Nimota

She is the one that lingers at the theatres when everyone else is gone. She is sitting in those empty seats and dreaming up a new end to the movie she just saw.

She is the one who blends in with trees. You have to look a little harder to see that she is there.

She is the one who has been broken by life and yet stops to smell the thorny roses by the path.

She is the one you look at and can see through. And yet, you are all she sees, all she wants to see.

Her name is Mota.

Some people call her Daughter, some others, Sister.

She longs for when you will call her, Love.

She has been there all your life, waiting in the shadows, ready to break your fall.

The little girl holding your hand while your mother packs up and gets ready to leave your drunken father.

The teenager squinting through her glasses as she applies balm to the bruises you have suffered from the relentless bullies in high school.

The ‘almost’ woman with tiny breasts hanging onto your every word and laughing at your dry jokes.

The person you ask for advice on where best to buy an engagement ring for your current girlfriend…

Her name is Mota.

It takes you 32 years, one failed marriage, packed suitcases, the pieces of your broken heart, two tear-filled eyes, to finally see what has been there all along.

Mota.

It was the packed suitcases that did it. You watched the woman you married pick up her suitcases and walk out the front door. It was like you had walked back in time; to a couple of years before when you had watched your mother walk away from you. Only Mota's hand on yours had kept you from running after the taxi that took your mother away. 

Mota.

She is the one that lingers at the theatres when everyone else is gone. She is sitting in those empty seats and dreaming up a new end to the movie she just saw.

This is where you find her when you finally know what it is you have been searching for all your life.

You sit beside her.

‘Hey.’

‘Hey babe!’

‘The movie is over, you know.’

‘No it isn’t. There is always room for a sequel.’

You take her hand in yours and join her in staring at the dark screen.

‘Maybe we can be the major characters in that one.’ You finally say.

She squeezes your hand a little tighter.

Nimota.

© Damilola Ashaolu 2012

hahaha...i think of how as children, we used to laugh at that name 'Nimota'. i am older now and wiser and think it is a beautiful unique name. For all the Nimotas, Godswills, Rukayats, in the world that suffered from teasing kids, this one is for you :)