“No, no butter”
“What of Bama?”
“No Bama”
“Oh, ok…Tea?”
“Hmm hmm”
“Oh…ah…ok…but, I go fit get pure water na? abeg”
“Uh…no water” I replied as I shook my head slowly, I was lying on my bed in Fajuyi Hall, the hostel for the so called ‘Big Boys’, ‘Big Boys’ who at first bought bread before going to beg for bread spread some five rooms away from theirs. Chukwuemeka Osaziniwandochi was one of them, we called him “Oshuofia” and he got me thinking for a while before I stepped out into what I call “my spectacular day”.
The sun was hot, as noise was defined in the deafening chants of protesters; secondary school girls, all on white hijabs and green flowing robes, whether Christian or Muslim, they did not care, all they cared for was boldly written on most of their placards and banners: “Bring back our girls!”
There were a lot of motorcycles on the road that afternoon, a lot of obviously hungry, haggard policemen, a lot of dust, and a lot of in fact; everything! Everything that wanted to speak for himself or herself, probably even itself, everything that wanted to say “Bring back our girls!”
The Boko Haram terrorist sect had succeeded in kidnapping more than two hundred female pupils, and were threatening to kill every one of them if the government did not release a group of Boko Haram suspects in custody, they had already killed a young beautiful Hausa pupil by brutally stoning her to death, and the “horror movie” as many people called it, was all over most of the social networks. Mr President is currently reckoned more as a dysfunctional robot than an active human being by most of the Nigerian citizens.
I stood in line at the First Bank ATM, behind a big guy that made it look like ‘Incredible Hulk’ was represented by ‘Ridiculous Hulk’. I watched as dust flew up, vowing to defy gravity, all to no avail. The roundabout in front of me was already rounded up, the girls stood in a circle, each one holding her uniquely inscribed placard or banner, either the print was saying something as simple as “Bring back our girls!”, or it contained understandable irrelevances such as “Chai! there is God o!”
The policemen had stopped a couple of black cars close to the bank entrance, where the ATM was , and were asking the passengers to step out, but the doors were firmly shut, and the window glasses were unyielding. Ridiculous Hulk was already at the ATM, so I was next. I noticed the rear door of the car in front, the one closest to me, as it opened to reveal a young man on a black shiny suit. As he attempted stepping out, I noticed he was with something I saw only in movies; a gun! Just then, I remembered that Ridiculous Hulk had been busy on his phone all along, whatever that means, it was too late. I could not look back anymore. Bullets swirled around my head, “Are these real armed robbers, Boko Haramians, or am I on a movie set?” Unfortunately, I did not have the guts to verify.
I found my elder brother running from nowhere, we ran across a lawn, and around a parking lot I had never even noticed before. Intuition told me to lie close to a red car, I yielded right away, but I couldn’t believe what happened next, intuition told me to get up immediately! I kept running till I thought I had lost my big brother to the frenzy of panicking little Protesters, and till I found him by my side again. People were already dead, young and great. “Are these really who I think they are? I will find out from the news.” And that immediately became my reason for running harder, if I wanted to see the news, I had to keep alive!
I ran towards a dusty road, and I felt some things hit me; “Bullets!” but these bullets were not painful, they were soft, like the shards of foam from my pillow, yet they seemed to make my head swirl as they hit me, and suddenly, there was darkness, and then light, I was awake!
I stretched languorously as I willed to fully recall my dream.
I will write the whole episode in my big blue diary, and I’ll call it: My Spectacular Day- the kind of dream my Fatherland makes me have.
“Guy, abeg, I hear say u get peanut butter.”