Hello.
I plan to use this thread for a collection of stories I just started yesterday night. Each story will be posted all at once. There may be long periods where no story is posted. Constructive criticism and other comments are encouraged, please.





Story One.

I open my eyes and they fall on the LED display of my bedside clock. 04:02. Two hours before I have to get up for work. I briefly wonder what woke me up as I turn over to the other side of my king size to resume my sleep. It is cold but my duvet is nowhere to be found, probably on the floor somewhere, a victim of my compulsory mid-sleep ritual of fighting demons. The cold starts to get to me and I debate standing up to retrieve the duvet - the thought does not last long. I dive under the sheets, impressed with my own skills of improvisation, and I am starting to doze when I hear a sound. It’s barely audible and at first, I think my sleepy mind is playing tricks but then I hear it again, like nails across wood, coming from the direction of my broomstick cupboard turned makeshift closet. I am alert at once and I get up quickly, swinging my leg over the side of the bed. I reach for the small bedside lamp and pull the switch. There is a sudden burst of yellowish orange as my eyes take time to adjust to the new conditions. I squint towards the direction of the sound but I cannot see a thing. The sound has stopped now.

“Probably a mouse, fucking parasites.”

The sound of my own voice in the quiet is a little startling, and I can feel the sleepiness begin to evaporate. I glance at the clock again. 04:11. I run a quick calculation in my head and decide that my chances of falling back asleep are about three percent. Well, damn. I pick my phone up, switch the flashlight on, and the room is washed in bright, white light. The martyred duvet is pooled at the foot of my bed and I move to pick it up. A draft of cold breeze as I pass by the windows causes me to pause, and as I move the curtains a little bit to the side, the cause of the chill I had felt earlier becomes apparent. Somehow, my windows are wide open, and a bit of snow has collected on the window sill. Even more disturbing, I could’ve sworn I’d closed them before going to bed. The latch is broken but it would’ve taken strong wind to blow the windows wide open like this.

I suddenly feel exposed and vulnerable. The latch should’ve been fixed immediately it broke.I sweep the snow off with my hands, flinching at the wet coldness of it, and I close the windows and draw the curtains back. I sweep the room with my flashlight, and it comes to rest on Maggie's small cot in a corner of the room. It is empty.

My breath catches in my throat and I slip into my padded slippers as I walk quickly to the bedroom door and switch the lights on. I look around the room, no Maggie. As I walk into the hallway, I hear soft whimpers from the living room and I gratefully head toward the sound, praying to God in my head that Maggie has not hurt herself. I slip my phone in my pocket as I get to her and she barely acknowledges my presence, only doing so by increasing the volume of her whimpers when I crouch in an attempt to lift her up. My fears are confirmed when my hands come away from her body wet and slick, and I begin to have a panic attack. I stand up quickly, my slippers making squishy sounds as I make blindly for the only light switch in the room. I flick it on and turn immediately to Maggie.

She is lying in a small pool of her own blood, one ear torn almost completely away from her head. Her eyes are full of blood too and one of them is almost swollen shut. She makes a feeble attempt to crawl toward me and a small fold of her intestines drags along the floor with her, drawing a short line of blood away from the pool around her. I can hear the sound of my own heart as it beats wildly against my ribcage. It takes more than a moment for me to regain my senses and when I do, my first instinct is to scream. My first attempt comes out as a choked cry, and I do not get a second attempt as a strong hand roughly grabs me from behind and stifles my cry with a rough palm held tightly against my mouth.

“One more fuckin’ sound, and you gon' die like yo dog” he whispered.

In a mad fit, the threat fails to register in my brain and, twisting wildly, I free myself from his grip, scratching him across the face in the process. I must have surprised him because he does not react immediately. In fact, he just stares stupidly after me as I make a mad dash for the lights, flicking it off. Thrown into sudden darkness, but boosted with the knowledge that I have the advantage of a familiar terrain, I sneak back into the hallway toward my room, adrenaline pumping, trying hard to be quiet to avoid giving away my location. I can hear him now, cursing in the living room. A slanting reflection of light shows that he has managed to turn the lights back on. And as I hear him move into the hallway, I pull my phone out of my pocket and dial 911.

