A child's Innocence.

I think it was on a Wednesday and I had been absent from school for two days due to a brief illness. So I decided to remain in class and complete the notes for the lessons I had missed on Monday and on Tuesday. I knew I might not get the job done at home when there's always a TV screen in front of me.

Thank you 🙏

By the time I had completed my task, I was the last person left in the class. On my way out, i spotted a sum of about eight hundred naira( almost two dollars) on the floor, just few inches away from the classroom door. Picking it up, I regarded the money closely. Surely, it had fell off from another class member. The money could be the child's transport and feeding allowance for the week, I thought. I definitely knew that the owner of the money would be in serious distress as soon as her or she finds out that they had dropped it.

The following morning, I handed the money to our class teacher and I told her the story behind it. Mrs maimuna made an announcement to the whole class and the owner of the money was discovered within a short while.

By the way, the idea of killing the money never occurred to me when I was alone in the class the previous day. Why would it? Looking back, I thought maybe it was because I never had money problems at that time. I have always had alot to eat. After a healthy breakfast, Mom would still dish out a substantial lot in my lunch box. Infact during break, I might just have to invite some other girls to join me in the feast as I wouldn't be able to swallow everything on my own. And ofcourse , dad would also give me some cents to spend during breaktime just incase i wanted anything that children would love to buy like :candies, chocolate and other junks that kids desired.

And as soon as i return home from school, my plate of food is already on the dining table waiting for me. I think food is about the first thing I see as soon as i open the door of our house. I don't even have to remove my school uniform before I start to attack my meal and I never cared if they got badly stained. Mom would definitely perform her magic again and they would be as good as new before going to school the next day. Maybe she buys a new uniform for me anytime she goes to get other items at the market , cause I really couldn't understand how my uniform could be looking so neat every morning even though there were days when I had ruined them with realy stubborn stains while at school. But I still didn't care, that's mom's business, not mine. Immediately after I had returned home,I'd be so glad to engage in two things at once. A mouth being continually stuffed with food and also delighting in an alluring cartoon network in front of me.

Basically, when I was much more younger, I ate five to seven times as day, including dinner. So,I had absolutely no reason to take some one else's money. I couldn't possibly eat money, could I? Lol.

I never thought about money since I had enough to eat. So, the temptation of keeping the missing money to myself never ever crossed my mind. Honestly I wouldn't even know what I would use it for. I even thought about leaving it on the floor till the following morning when the real owner would come pick it up. But we had always being taught in class, to return missing items to the appropriate authorities.

After that incident, Mrs maimuna , our class teacher always maintained a warm smile any time she sees me or whenever she was having a conversation with me. Needless to say that she had been impressed by the "integrity" of a little girl. I also told mom about the incident, and she also smiled at me and told me that I had done the right thing as they were absolutely no reason at all for me to have taken that money. This event actually happened when I was in my first year in Junior high and I was around eleven at the time.

The following term, a more unfortunate incident happened in class. A student who had her school fees on her had forgot to pay it at the cashier's as soon as she had arrived at school. It was after the break was over and we had all returned to class that she realized her error. She quickly brought out the money from the bag and ran to the office for payment. The cashier revealed to her that about five percent of the money was missing but the girl was very sure that her school fees had been complete when her father gave it to her.

It was now very easy to suspect that another student in class must have tampered with the money when we all went out to play. This made our class teacher, Mrs maimuna very furious. Ofcourse she had in many occasions warned her students against such bad habits and why young children should never steal. Needless to say,she was very dissapointed in us.

I was also shocked that a student in class could steal money . All of the cases of money heist I have seen on TV were being perpetrated by grown-ups, some of them even had guns. How could a small child steal money, I thought. How could someone be having money problems when he or she is not yet an adult? What would he or she use the money for? Doesn't he eat enough food at home and at school, just like the way I do? My little mind kept thinking about all the possible reasons while a little child would open another's bag and steal her school t fees, but the whole thing never made any sense to me, so I gave up thinking.

Each and every student in the class was asked to contribute a certain sum of money in other to make up for the stolen money . Since we couldn't catch the thief, we all had to pay for the crime, aunty maimuna told us.

But to my surprise, Mrs. Maimuna exonerated me from the punishment. She announced to the whole class that she would personally pay my fine. She reminded the whole class about the incident that happened the previous term where I returned the missing money of a student I found in the class even though I had the opportunity of taking it and no one would know .

So, according to her, it was impossible to imagine that i might be the one who had taken this girl's money. She wouldn't even believe that even though I had been sharing thesame seat with the victim. She said that I had already proven my integrity to her and the rest of the class a long time ago.

I just can't explain how I had felt when Mrs maimuna made that speech, but at that moment, I definitely knew that I would never forget what she said about me for the rest of my life. I would never forget her too.

When Mrs maimuna had finished talking, I turned around to take a glance at the faces of the other class members since my seat was the first in the row. I saw alot of faces frowning at me, but two or three faces still smiled at me and I smiled back at them. I couldn't blame those who were angry that I wasn't made to pay the fine when they had paid. could I ? They were paying for an offence they never committed, so i understood the reason for their bitterness.

For the rest of the day, I kept wondering who the thief could be. Was he/she among those that were frowning at me? It's also possible that this thief was among the few who smiled. I guess I would never know.

******************************

Thanks for staying with me 💖💖