I was walking along the road to buy food from the mama put who cooked delicious egusi and onugbo soup. I was really hungry and needed to eat something fast but I was too weak to walk. Work had been unusually too busy of late. So, I dragged myself as fast as I could, all the while, thinking about home, when things were still good, about Ifem and her delicious cooking then, about the times when it was so easy to laugh. It was nightfall after all, the time I loved to enjoy my reverie the most. I was lost in it when the girl pulled my hands suddenly to stop me. "Good evening sir!"
I turned sharply to look at her, surprised, and at the same time, angry that she had the nerve to pull my hands. A total stranger. But then, I looked at her face, the innocence written on it, the slight uncertain smile, and I melted. A girl of 20 whose eyes told the story of a brittle despair. Especially when she pleaded, "please do you have any money to give me? I haven't eaten since morning and I do not know what to do."
Her words rolled out too quickly, too easily in a startling way. She said that the lock down was making life difficult for her. That she was visiting a friend from Lagos because the friend had promised to get her a job, that she was still searching for the job when the lock down came and made things difficult. "I really need help sir. Anything would be appreciated."
I had only ₦500 on me and that was 'home and abroad' because nothing else was left.The dinner I was going to buy was like a 'last supper'. Because certain failures by the government had left me stranded.
Yet, I couldn't ignore this girl's difficulties. And so I decided to split the money in two. "I don't have much," I explained. "But I can give you a little from this money after I must have bought my food." I asked her to walk with me so that I'd give her the change after buying the food.
As we walked, we talked about things. About her preparations for JAMB, her difficulties at home. She said she was the first child, that she just wanted to get out of home in order to see what life was about out there. That her step father wasn't kind to her. She said she needed the freedom and were it not for the lock down, she would've been happier.
I listened, wondering what it was that made her so comfortable with me, a stranger she'd just met, what it was that was going on on her mind, why she wasn't scared of me and so, I asked her why. "Why are you so free to tell me all that? Why aren't you scared?"
I had to interrupt her with the question because she talked so freely. And I had expected her to be startled but she wasn't. Instead, she smiled and said that she had seen my face and had felt it was the least scary, that she had told herself before walking up to me, that I couldn't hurt her, that all I could ask would certainly not go beyond sex, and that it was something she wouldn't mind giving since she already liked me from a far. She looked at me and smiled a little bit more elaborately. A knowing smile. Assured and unwavering. It felt powerful enough to seduce the unguarded soul.
We were now close to the cross road and so, even though I had been so stunned by her boldness and had wanted to talk about it, I kept calm as we waded through the maze of Okadas, and traffic. But, I kept turning the whole thing in my mind. What else could this child must have done since her travails started? Who knew how many men she must have given herself to just in order to eat? I couldn't help thinking of my little nieces. She was just about their age.
After buying the food, I decided that the ₦250 change was too small and so I asked her if she would follow me to my house so I could give her some uncooked rice and more change. "My place is not far," I pointed. "It's just a few minutes walk."
She followed me.
I couldn't stop thinking about her slight frame and chocolate skin. I wondered how much longer before the freshness and firmness of her body would be gone. Plundered by opportunistic men.
As we walked, we talked some more. This time, I did most of the talking. About the mess in the country, about the virus, about how she should focus on her studies and try to get home quickly once the lock down was over, about trying to repair her relationship with her dad. She had spoken of him earlier with obvious disgust.
I told her also, to be careful with men, especially harmless looking ones like me. "We could be dangerous too," I pointed out, looking at the mark on her neck. A statement which made her smile. Especially, when she began explaining that she had been seeing me for quite some time, that considering all the men she had been tempted to give herself to, that I would be the least evil among them. "I'm even attracted to you," she said, trying to avoid my eyes.
She was now more thoughtful as she added that she knew that one way or another, she could certainly be forced to sleep with a man for food and that she would he happy to do it with the man she'd grown to like. "All the times I've seen you pass by, you've looked harmless. I like you."
I was again stunned. Her boldness and openness were remarkable. I had never seen it before. I mean... this is Nigeria where if you said something personal, people would rush to use it against you. Why was this girl behaving totally different? We talked until we got to the house and I pointed. We're here. "Would you like to come in?"
"Yes. I would love to."
We were half way through the stirs when I changed my mind. I worried that the hallway was too dark, that it could make her uncomfortable and so I asked her to stop, to wait for me beside the jeep parked outside. I tried to smile as I touched her shoulder gently. "I hope you don't mind." I watched her face. It suddenly lost the smile and enthusiasm. I wondered if it would have looked same had she seen my ring, had I told her that I was married.
I soon returned to see her leaning on the car. "Is it yours?" she asked as she thanked me for the rice and little change. She whipped out her infinix spark. "Let me have your number," she thrust it towards me. "I'd love to chat."
I held the phone. A little while. A few minutes. Then a few more, all the while turning over in my mind, the difficulties that might have put this girl in such a situation as to actively seek out men, the unfairness of it all. The fact that the society was gradually breaking even the children amongst us. Her native hair style reminded me of Reginald Nwankwo's girl friend in the story 'girls at war,' and her famous request "if you must shell, please don't send in the boys," in reference to sex and not releasing of sperm, and I felt like crying at that very moment. I looked at her tiny waist and wondered if she would even be able to take in a full grown man. She looked almost like a teenager.
The rustle of the wind outside broke my thoughts. It was brewing. As if to usher in a minor storm. And so I tapped her shoulder. Out of the blue. "You have to go before it rains. You have to run now."
She looked up and I saw her eyes; they were sad. "I can stay for the night with you," she said, unwilling to take the first step towards the gate. "My friend told me to find a good man and satisfy him, to get him to love me and care for me." She held my hand and rubbed it gently. "Don't you like me?" Her voice was broken. So broken that it got to me as much her soft palms and the caress.
But I pulled my hands away, gently. "You're a child my dear. I like you but you're a child. It wouldn't be fair if I should take advantage of you."
My mind became full of emotions. I wished I could have been able to give her my number and keep in touch. I wished I could have been able to give her a little more help. But, my thoughts would soon be cluttered by the sound of the minor storm. And my anger against the world and how it breaks the children before they're grown.
©Nnaemeka Ugwu.
June 2020.
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