“911, what is your emergency?

I am too scared to make a sound, so I mute the speaker, leave the line open and quietly opening the door to my closet, I walk into it. I store my hockey sticks in my closet after practice every week, and as the kitchen is on the other side of the house, they are the closest things I have to a weapon. I close the door almost completely, leaving a tiny rectangular space, just enough to look into a part of the room. I feel around for one of the hockey sticks and as my hands close around one of them, I wait.

I do not see him, but finally I hear him walk into the room, slowly, judging by the sound of his boots on the tiled floor. He makes no sound for a while, except for his ragged breathing, and just when I begin to wonder If there’s a chance he doesn’t notice the closet, I hear his boots approach my hiding place.

It is pointless to scream, my home is the only one around for miles. My hands tighten around the stick, which now seems a pitiable excuse for a weapon, and I debate handing myself the advantage and rushing out at him, or simply wating and riding out my luck. My choice is made for me when a a mouse suddenly rushes out from somewhere behind me and over my feet. Reflexively, I jerk away from the spot and, as if on cue, he pulls open the closet door, dragging me out by my hair and snatching the now-useless stick away from my grip. He slaps me hard across the face and throws me on the bed. In the same move, he’s suddenly on top of me, trying to hold me down and unbuckle his belt as I lash out ferociously, scratching and punching every part of his body that I can reach. In one stroke of luck, I strike him in the eye and he makes some sort of animal noise, holding one hand to his face and pinning me down with the other.

“That’s it you lil’ bitch. You gon’ git what you askin’ for now!”

He punches me hard in the face and the fight completely goes out of me. I am dazed and I can feel myself losing consciousness, unable to resist any of his efforts at pinning me down. I think he sees this too, because he releases me and focuses on getting rid of his belt and trousers.

“Please...don’t”

The last thing I hear as I fade into oblivion is the distant sound of sirens.

Wow...that was intense, well written and well led

sheikshegetto:
Wow...that was intense, well written and well led

Thanks! Constructive criticism allowed too, please.

Artwork and written content originally by me. DO NOT PLAGIARISE

Jungle Injustice?


He throws a glance toward the wife. She is half-sitting, half-falling off the rocking chair with two broken legs in the corner of the small room in which they now live - him, her and their three children. She holds the new addition to her chest, and he listens to the loud suckling sound the infant makes as she feeds hungrily on her mother's ample bosom.

Impatient now, he clears his throat loudly. She barely looks up at him and only acknowledges his presence with a small hiss, readjusting her position on the doomed chair. A little confused, a little angry, he speaks up

"Woman, am I to starve to death this morning? Where is my food?"

She takes one long, irritated look at him

"Which food abeg? The one wey you give me money for? Abi I resemble magician? Your pikin no chop better food for three days, you open that your condemned mouth dey ask me for food. Go find better work if hungry dey catch you. Lazy, shameless man!"

Taken aback, his first instinct is to rush at her, give her a sound beating and send her back to her father. The feeling is overpowered by his confusion. She has never spoken to him in this manner before. In fact, this is the first time she has raised her voice against him, she would always concede during arguments, and there was even a time when she could barely look him in the eye when he was angry. So, why the sudden change?

"You no fit talk? Dog chop your tongue? I say go find better work make your family chop! Have you no shame?! Nneka's husband got her a new necklace yesterday. He gives her fifty thousand naira every week for soup. What have you ever given to me?! Ehn?! Answer..."

Livid now, he barks in fury

"Amadioha strike you down where you sit if you utter another word!"

Breathing heavily, blinded with shame and anger of a kind he has never felt before, he changes his shirt, pulls on the same pair of trousers from the previous day and storms out of the room.

Once outside, he sees his second son, Emeka. He is playing with that piece of wood again. The one he somehow manages to pretend is a truck, pushing it back and forth across the sand and making laughable impressions of a car engine with his mouth and nose. He stops, entranced, for a second and the boy soon notices him.

"Papa. Good mooring, papa"

He ignores the boy and steps into the street.

