…and he shall wipe every tear from their eyes.

 -Miracle Nwokedi 

When our own transits to the other side so early; our tongues feel bloated to tell it, we do not always have the right words to write about it, for everything would rather seem like in a dreary tranquil dream. Just the way it feels to me now. 

In my little life, Dika, I have met young ambitious individuals who didn’t mind whose candle light they blew off just so they could shine. But not you. You wanted to help light someone else’s candle so you both could shine together. You believed it would make the room (world) brighter. You were a glorious testament of agape. A God-lover which explains the soft look on your face when you talked about Him alongside your desire to please Him. “People must come to God,” you said, “because of their love for Him not for a want nor the fear of hell.” You were a young man at the frontline of human capital investment. You wanted to build a people, a nation. You had even mentioned putting me up for a writing course. 

I would first meet you, after an earful of your fabulous personality, on a hot February afternoon in 2015, during my final school clearance. That in itself would be the sparking off of a beautiful friendship with you - friend of a friend who turned friend. Soon, we were calling each other, talking about this and that. You were so full of ideas. So ready for this life. There was such verve I had seen in you that was not easily found in many young people. You knew what you wanted and how to go about getting it. You set goals and crushed them all. You were into so many things that I wondered how you managed them all and still had great relationships with people.

I remember that beautiful morning I made you wait for so long (because I always made you wait), I was going to retrieve my laptop which you had helped me fix. I kept saying I was close by when I wasn’t. Thought you would freak out on the phone or at least, yell when I finally arrived. But not you, Dika. You kept saying ‘take all the time you need ma’am. I would wait patiently for you’ and as though to mock my flying thoughts, you received me with warm smiles. Just then, I knew you were some sort of an extraordinary human being. Somehow, we had ended up in Shoprite that same day. We were checking out this snack and the other, choosing between lipton and top tea for your Dad, laughing, chattering about African parents and their wahala. You mentioned something about giving Mum the life she deserved and how you are so close to fulfilling it. I laughed a great deal. Later, you and I would be sitting in the hall area, talking about God and relationships, relishing memories from school together, talking in that manner of kids who had so much to say but hadn’t enough time. When Dozie (the friend who made our knowing each other possible) featured in our conversation, there was this inexplicable love that I saw from your look. The kind that said things had transcended friendship to brotherhood. It felt pure, peaceful and beautiful. I couldn’t trace one bit of rivalry in the things you talked about him which he had achieved. In fact, you wished he reached for more. You wanted the best for him. 

Dika, we had our dreams and frustrations and fears. We shared them together. Asides your tech aspirations, your entrepreneurial visions were aflame. You wanted to export embroided clothes and clothing accessories of beads and other native wares to African people outside Africa, to maintain their Africanness and help them be in touch with their roots in a way that doesn’t stress them. You had begun the process. I said I wanted to get a Masters in Creative Writing which can only be obtained from foreign schools. In all, we were afraid there wouldn’t be enough capital to carry out all we wanted. Yet, you had consoled us (yourself and me) by saying that money will never be a deterrent, maka n’ onye nwelu mmadu nwelu ife.  

We talked about people often because you were a people person. You loved people. You cared for people. You helped people. And it didn’t sound strange when you said something about not ‘having a heart’, being hurt and emotional about the things ‘people’ do after all. Despite this love for people, we shared resentment for folks who ‘used’ people or rubbed shit on other people’s faces. I remember smiling, drawing out my words, saying that I valued relationships and friends and how I was lucky to have met you, to have become your friend. Now, it seems like we had both wasted our time having all those conversations because you ‘left’ anyway. You left us. Dozie and me. 

You know, this news had come to me like the striking of a sledgehammer. Even now, it feels to me like you are playing hide-and-seek or something close to it, because none of this still makes sense to me. We had funny plans, Dikachukwu. It didn’t have to be skewed. You had asked what marriage felt like, what inspired me since you wouldn’t wait so long to start your own family. You requested for gospel audio messages on relationships and marriage. You said you were going to marry that special somebody soon and make her kitchen enchanting like mine, after you had seen the picture I took in my own kitchen. Her laptop would come in pink. My kids were going to come to your house for vacations. I promised to incite things in them before they could come. “They would run your house amock.” I said, choking with laughter. You dared me to bring it on, that you could handle it because you were great with kids. We were going to revisit the eye clinic on the first floor of Goshen plaza, Okpara avenue, Enugu. We had ran away the first time maka afa ego. The amount for drugs there was just too scary. Something we would later sit to laugh about. We might have also visited the Ndi Igbo Centre for Memories, in Independence layout if I managed to get a leave from my office. Dika, I was working towards that until now.

With every single memory of you and I that I recall, I say to myself, what is life but meaningless. I was almost going to question God. But what do I know? I don’t love you more than He does. He has also promised to wipe every tear from our eyes (Rev. 21:24). Because of you Dika, I am redefining friendship and life and death. Truly, life is not measured by the number of days spent on earth but by the number of people one had impacted on. You left too soon perhaps, because in your short life, you have been tasked with leaving footprints in the sand of time. You know, my mum wouldn’t forget those apples and cherries you had bought in a hurry, for that was the first thing she had mentioned when I told her. Your mouse and the speakers you had bought me, I now understand to be the memory of you that you wanted to leave with me.

You looked restful even in death and I hope you continue to rest in God’s loving arms. I love you Dikachukwu. 

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