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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Teens
- Theme: Survival / Success
- Subject: Crime
- Published: 04/12/2019
PATHFINDER'S SERIES
SAVED BY THE PHONE CALL
PART 1
I never knew my mother until I was 15 years old.I was raised by two German couples by name Weber Mary and Hoffmann Peter.They proved to be a solid rock of support for me during the absence of my Parents. One day , A woman came to my foster parents home.She meet my foster parents and had a discussion with them after which I was called to a serious meeting.During the meeting, my foster father told me the woman was my mother.She was around 32 years and had been away for sometimes now and that now that she was back, she would want to see me and possibly take me away from my foster parents. Naturally, I refused because the Germans were the only parents I knew until I grew up before they told me they were not my biological parents and that my parents have gone somewhere and would soon be back.They never told me where my parents have gone to and why they can't take me along with them to the place.Eventually, the mystery was unravel and it made me hate my mother and at the same time thank God that things happened the way it happened.Who knows, i could have been a wasted Gift.Before I told you my mother's secret. Let me tell you who I am.
I am Sam Dede,a software Engineer for National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), one of the very few blacks in NASA, with a rare gift of designing Computer softwares for NASA to accelerate her space exploration projects. We designed softwares to help operationalise artificial satellites. Like the Geostationary satellites.
I lived in Florida, U.S.A in one of the elite areas, Orlando and I cannot forget to mention the famous Miami Beach. Been a black man, I must say I was highly privilege to live a highly prestigious lifestyle which will always be a mere dream for majority of blacks in that region. As a senior software developer, Which other lifestyle do you expect apart from a nice car, a lamborghini ,a huge mansion and special privileges rarely enjoyed by my fellow blacks. Perhaps you were taken away by the flamboyancy of my narration to think that I was born with a Golden spoon in my mouth but My story is far from rosy.
Let me brief you more on my background.I was not an American by birth.I was born in Cross River State of Nigeria.When I was very young, the two German couples took care of me as their own child,a task my own patents failed to undertake. I attended Destiny Foundation School before moving to Hillcrest school in Calabar. My favourite Subjects in Secondary school were Mathematics and Science.I was offering science with Computer studies. These subjects were so easy to me that sometimes I felt like school was just wasting my talents.I remembered one instance where Mr.Fundele, our Mathematics teacher was struggling with a certain mathematical question on Calculus which I personally saw to be very easy so I raised up my hand and said,"Sir, Please,I think I can solve that question. He looked at me quite surprise and in disbelieve because to him, it was one of the toughest mathematical questions. Within three minutes, I solved the question in a very simple manner. He was shocked.From that point on, he took me as a teaching assistant.I sometimes teach my colleagues in his absence to the point that the Class has begun enjoying my approach to teaching than his long boring method. My colleagues would secretly wished in their heart that he would not be around so that I could take over the class.I was nicknamed "Archimedes" by my colleagues for my adept knowledge in Mathema tics and science. To them I was a mathemagician. Consequently, Mr.Fundele became pissed off by the incessant praises been heaped on me by my colleague students especially the girls who saw me as a math god and began crushing on me. I completed secondary school with exceptional grades.Eight straight A's.When I completed senior High school,I stayed in the house for two years because I always dreamt of becoming an Astronaut but No University in Nigeria had the resources to finance the study of that course Coincidentally,the time had come for my foster parents to relocate to the united States.Luckily they wanted me to go with them because they had developed a special attachment to Me.Initially,My mother was reluctant to let them take me to U.S.A. but eventually decided to let me go. After all, I knew my German foster parents more than her-my own mother. We left Ghana on 5th May, 2010.When we reached USA,I applied and was admitted to University of Michigan to Study Climate and Space Science and Engineering.I graduated with a first class.I advanced it to Masters and Doctorate levels.My favourite lessons were in Geoscience and remote sensing. I did subsidiary courses in software engineering and by the time I completed, I was one of the famous students in the field and was given a rare opportunity to be part of the team that work for NASA as a software Engineer.During my graduation, I invited my mother.She boarded a plane to Michigan, U.S.A.I expected my mother to be happy for me for achieving that great height. She was happy during the graduation but getting to the end of the anniversary, she broke down in tears. She cried so much that I became sad without knowing why.
As I was contemplating what was eating her up, she uttered the words,"My son, Forgive me"
"Forgive you?"I asked innocently, "for what?"
