FATE

Chapter 4

When Hannatu finally regained consciousness, Gwaggo Asabe guided her back to her room where Muhammadu's dead body was.

He was bathed and shrouded according to the teachings of islam by an imam, Kawu Audu and his siblings.

"You're to pray for him" Gwaggo Asabe said.

She crouched down by his head, his face was visible to her and she prayed for him.

She could still remember few weeks ago when out of no where Muhammadu blurted "I forgive you Hannatu for all that you've done intentionally and not."

"What's wrong?" She asked

"Nothing. It's not a bad thing to forgive or to ask one for forgiveness now, is it? Especially husband and wife."

"No. Of course not" She replied smiling. "In that case I forgive you too."

"That's more like it. Thank you. We should always forgive each other no matter what."

"I forgive you" she still felt the need to vocalize it silently as she sobbed quietly. "May Allah forgive you, have mercy on your soul and may He grant you Jannah."

His mother and siblings also prayed for him and then he was finally taken outside where the congregational prayer was held and was finally laid to rest.

All Hannatu does is pray all day all night. Especially at night as people kept coming during the day to pay their condolences.

She hardly eats and barely sleeps at night because that's when reality often kick her hard. That indeed she lost her husband and is now a widow with a child. A single mother.

After seven days, Kawu Audu called for a small meeting. " He started with prayers. He prayed for the deceased and began his speech.

"I urge us all once again to be patient. This is not the first time we lost someone in this family but of course we must mourn and grief."

"We've lost our parents, your grandparents, our brothers Ishaq and last year Jafaru, your uncles, few other relatives and now Muhammadu. May Allah forgive them all."

"But we must know death is inevitable it will come for us all. So we must all carry on with our lives and do the needful.

The men went back to their works and the women to their houses.

With the help of family Hannatu was able to cope with the life-changing loss of a spouse.

She weaned Aliyu and completed her iddah (The waiting period a woman must observe after the death of her spouse or a divorce).

Gwaggo Asabe having no kids proposed that she takes Aliyu with her so Hannatu can remarry if she so wishes.

Being still young and beautiful, she kept receiving marriage proposals from relatives and outsiders alike but she kept rejecting them.

So the topic was brought up on the day they all gathered and late Muhammadu's inheritance was to be shared.

The inheritance was shared according to the teachings of the shari'ah law by a judge.

That was when Kawu Audu told them about Muhammadu's will. The money and properties he left behind for his child's education.

That caused a hassle among his relatives until Kawu Audu presented the will in written form signed by his late nephew and the judge accepted it and told the family there's nothing he can do about it.

This got Hannatu thinking was money and some properties all they could think about and not a lost son and a brother?.

Then Gwaggo Magajiya brought up the topic of her getting suitors but sending them away nonetheless.