Tuesday 19 August 2014
The Case of Pious
Pious had always been a careful
boy. Even as a kid, he had taken all the elderly advice to heart. He always
looked left, and right, then left again before crossing. He never spoke to
strangers, ignoring them as they called to him on the way to and from school.
Even when playing “catcher” with his friends in school he never let people grab
him, because of suspected germs. But he had one major flaw- nail biting. He
just couldn’t stop. Even throughout his secondary school up until his
university days. He just never could bring himself to use a nail-cutter; he chewed
on his nail when he was scared, worried, hungry or bored. Pious had read
somewhere about obsessive compulsive behavior. That must be what it is, that’s my OCD. He always used to say to
himself. That all changed on the 26th of July 2014.
“Nigeria records the first case
of Ebola” was the headline that jumped at Pious that morning. He had been
following the news on Ebola passively for a few months. The deadly virus which
had already killed 600 people was now in the Lagos, the most populous city in
West Africa. This frightened pious. He spent days pouring over Wikipedia and
other websites trying to understand this deadly virus. He understood that the
virus originally originated in bats and that it had been contained in Congo and
Sudan in the 1970s. How the hell did it
they let it get here. Pious went into overdrive. He ran to the mall, bought
extra hand sanitizers, gloves, Dettol antiseptic, soap and cream. The fear of
the disease cured him of his OCD- he stopped chewing on his nails.
Every day he would scour the
internet, searching for updates on the deadly Virus. On the 4th of
August, it was confirmed that the doctor who had had contact with the Liberian
had been infected. On the 9th of August, one of the nurses who had
attended to him was confirmed dead. On 14th of August, Lagos state
sectioned off a ward in Obalende, specially for Ebola victims. Pious thought he
wasn’t protected enough, so he stopped taking public buses and stuck to only
“Keke” and taxis. Public places such as markets and bars were a no-go area. He
was even tempted to join the craze of salt water drinking and bathing that
swept through the country.
Then came the day he woke up and
felt something wrong within his body. Oh
my God, I have Ebola!! He thought frighteningly to himself. But the symptoms
were not like any he had read about. He found it hard to breath, his heart beat
faster than normal, he was losing sensation in his fingers and toes, and he
felt dizzy. What do I do? What’s going
on? Am I dying? Am I going crazy? Oh my God I am going crazy.
As soon as it was day break, he
headed off to Ikoyi in a taxi to go see a trusted family doctor. Gbenga, the
doctor laughed hard when Pious asked him if it was Ebola.
“You had a panic attack Pious…nothing to fear”. The Doctor said.
“Are you sure?” pious asked looking very concerned
“Trust me, my certificate is original, you are very much free from
Ebola…you are just really stressed out”. Gbenga continued “I know the Ebola
outbreak, if you can even call it that. Is scary, but you shouldn’t stress yourself
over it”
“There are about thirty million people in Lagos and there have been
only ten cases so far… I mean you should be very careful, no doubt, but you
still need to be sure not to overwork yourself and your mind unnecessarily,
Lagos stress is already enough to do that. I want you to take a day from work
and just relax and enjoy life, you are too young to be having panic attacks”.
Gbenga prescribed some drugs and sent Pious off on his way.
It took a while, but Pious did calm down. He even boarded a bus when
going back. As he sat in the bus, he felt himself relax, his heart beat and
breathing normalized. Me, panic attack? How?
Pious thought to himself, am I white?
I. was all he could do from laughing out loud. For the first time in a long time, he was aware not anxious of his
surroundings. There sat by him a woman cradling her child to sleep. In front,
the conductor was cursing at a passenger who had just handed him one thousand
Naira bill. Pious looked outside the window, it was a beautiful day. It wasn’t
too sunny, too windy, too cold or rainy. There were no extremes. The weather
was perfect. He had been crossing the third mainland bridge to and from work
for more than 3 months now, yet he never saw what he did today. For the first
time he noticed the river which sprawled out on either side of the bridge. The
river seemed so serene, so peaceful, so undisturbed, yet so powerful, so
majestic. He felt humbled and uplifted at the same time. He took another deep
breath. At that moment, Pious remembered
a statement he had read or heard somewhere; Danger
is real, fear is a choice. He chose not to be afraid anymore- he felt
freer, he felt lighter. He felt alive.
As the bus sped through to the
end of the third mainland bridge on this fine Wednesday afternoon, there was a
loud pop sound. Before anyone could phantom what had happened, the bus was
swerving and spinning out of control. It crashed into an oncoming vehicle,
before somersaulting violently into a broken down BRT bus. The scene is
chaotic, with screech sounds coming from everywhere, everyone trying hard to
avoid the crashed bus. After a moments passed there is just silence, people
getting out of their vehicles moving closer to observe the horrific crash site.
“No survivors in horrific bus accident on Third Mainland Bridge” was the
headline that was carried in the Newspapers the next day.
Life
is beautiful because it is ephemeral. Do not let fear stop you from enjoying
the beauty of living.
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