PART 2
She sobbed uncontrollable to the point that even those nearby felt pity for her.
"Sit down my son,"I have a secret to tell you.
She began,"I got pregnant with you when I completed Senior Secondary School. I wasn't doing any work by then and wasn't really expecting to get pregnant by then. Your father was a Taxi driver from Kano, a city in Nigeria. His name is Maxwell Okoh.Let me tell you how we met.One day I stood by the road side waiting for a taxi cab.That day,the taxis seemed to go on break.None was passing by.Finally i saw one coming along the direction of the road where I stood. He stopped by the side of the road and asked where I was going. I told him I was going to Cross river state. He offered to take me there.He was a handsome,quiet-looking,giant-like hairy man,like you. I was impressed by his appearance and he was attracted to my beautiful physique too.Every weekend he would come to me and we would chat and laugh.We started a relationship. I told him without any equivocation that we would have "NO SEX BEFORE MARRIAGE. "He agreed without argument.That blissful day,he came to me.It was raining. He wanted to go but I told him to stay. We chatted a few times but this time around, things went beyond just laughing and chatting. Before I could come back to my moral senses,he was already in me,probably oblivious of the consequences. That rainy day, the moral barrier had been breached in that short moment of pleasure.
One month later,What I feared happened. I missed my period.I did a pregnancy test and discovered I was pregnant. When I told Maxwell that I was pregnant, he was dilematic. She told me he didn't know what to say or do.Later events revealed he knew exactly what to do and that is -Run away His parents too didn't want me and my pregnancy. I searched and searched for him but to no avail.I became depressed. My parents scorned me seriously for getting pregnant out of wedlock and denigrating myself and the family which was regarded as an icon of moral purity since my father was a pastor. My Son,This may come to you as a shocker. I tried putting you in a pit latrine but someone popped up in the last minute and caught me before I could actualize my evil plan. I tried to starve you to death but your cry was unbearable. I tried other things to get rid of you but all of them had proven futile.Eventually, a brilliant plan or rather.... a devilish idea came into my head that I should throw you into the bush.That fateful day, I carried you at my back.You were just seven months old.I took you far into the forest where I knew nobody could possibly find you .When I reached the forest, I untie the cloth I used to carry you and dropped you down from my back. I laid you gently on the cloth and run away with a sigh of relief,saying to myself"Alas,This burden is gone."Yes, I said to myself that finally, I had gotten rid of you.That evening, I watched news on Television but could not hear anything about an abandoned child in the forest. On the third day, it was in the news that a child had been abandoned by his mother and was found by a white men.The white man was a German by name Hoffmann.On the TV,He was granted an interview.He said he was in the forest that day because he was the doing a research for the forestry commission of Nigeria and part of the research findings would be sent to U.S.A.When he reached the thicker side of the forest he was attracted by the loud noise emanating from a particular side of the forest. He moved towards the direction of the sound in his bid to find the source.When he reached there,He found out that the sound was emanating from a mobile phone.Somebody was calling incessantly. Just a few inches from the mobile phone ,'VoilĂ ,' there laid a bouncing baby boy, wrapped in a cloth under the Bush.
Mr.Hoffman said he took the baby boy to the police station and narrated the incidence to the police,starting from how he was in the forest doing research and how the sound from the call of the phone attracted him which eventually led to the discovery of the boy.
A search was conducted to ascer tain the owner of the phone.it was discovered the phone belong to me _Gina Oni.My phone dropped on the ground unknowningly when I was in a hurry to get rid of you and run.it was my sister, your auntie lizzy that was trying to call me that day when the sound of the phone call attracted Mr. Hoffman.I was apprehended by the police for intentionally abandoning my child to the mercy of death but you were destined to live. Quickly,I was arranged before court, found guilty and handed a fifteen year prison sentence. That was why you couldn't know your me until you were fifteen years old when I was released from prison. Mr.Hoffmann and his wife took you as foster parents.As for your father , he was still at large. Till date, I never knew his whereabout. So, my son, that was my story. I am very sorry for all that."
When my mother finished her narration, I was very sad, angry and bitter.My hatred for her grew sevenfold. I swear, if I were to have a gun by then, I would have shot her without remorse.I honestly wished she had not told me this bizzare incidence. Unable to control my emotion any longer, I left the graduation ceremony immediately.After that nasty revelation from my mother I saw her as my enemy. How can a woman who carry me in her womb for nine month and suffered the pangs of child birth turned around to throw me away in a bush and run away. Had she forgotten the paroxysm of the excruciating pain she felt during child birth ?What of if I had died that day under the mercy of the harsh weather?
