyard.

I begged my papa to invite one travelling doctor from Makurdi to check my pulse early.

“Papa, abeg, I no just feel balanced,” I said, pulling at his agbada. He looked at me, suspicion in his eyes, but he could never say no to me for long.

The doctor just shook his head, helpless. “This pikin strong pass akpu. Wetin you dey fear?”

He peered at me through thick glasses, his hands rough from years on the road. My father snorted, “Na true talk. No be every wahala need doctor, my daughter.”

I frowned and insisted, “I really want the Makurdi doctor to check my pulse.”

I didn’t care if I sounded stubborn. The fear from my last life sat heavy on my shoulders like a wrapper I couldn’t throw away.

For more than ten years in the women’s quarters, the palace doctors kept saying I damaged my body when I was small, so I couldn’t get belle.

Every remedy—leaves, roots, prayers at the mosque—nothing worked. Their words haunted me, as if my body was a broken calabash.

I worried and suffered, unable to give Auwalu a child.

Every time I saw his other children running in the courtyards, laughter echoing, my heart squeezed. It was an ache that never left.

He got many sons and daughters, but none from me. Even though he always tried to comfort me, it still pained me deeply.

He’d say, “My Ronke, na you get my heart. No let all these children matter vex you.” But I couldn’t help it. My womb felt empty, my spirit restless—like farm without yam.

In this life, if I fit give him a child, I go really be happy.

I clung to hope like a child to her mother’s waist, praying every night that this time, things would be different.