“The rout of the family council !” : A text by Jules C.. Agboton (11st part)

Exactly three weeks after my father died, the family held council in the garden of our house. We were kept out of the proceedings until Uncle Jonas came to get us, shouting both orders and poorly articulated threats..

– Your father during his lifetime, didn't help anyone. He didn't listen to anyone either. If it had been inhabited by an ounce, I do say, a single ounce of common sense, he would still be alive today ! You are of course innocent of his evildoing but too bad for you, you will nevertheless pay the price. Your mother with ! She often supported him and even pitted him against us, his family !

My older brother led the way behind him, my sister and I followed in silence and doubtful. Personally, I couldn't understand why this uncle was so close to dad when he was alive, spoke of him in these terms after his death. I still had no answers to my questions when we reached the family reunion.

My mother was prostrate on a small mat on the ground in front of the family arranged in a half-moon. There was there, in the audience, some people we had never seen. Maybe, members of the large family dispatched from the village for the occasion.

I noticed young shoots of hair on Mom's roughly shaven head during the ceremonies on the third day after my father's burial.. I looked at her furtively and could note in the expression on her face a very deep distress that the grief that struck us could not alone justify..

Our uncles gestured for us to take a seat next to our mother.. I glanced at the mat again and realized that they were inviting us to sit on the floor instead.. What we did without complaining. While the audience still observed a heavy silence, I spent the time observing my mother very closely. In so few days, she had aged considerably, his face was plowed with deep wrinkles that I had never seen before. When she finally looked up at us, I noticed that she had cried a lot again and could not hold back my own tears.. I hated my uncles and deplored my helplessness in the face of the treatment they had inflicted on my mother since the death of our father..

– Your father is dead ! Yes, he is dead but we are here ! As we say at home, death does not strike everyone in a family at once. Some die and others stay ! It's the case ! Your father is dead and we, we are alive ! This is why we are gathered here to decide on his succession.. He's our brother. We therefore have the legitimacy to proceed in this way.

These words were delivered in one go by the eldest of Dad's brothers with an embarrassment quite perceptible to all.. Watch Gaby, as they demanded that we call him was not comfortable. I thought he was fulfilling a mission that others had entrusted to him without real conviction..

After this brief introduction, he left the floor to one of the men from the village who repeatedly readjusted the boubou that he was wearing directly on a pair of pants cut from a fabric of dubious quality (To be continued…)

Bit of news (fiction)

28 May 2022

Jules C BUTTON