No, this woman is wicked," I said.
The great hatred I had for my mother made me stopped picking her calls or having anything to do with her.This continued for five years.On August 12,2017, I received an email from my mother's sister, my untie Lizzy. I hardly received E-mails from her so when i saw the email,i conjectured that something was amiss.Initially I didn't want to open the email at all but to delete it.On the third day, my curiosity grew greater and I decided to open the email. Then something stopped me from opening the email again.I procrastinated for one week before I finally summoned enough courage to open the letter.I kept having this premonition that this letter would not contain any good news and it didn't. The message was simple"MY MOTHER WAS DEAD " it said.When I read the letter, all the hatred I had for my mum dissipated. My hatred was quickly replaced by remorse and pity.I worn the gown of melancholy as I meticulously take in the words conveyed by the email.According to the email, my mother said she was sorry for abandoning me in my infancy in the bush and that she had yearned for my forgiveness all this years. Since I have decided not to forgive her, she said she had also decided to relieve herself of the burden of guilt by taking away her own life.Part of the e-mail was a scanned letter my mother wrote down before committing suicide by drinking poison.The scanned letter attached to the email read ,"my son, it is with great sadness that I write this letter today.By the time you receive this letter, I won't be alive.I don't blame you for hating me.I would have done the same thing if my parents were to run away from me ...but please forgive me.I am human and can make mistake just like you.I know those who create their own drama deserve their own karma.It is my sincerest hope that you won't follow the same path.Love ,Your mother."
My mother's letter melted my heart and my hatred. Her funeral was scheduled for November, 2017.I came down from the United States to Nigeria for the Funeral and saw the lifeless body of the woman who gave me life and attempted to take back the life she had given me but failed. Had she succeeded, I would have been lost to the world and my contribution to the world would not have been realized. Make no mistake,i was one of the very very few people who have the gift of design space softwares for artificial satellites. Currently I was appointed as the Administrator of National Aeronautics and space Administration by President Barack Obama.Reminiscing on the past I felt quite guilty for not forgiving my mother but more importantly I was grateful that I was saved by a phone call.
SAVED BY THE PHONE CALL(Agamah)
PATHFINDER'S SERIES
SAVED BY THE PHONE CALL
PART 1
I never knew my mother until I was 15 years old.I was raised by two German couples by name Weber Mary and Hoffmann Peter.They proved to be a solid rock of support for me during the absence of my Parents. One day , A woman came to my foster parents home.She meet my foster parents and had a discussion with them after which I was called to a serious meeting.During the meeting, my foster father told me the woman was my mother.She was around 32 years and had been away for sometimes now and that now that she was back, she would want to see me and possibly take me away from my foster parents. Naturally, I refused because the Germans were the only parents I knew until I grew up before they told me they were not my biological parents and that my parents have gone somewhere and would soon be back.They never told me where my parents have gone to and why they can't take me along with them to the place.Eventually, the mystery was unravel and it made me hate my mother and at the same time thank God that things happened the way it happened.Who knows, i could have been a wasted Gift.Before I told you my mother's secret. Let me tell you who I am.
I am Sam Dede,a software Engineer for National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), one of the very few blacks in NASA, with a rare gift of designing Computer softwares for NASA to accelerate her space exploration projects. We designed softwares to help operationalise artificial satellites. Like the Geostationary satellites.
I lived in Florida, U.S.A in one of the elite areas, Orlando and I cannot forget to mention the famous Miami Beach. Been a black man, I must say I was highly privilege to live a highly prestigious lifestyle which will always be a mere dream for majority of blacks in that region. As a senior software developer, Which other lifestyle do you expect apart from a nice car, a lamborghini ,a huge mansion and special privileges rarely enjoyed by my fellow blacks. Perhaps you were taken away by the flamboyancy of my narration to think that I was born with a Golden spoon in my mouth but My story is far from rosy.
