Chapter 3: The Wrong Degree

Reality set in weeks after the wedding when Chinedu's family came to visit their new apartment.

Chinedu's mother always had that smile on her face never reached her eyes.

"Our son has a good heart."

Nma smiled politely. "He does."

"He even married a village girl."

The words were soft enough that no one else noticed, Nma blinked. "I'm sorry?"

His mother laughed lightly. "Oh, don't look so serious, I'm only joking."

Before Nma could answer, one of Chinedu's older sisters joined them. "So you're the famous girl from the village." She looked Nma up and down, "You clean up well."

The women laughed while Nma forced herself to smile.

"They're joking," she told herself."They're still getting to know me."

The comments continued throughout their stay in the house.

"A city wife would know which spoon to use.", "You still sound like someone from the village.", "Your parents did their best.", "It's just... different."

Every sentence sounded harmless on its own but together they slowly chipped away at her confidence.

Whenever another remark was made, Nma instinctively looked toward Chinedu. Hoping he would notice and say something. Instead, he laughed along. "My family likes teasing people, Don't mind them, They're only playing." He kissed her forehead. "You worry too much."

Nma smiled, Perhaps he was right.

Their first months together were happy, not perfect just happy.

On quiet evenings, Nma sometimes opened her Biology textbook while Chinedu watched television.

She still read about anatomy, Human physiology, and medical ethics.

One night he noticed and asked "You still read that?"

She smiled. "It reminds me of where I'm going."

He kissed her forehead. "And you'll get there."

She believed him.

Six months later, the nausea began, then dizziness and fatigue. The clinic confirmed what they already suspected.

"You are pregnant." Nma stared at the small ultrasound image in disbelief and smiled. Then, almost immediately she thought about school. That evening, she sat beside Chinedu on the veranda.

"The admission forms come out next month."

He nodded. "I know."

She hesitated. "I can still apply, the baby won't come for several months."

He remained quiet and she knew that silence, it suddenly reminded her of the udala tree in her father's compound and the elders that sat under it. Finally, he spoke. "Nma, i've been thinking." He reached for her hand, "Let's postpone school."

Her smile faded.

"Only until after the baby."

She searched his face. "You mean one year?"

"Maybe, it depends."

"On what?" She asked

"Our finances, the baby, life." He squeezed her hand reassuringly. "You've waited this long, one more year won't change anything."

One more year, such a small sentence that was so easy to believe. Nma looked toward the bedroom, on the table beside the bed sat her old Biology textbook, waiting just as it always had. She thought about the child growing inside her then about the promise beneath the mango tree.

"Alright, we'll wait until after the baby."

Chinedu wrapped his arms around her. "Thank you, you always understand."

She told herself this wasn't giving up, it was only postponing, just one year.

At twenty-three, Nma still believed that "next year" meant exactly one year.

She had no way of knowing that some dreams are not destroyed all at once, they disappear one postponed tomorrow at a time. Motherhood arrived with equal measures of joy and exhaustion. The day she held her daughter for the first time, nothing else seemed to matter. The tiny fingers wrapped around hers and she whispered into the baby's ear,

"You will never have to give up your dreams."

She didn't realize she had made a promise to her daughter that she had been unable to keep for herself.

The first year passed quickly. Sleepless nights became ordinary. Feeding, bathing and rocking the baby to sleep and still cleaning, cooking and doing laundry. By the time evening came, Nma often fell asleep before she could even open her Biology textbook. Still, She never put it away. It remained on the bedside table waiting just like her dream.

On her daughter's first birthday, Nma smiled as relatives filled the house with songs and laughter. After the guests had gone home and the house was quiet again, she sat beside Chinedu.

"The baby is one year old now."

He smiled. "She is growing so fast."

Nma took a deep breath. "I think it's time."

He looked at her. "Time for what?"

"School."

For a brief moment, he said nothing then he sighed. "I knew this conversation would come."

"You promised."

"I remember."

"So..."

He reached for her hand.

"Our daughter is still too young, my mother says babies need their mothers. It won't be for long, Let's wait another year."

Nma lowered her eyes, another year. She had heard those words before but she still nodded.

"Alright."

The next year brought another surprise, she was pregnant again. This time, she cried, She cried because she knew what pregnancy meant: Another postponement, another "next year."

As the children grew, Chinedu's family became a constant presence in their lives. His mother visited often sometimes she stayed for weeks.

His sisters came without notice, filling the house with loud opinions and quiet insults. "Nma, in our family we don't cook soup this way."

"You still do things like people in the village."

"Our brother has changed since he married you."

"You're too opinionated for someone with your background."

Whenever they spoke, Nma instinctively looked toward Chinedu, he was her husband, surely he would defend her. Instead, he smiled awkwardly.

"Just ignore them, they don't mean any harm." Or worse, He agreed.

"Mummy is only trying to help.", "My sister has a point.", "You should listen."

Nma felt a little more alone and family gatherings became something she quietly dreaded.

She wondered what happened to the man who had promised to spend his life beside her.

Years passed and their children just grew up, they had four children.

