The fall of a genius: Mohammed Inuwa Natiti

To each one of us, life is precious. There is nothing that means more to us than our well being and that of the people we love the most; our family, friends and well wishers. Each day we wake, we hear of the death or birth of someone we may not even know. If it is birth, we rejoice and death, we sympathize. Often, we wonder how soon or how far away ours is.

When it does not directly affect us, we summon courage to say to people ‘death is inevitable’, because we all come from God and back to Him we shall return,  yet when death comes knocking at our door, we ask why? We hurt and we cry but no matter what, our tears or the pain we feel can never bring back a loved one we have lost, and all that we are left with are memories; particularly the pleasant ones.

When I met Mohammed Inuwa Natiti seven years ago, I knew that in him I had made a friend and a brother. Not only did he lift my soul by his kind and affectionate ways, his faithfulness which is something that is rarely seen amongst us today, drew me closer to him. In the depth of my heart, his reflecting image will never varnish; the sound of his voice, the sweet smell of ambre and his eyes were the symbol of a brown crystal. In him I found rest, peace and encouragement.  And after only four beautiful years of marriage, who would have thought he would be the first to leave.

It was the deepest night of all nights, as the scouring pillars of nature overtook him. I watched how death seized my beloved husband, he died as a result of a cardiac arrest he had right in front of me. “Innalillahi wa inna illaihi raji’un”, these were the words I uttered as the cruel touch of destiny pushed us apart forever.

Being an introvert, perhaps a lot of people would have thought him to be unfriendly, but that was who he was. He was never much of a talker, more of a very cheerful listener. More than anything, his greatest virtue was patience. Whenever he saw me sad, he would say “be patient, it will come to pass”. People often say that we never know what lurks in the shadows, as such we can never know if death is just around the corner and even if we did, we cannot stop it. For someone who was hale and hearty to slump before me within seconds of speaking in my presence, I now fully understand what it means when they say, you never know what is coming until it hits you.  Inuwa’s death hit me like nothing has ever done but I take solace in the fact that he left me beautiful memories of him and two little angels (Eman and Abubakar) who will forever remind me of him.

Life naturally has its ups and downs, and most marriages like friendship have its lowest and highest moments (mine no exception), more than anything however, the moments we shared together will forever be a memorable one.

For some, they have lost a son, a brother, a friend, a father and a mentor, but I have lost all of these in my husband, I have lost a confidant. My children and I have lost a hero. I know there is no way I can ever repay the joy he gave to me and our two lovely angels, I can only promise to dedicate every minute of my life to their proper upbringing and care with the help of Almighty Allah.

People often say that words can never describe how we feel especially in our moment of grief and I think it is true, because there aren’t enough words to express the agony and pain that I felt at the moment. But who am I to question an act of Allah. He created us and He knows best what suits us.

There are so many things I wish I had said to him, so many questions I wish I had asked, so many wishes, but these wishes will forever remain so because we cannot turn back the hands of time. I feel fortunate to have met my husband and I thank Allah for giving me the opportunity to have shared the four most interesting years of my life with such an understanding and interesting man. May Allah subhanahu Wa ta’ala shoulder us and give me and his Family, the strength to bear this great loss.

Rabi Ali wrote from Number 13A Idoma Road Off Jabi East, U/Rimi GRA Kaduna.