Let me brief you more on my background.I was not an American by birth.I was born in Cross River State of Nigeria.When I was very young, the two German couples took care of me as their own child,a task my own patents failed to undertake. I attended Destiny Foundation School before moving to Hillcrest school in Calabar. My favourite Subjects in Secondary school were Mathematics and Science.I was offering science with Computer studies. These subjects were so easy to me that sometimes I felt like school was just wasting my talents.I remembered one instance where Mr.Fundele, our Mathematics teacher was struggling with a certain mathematical question on Calculus which I personally saw to be very easy so I raised up my hand and said,"Sir, Please,I think I can solve that question. He looked at me quite surprise and in disbelieve because to him, it was one of the toughest mathematical questions. Within three minutes, I solved the question in a very simple manner. He was shocked.From that point on, he took me as a teaching assistant.I sometimes teach my colleagues in his absence to the point that the Class has begun enjoying my approach to teaching than his long boring method. My colleagues would secretly wished in their heart that he would not be around so that I could take over the class.I was nicknamed "Archimedes" by my colleagues for my adept knowledge in Mathema tics and science. To them I was a mathemagician. Consequently, Mr.Fundele became pissed off by the incessant praises been heaped on me by my colleague students especially the girls who saw me as a math god and began crushing on me. I completed secondary school with exceptional grades.Eight straight A's.When I completed senior High school,I stayed in the house for two years because I always dreamt of becoming an Astronaut but No University in Nigeria had the resources to finance the study of that course Coincidentally,the time had come for my foster parents to relocate to the united States.Luckily they wanted me to go with them because they had developed a special attachment to Me.Initially,My mother was reluctant to let them take me to U.S.A. but eventually decided to let me go. After all, I knew my German foster parents more than her-my own mother. We left Ghana on 5th May, 2010.When we reached USA,I applied and was admitted to University of Michigan to Study Climate and Space Science and Engineering.I graduated with a first class.I advanced it to Masters and Doctorate levels.My favourite lessons were in Geoscience and remote sensing. I did subsidiary courses in software engineering and by the time I completed, I was one of the famous students in the field and was given a rare opportunity to be part of the team that work for NASA as a software Engineer.During my graduation, I invited my mother.She boarded a plane to Michigan, U.S.A.I expected my mother to be happy for me for achieving that great height. She was happy during the graduation but getting to the end of the anniversary, she broke down in tears. She cried so much that I became sad without knowing why.
As I was contemplating what was eating her up, she uttered the words,"My son, Forgive me"
"Forgive you?"I asked innocently, "for what?"
PART 2
She sobbed uncontrollable to the point that even those nearby felt pity for her.
"Sit down my son,"I have a secret to tell you.
She began,"I got pregnant with you when I completed Senior Secondary School. I wasn't doing any work by then and wasn't really expecting to get pregnant by then. Your father was a Taxi driver from Kano, a city in Nigeria. His name is Maxwell Okoh.Let me tell you how we met.One day I stood by the road side waiting for a taxi cab.That day,the taxis seemed to go on break.None was passing by.Finally i saw one coming along the direction of the road where I stood. He stopped by the side of the road and asked where I was going. I told him I was going to Cross river state. He offered to take me there.He was a handsome,quiet-looking,giant-like hairy man,like you. I was impressed by his appearance and he was attracted to my beautiful physique too.Every weekend he would come to me and we would chat and laugh.We started a relationship. I told him without any equivocation that we would have "NO SEX BEFORE MARRIAGE. "He agreed without argument.That blissful day,he came to me.It was raining. He wanted to go but I told him to stay. We chatted a few times but this time around, things went beyond just laughing and chatting. Before I could come back to my moral senses,he was already in me,probably oblivious of the consequences. That rainy day, the moral barrier had been breached in that short moment of pleasure.
One month later,What I feared happened. I missed my period.I did a pregnancy test and discovered I was pregnant. When I told Maxwell that I was pregnant, he was dilematic. She told me he didn't know what to say or do.Later events revealed he knew exactly what to do and that is -Run away His parents too didn't want me and my pregnancy. I searched and searched for him but to no avail.I became depressed. My parents scorned me seriously for getting pregnant out of wedlock and denigrating myself and the family which was regarded as an icon of moral purity since my father was a pastor. My Son,This may come to you as a shocker. I tried putting you in a pit latrine but someone popped up in the last minute and caught me before I could actualize my evil plan. I tried to starve you to death but your cry was unbearable. I tried other things to get rid of you but all of them had proven futile.Eventually, a brilliant plan or rather.... a devilish idea came into my head that I should throw you into the bush.That fateful day, I carried you at my back.You were just seven months old.I took you far into the forest where I knew nobody could possibly find you .When I reached the forest, I untie the cloth I used to carry you and dropped you down from my back. I laid you gently on the cloth and run away with a sigh of relief,saying to myself"Alas,This burden is gone."Yes, I said to myself that finally, I had gotten rid of you.That evening, I watched news on Television but could not hear anything about an abandoned child in the forest. On the third day, it was in the news that a child had been abandoned by his mother and was found by a white men.The white man was a German by name Hoffmann.On the TV,He was granted an interview.He said he was in the forest that day because he was the doing a research for the forestry commission of Nigeria and part of the research findings would be sent to U.S.A.When he reached the thicker side of the forest he was attracted by the loud noise emanating from a particular side of the forest. He moved towards the direction of the sound in his bid to find the source.When he reached there,He found out that the sound was emanating from a mobile phone.Somebody was calling incessantly. Just a few inches from the mobile phone ,'VoilĂ ,' there laid a bouncing baby boy, wrapped in a cloth under the Bush.
