To read the story from the start go to: https://the-inkling.com/catch-up-with-the-inklings/
On Thursday morning Ousman woke up feeling excited. He was looking forward to the party that night at India’s place. She’d promised him the night before that she would hire the chocolate fountain again.
Ousman rushed to get ready for school so he’d have some time left to play with Aminata before he had to leave.
When Ousman was dressed he went to the kitchen to pack his lunch and have breakfast and was a bit surprised to find Mamadou there, cooking something with lots of tomatoes and eggs in it.
“Your hair needs more brushing” said Mamadou. “Go and get your brush and I will do it for you”.
Ousman wasn’t happy with this change of plans but didn’t want to be rude to his dad so he went and got his hairbrush.
Mamadou turned the stove off and brushed Ousman’s hair until there were no tangles or stray hairs. Ousman stayed quiet and pretended it didn’t hurt in the hope that it would be over sooner. He hoped that his dad wasn’t going to want to brush his hair every morning.
“There! Now you look really handsome” said Mamadou and he gave Ousman back his hairbrush. Ousman ran to put the brush back and when he returned to the kitchen he saw that Mamadou had put some eggs out for him.
Ousman sat down and looked at the eggs. They had been fried with onion and tomato. Ousman thought they smelled quite nice, but was a bit suspicious.
“Here – have some bread with it” said Mamadou and he handed Ousman a thick slice of bread.
Ousman watched Mamadou dip the bread into his eggs and copied him. Then Ousman slowly took a bite of soggy bread and was pleasantly surprised by the taste.
Binta came in from the backyard with a bunch of flowers and put them in a small vase on the table before she sat down to eat some eggs too. Ousman watched his mum take her first bite to see what she thought of it and could tell from her expression that she liked it too.
When Ousman had finished eating his eggs he quickly packed himself some food for lunch, before going to find Aminata, who was usually sitting out in the backyard at that time of day.
Aminata was splashing around in some shallow water underneath the fountain. Ousman watched her for a minute or so and then he realised he could hear frogs croaking in the pond so he went to have a look. As Ousman approached the pond he noticed a small splash and imagined that a frog had jumped into the water to hide from him. Then Ousman noticed something that looked like froth in the water. When he looked more closely he noticed that they were frog’s eggs. Ousman was so excited that he ran to tell Syafika.
Syafika wasn’t up yet so Ousman knocked on her bedroom door.
“Syafika! You’ve slept in again! Would you like me to make you tea again? And guess what? There are frog eggs in the pond. Come and see!” shouted Ousman.
Ousman waited for Syafika to respond but she didn’t.
“Syafika! Wake up!” shouted Ousman, but there was still no answer.
Then Ousman heard the phone ring. Aminata flew over to the phone and started copying the ringing sound.
Ousman was a bit scared of answering the phone because he thought it would probably be someone he didn’t know, but he couldn’t see anyone else heading towards the phone so he reluctantly answered.
“Hello” said Ousman.
“Is that Ousman? It’s me” said Syafika.
“Why are you calling me?” asked Ousman. He was confused because he still thought Syafika was in her room asleep.
“Didn’t you wonder where I was?” asked Syafika.
That’s when Ousman realised that Syafika wasn’t in her room.
“Where are you?” asked Ousman. “Did you leave really early?”
“Didn’t anyone check the message I left on the answering machine?” asked Syafika.
“I don’t know” said Ousman.
“Didn’t anyone miss me when I wasn’t there last night?” asked Syafika.
“Aunty Rose thought you were asleep and she told us all to be quiet” said Ousman. “When you do come home, have a look in the pond. There’s something really exciting”
“Ok” said Syafika. “Can you tell Mum I’m coming home soon and that I stayed at a friend’s house last night because I was sick. I was vomiting!”
“Ok” said Ousman and he was so excited by the news that he hung up without saying goodbye and ran to find Rose.
The Inkling 