“Tomorrow will be better than today,” “Tomorrow will be better than today,”
“Tomorrow will be better than today,” I muttered under my breath as I held and gently rocked my five year old brother, Abba whose temperature had gone up today. His little body covered in a towel soaked in cold water seemed to be making matters no different as the heat from his body penetrated the towel making it hot. The pharmacy two streets away had said we needed 5000 Naira for his fever drugs. If I had 5000 Naira to spare we wouldn’t have to beg for food from Aunty Ladi’s house down the street every day. I tried to beg the pharmacist to give me the drugs on credit but he looked me up and down and said “no money, no medicine” it was as if I had an incurable disease—the way he looked at me, utterly irritated.
Do poor people no longer get sick anymore or has sickness now become a privilege of the rich? Yesterday Aunty Ladi said she couldn’t give us food because they only had a little food left and she needed to feed her six children and husband. I don’t know why they keep having children they can’t feed. I’ve known Aunty Ladi since I was six years old and I am now twelve, and the only memory I have of her is of her being pregnant every year. I managed to get leftovers from the bukka on Mama Siya’s street for Abba and I even though he could barely eat.
Goggo always used to say “gobe zai fi yau kyau”- Tomorrow will be better than today, before she died three months ago from an unknown illness. She was my father’s elder sister and the only living family we had. My parents were killed in a Boko Haram attack when I was six so she took us in as her family since her husband and three children died in a trailer accident years before. Goggo was very fun loving and always had a positive attitude. She loved people and made sure to give to others even with the little we had. Since she died, it’s just been Abba and I, and even though the neighbors have tried hard to support us, they can only do so much. Unlike Goggo, I don’t believe that tomorrow will be better than today because I believed that yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that, and nothing changed. Tomorrow I will go to Baba magani who does herbal concoctions to help with Abba. He used to help Goggo when she was alive so I hope he’ll have some kindness in his heart for us now that she’s no
longer here. If he does, then maybe Tomorrow will be better than today. In the meantime, I’ll be praying for Abba’s temperature to come down a little bit. Sustainable Development Goals One and Two: No poverty/ Zero Hunger