Mr.Hoffman said he took the baby boy to the police station and narrated the incidence to the police,starting from how he was in the forest doing research and how the sound from the call of the phone attracted him which eventually led to the discovery of the boy.
A search was conducted to ascer tain the owner of the phone.it was discovered the phone belong to me _Gina Oni.My phone dropped on the ground unknowningly when I was in a hurry to get rid of you and run.it was my sister, your auntie lizzy that was trying to call me that day when the sound of the phone call attracted Mr. Hoffman.I was apprehended by the police for intentionally abandoning my child to the mercy of death but you were destined to live. Quickly,I was arranged before court, found guilty and handed a fifteen year prison sentence. That was why you couldn't know your me until you were fifteen years old when I was released from prison. Mr.Hoffmann and his wife took you as foster parents.As for your father , he was still at large. Till date, I never knew his whereabout. So, my son, that was my story. I am very sorry for all that."
When my mother finished her narration, I was very sad, angry and bitter.My hatred for her grew sevenfold. I swear, if I were to have a gun by then, I would have shot her without remorse.I honestly wished she had not told me this bizzare incidence. Unable to control my emotion any longer, I left the graduation ceremony immediately.After that nasty revelation from my mother I saw her as my enemy. How can a woman who carry me in her womb for nine month and suffered the pangs of child birth turned around to throw me away in a bush and run away. Had she forgotten the paroxysm of the excruciating pain she felt during child birth ?What of if I had died that day under the mercy of the harsh weather?
No, this woman is wicked," I said.
The great hatred I had for my mother made me stopped picking her calls or having anything to do with her.This continued for five years.On August 12,2017, I received an email from my mother's sister, my untie Lizzy. I hardly received E-mails from her so when i saw the email,i conjectured that something was amiss.Initially I didn't want to open the email at all but to delete it.On the third day, my curiosity grew greater and I decided to open the email. Then something stopped me from opening the email again.I procrastinated for one week before I finally summoned enough courage to open the letter.I kept having this premonition that this letter would not contain any good news and it didn't. The message was simple"MY MOTHER WAS DEAD " it said.When I read the letter, all the hatred I had for my mum dissipated. My hatred was quickly replaced by remorse and pity.I worn the gown of melancholy as I meticulously take in the words conveyed by the email.According to the email, my mother said she was sorry for abandoning me in my infancy in the bush and that she had yearned for my forgiveness all this years. Since I have decided not to forgive her, she said she had also decided to relieve herself of the burden of guilt by taking away her own life.Part of the e-mail was a scanned letter my mother wrote down before committing suicide by drinking poison.The scanned letter attached to the email read ,"my son, it is with great sadness that I write this letter today.By the time you receive this letter, I won't be alive.I don't blame you for hating me.I would have done the same thing if my parents were to run away from me ...but please forgive me.I am human and can make mistake just like you.I know those who create their own drama deserve their own karma.It is my sincerest hope that you won't follow the same path.Love ,Your mother."
My mother's letter melted my heart and my hatred. Her funeral was scheduled for November, 2017.I came down from the United States to Nigeria for the Funeral and saw the lifeless body of the woman who gave me life and attempted to take back the life she had given me but failed. Had she succeeded, I would have been lost to the world and my contribution to the world would not have been realized. Make no mistake,i was one of the very very few people who have the gift of design space softwares for artificial satellites. Currently I was appointed as the Administrator of National Aeronautics and space Administration by President Barack Obama.Reminiscing on the past I felt quite guilty for not forgiving my mother but more importantly I was grateful that I was saved by a phone call.
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