My name is Ahamefuna, "my name will not be lost," & I have Chelu and Elozona, two friends I love. We survive together in this community. Elozona is the eldest of us, and Chelu is the youngest, although the biggest by size. I am the smallest, maybe because my Ma gives my sisters and me tiny meals to tease our empty bowels so much as once in a day. She says that's the much she can afford. And we believe her because since our Pa left that rainy morning, things, as Ma said, have been difficult. And we could see this in how much she works & in how little she gets. We could see how so much work and almost no food had rid her body of skin and blood. And sometimes, I cannot blink back the tears that pool at the shores of my eyelid when I look at how frail her body has become, so weak her breasts are now like saggy balloons hinged on both sides of her bony chest.
One time I heard our Pastor's wife, Mummy Love, tell her plump children that my sisters and I looked like starving crayfishes, & so they shouldn't play with or come near us at the church's playground. And I see, in their arrogant eyes, the gratifying discrimination that their toothy laughter could not mask. But I don't care; I have Chelu and Elozona to play with, and I know they like to play with me too.
I know they want to play with me because I can see the light that fills their eyes when we roll those sooted roadside tyres on the community's football field. Then afterwards, we would hurry to the river where we eventually wash and rid ourselves of the brown sweat that balms our tender skin & the earthen grime that colours our tired and spindly feet as our bellies hummed with melodies of hunger.
I see it in the way we sing our way back from the icy-effort-at-education that is our school, with our voices very loud & righteous until the veins on our thin necks look like electric cables purveying energy to our parched throats. I see it sparkling bright as they offer their voices to the wind in interwoven cackles as we swim on Fridays under the fading evening light. Even the exuberant current of this abundant water cannot quench this light that pours from their immaculate eyes. I saw it shine brightest today when we stood, like stubborn hairs, on the scalp of Okuata Hill as I told them how dearly I loved them both. It was as if I gave them an electric bulb, and they swallowed it. I think that when I no longer see this light in their eyes, it must be that I am dead, for it is when love is lost that people die.
Chinyere says Love is like a drug, it wears off, and one needs to top it up to make the feeling last. Some days, I return to find steaming..
Read moreFor most humans, greed was the driving force that hurtled them to the doorsteps of Ìyá Alaanu’s ibùdó. However, they always left more...
Read moreThe cut on my head must have been deeper than I thought. My white blouse was already drenched in blood...
Read moreTHE thing about poison is that a small quantity is often a lethal dose, while a substantial amount gets forcefully ejected by...
Read moreI didn’t want to choose between worrying her or asking for help. Even though I knew I had to do both. The Kenya Bureau of Mysteries had...
Read moreNjambi sits silently while the potbellied man who smells like nyama choma and beer complains about...
Read moreShe found scant evidence of his betrayal; an invoice slip here_ for a pair of Dior slip-on’s she never got, a strand of hair that...
Read moreLast night, I had the strangest dream. This wrinkled, stooping old man hobbled up to me as I sat under a...
Read moreWhat do you know about bullet-riddled night skies, About lineages wiped out, children slain in their sleep? About...
Read moreI could tell from the moment that I woke up that this Saturday was unusual. For some reasons, my alarm...
Read moreWhen I am twelve, Mom take me to new school, in Highway, far from where my younger sister Udy go. Mom say I am special child, fine...
Read moreBaba really liked his dog, Efon. It was a very loyal dog. It followed him everywhere – when he wanted to tap...
Read more