But each January, Nma quietly asked about returning to school and each time life found another reason to wait.

"The children are still small.", "We're saving to build a house.", "My mother is sick.", "We can't afford it now." Every explanation sounded sensible and temporary.

Eventually Nma stopped counting the years, she measured time by postponed admissions.

One evening, while cleaning the bedroom, she found the old Biology textbook beneath a pile of folded clothes. She brushed away the dust with her palm. Inside the front cover, her old Biology teacher's handwriting stared back at her.

"Never stop believing in tomorrow."

A tear rolled down her cheek.Tomorrow had become a word she was beginning to fear.

Not long afterward, Chinedu came home with news. "Nma, I spoke with my mother and my brothers today."

Her face brightened. "About school?"

"Yes."

Her heart raced, finally after all these years.

He smiled. "We've agreed that it's time for you to further your education."

She almost hugged him but then he continued. "But..." The word settled heavily between them.

"My family doesn't think nursing is suitable anymore, Mummy says the shifts are too demanding for a married woman. And my sisters believe you'll spend too much time away from the children. They suggested something more... practical."

Nma felt her heartbeat slow. "What do you mean?"

Chinedu looked away. "They think you should study Management at the polytechnic instead."

Nma felt her ears ringing like she had been slapped, the room seemed to grow smaller. She glanced toward the shelf where the old Biology textbook still rested.

For a long moment, she said nothing.

At twenty-nine, Nma had become an expert at accepting less than she truly wanted.

For three nights after Chinedu's announcement, Nma barely slept. She lay awake staring at the ceiling while the rest of the house breathed quietly around her. According to Chinedu's mother "Management is a respectable course, You'll get your certificate and you can even work in an office one day but most of all your home won't suffer."

Management.

The word sounded foreign, it had never appeared in her dreams not even in her prayers and never in the future she had imagined as a little girl sitting beside her grandmother's hospital bed. Every time she closed her eyes, She saw herself dressed in white standing beside a patient, offering the same comfort that had once been offered to her grandmother. That was the life she had always imagined and had promised herself.

Not one behind an office desk.

And now... Someone else had chosen a different life for her. Again.

Has Chinedu forgotten their promise? The promise beneath the mango tree. The one he had made while holding her hand. He was no longer speaking as the young man she had fallen in love with.

The following day, she stood alone on the veranda while the children chased each other around the compound. Chinedu joined her.

"You've hardly spoken."

"I'm thinking."

"I know you're disappointed."

She laughed softly. "Disappointed?, I don't even know if that's the word anymore."

He rested his elbows on the railing. "Nma...Life changes, so do dreams."

She turned to look at him. "Did yours?"

He frowned. "What?"

"When you wanted to become a manager, did someone tell you to become something else?"

He remained silent but she continued. "When you applied for jobs, did anyone tell you your family had already chosen your future?"

She looked away before he could answer.

"I already know."

That night, after everyone had gone to bed, Nma opened the wooden wardrobe. At the very bottom was the old Biology textbook. She lifted it carefully, as though afraid it might fall apart, the pages had yellowed with age. Inside the front cover was the familiar handwriting.

"Never stop believing in tomorrow."

She smiled through tears. "I'm sorry." She wasn't speaking to the book, she was speaking to the sixteen-year-old girl who had carried it all the way from her village to Enugu. "I'm so sorry."

She traced the faded words with her fingertips. "I tried...I really tried." A tear landed on the page, she quickly wiped it away. Then she closed the book with the tenderness of someone saying goodbye to an old friend. She wrapped it in a clean piece of white cloth and placed it inside a small wooden box.

And for the first time in years, the book was no longer on her bedside table.

A few weeks later, Chinedu drove her to the Federal Polytechnic to collect her admission forms. She stepped onto the campus and watched students hurry from one lecture hall to another in their different outfits and some in uniforms representing their departments. Then she saw them: A group of nursing students from the nearby teaching hospital walked past the entrance in crisp white uniforms. They were chatting happily, completely unaware that a woman standing a few metres away was quietly mourning the life they were living. Nma stood still until they disappeared from sight. Chinedu noticed.

"You'll be late."

She nodded. "I'm coming."

Inside the admissions office, the clerk smiled. "Congratulations."

"What course are you registering for?"

For a second Nma couldn't speak. The answer she wanted rose naturally: Nursing. Instead, she heard herself say, "Management."

The clerk wrote it down without looking up, Just one word that took less than two seconds. Yet it erased a dream that had lived inside her for more than a decade.

She graduated four years later with a Higher National Diploma in Management. Her children clapped proudly at the graduation ceremony, Uncle Joseph embraced her with tears in his eyes.

"You've done well."

She smiled. "Thank you, Uncle."

Everyone congratulated her, photographs were taken and food was shared.

No one knew that, tucked safely away in a wooden box at home, was an old Biology textbook.

No one knew that as she held her Management certificate for the cameras, a small part of her was still waiting to wear a white nursing uniform

She smiled for every photograph. Because by then Nma had learned that sometimes the easiest way to hide a broken heart...

...was simply to smile.