* * * * * * * * * *

He has no idea where to go, and he simply wanders around the neighbourhood for a while. He notices the people giving him curious stares, and he feels a little uneasy. He has heard stories of the precarious security situation of his new home, but there was no choice, really. It is the only place he could possibly afford, especially after getting laid off at his government job.

The government. He scoffs.

He had been working as a janitor at one of the government hospitals in the city. They had received no pay for five months preceding the day he was sacked, along with a lot of workers at the hospital. The reason they were given was that the economy was failing, and the government had to "cut budgets", even though everybody knew that the governor had been lining his already fat pockets with the salaries of his workers, in preparation for the upcoming elections. At the time, he was neck deep into debt and nobody would lend him money anymore. His rent was overdue and the landlady was threatening to kick him out. His first son had been forced to stop schooling after his secondary school and the once brilliant boy was fast becoming a nuisance around the house. Emeka's education also had to be stopped - although temporarily - so they wouldn't have to worry about his fees. His wife had just had another baby and it was an extra mouth to feed. The day he received the sack letter, he had locked himself up in one of the bathroom stalls and cried like a baby. He had gone straight home, fighting the urge to stop at the beer parlour, and straight to his bed to sleep, offering no explanation to his curious wife. Three days later, under the cover of nighttime, he left the house with his family and they moved to this new place. Presumably, to take a stab at a new life, free of debt.

He stops and looks around. He realises he has wandered some way from familiar territory while he was lost in thought. He is at some sort of mini marketplace and the chatter of the people buying and selling is what brought him back to Earth. He starts to look around the various stalls, deciding that it will be useful to know the goods sold here, so his wife would not always have to go all the way to the bigger market in town. He chuckles to himself at the irony of his situation. He has just practically been kicked out of his own house by his wife for having no money, and the next minute he is 'shopping' for things he cannot afford. He is about to turn back and go home when an object in the display of a stall beside him catches his attention.

It is a toy truck. A medium-sized, blazing red fireman's truck. It sits beside smaller cars, like a god among them, a god wrapped in recyclable plastic. The first thing that runs through his mind is the reaction on his Emeka's little face if he somehow manages to get this for him as a gift. He can picture the boy's wide grin, tooth gap and all, and this brings a small smile to his own face. He turns to the shopkeeper, a teenager probably helping out her mother, or working for the real shop owner.

"Make I see that toy inside dia. The big, red one"

She stands and pulls the truck out of the display. She holds it out to him.

"Dis wan? Na one-two"

Startled, he reflexively snatches his already extended arm back. He did not expect it to cost that much. One thousand two hundred naira for a toy truck? Haba! That would feed his family for two days in their current situation. The thought of his son's face swims back into focus and he digs into his pocket and pulls out all the money in it. He counts just four hundred and fifty naira. He could have sworn he had more in there. Probably in his other trouser, back at home. The expression on the girl's face turns sour as she sees this, and she starts to put the toy back in the display.

"Wait fess na. Bring am make I see am. I go pay the money."

With a doubtful look on her face, the girl hands the truck over to him. He rolls it around in his hands, pretending to admire it, his brain working furiously. He contemplates offering to come back to pay the rest of the money, but he dismisses the thought as soon as it comes. No chance. There is only one way he leaves with the truck. He says a brief prayer of forgiveness to God, and he turns to run.

"Oga, where you...? Eeeh!! Thief! Thieeef!!!"

Panting already, he sprints as fast as he can, unsure if he is going back the way he came. He can hear more people joining in the 'thief' chant, and soon enough, from the corner of his eye, he sees some people running after him. The full realisation of what he has just done hits him. But it is too late to stop now. Turning into a backstreet, he increases his pace, the truck starting to feel heavy in his hand.

It is quieter here, and it seems he has left the chants a long way behind him. He starts to slow down to catch his breath, when he feels a heavy stone smash into the back of his head. The truck drops from his hand as he clutches his head in agony, his palms slick with blood. He hits the floor on his knees as his vision starts to go blurry. Pumped full with adrenaline, he shelves the pain and struggles to his feet, blindly making his way forward, away from the sounds of the slap of feet on the sandy, untarred road. He spares a look back at his pursuers, and he is in time to see one fly at him, tackling him to the ground. In a fit of animal fury, he lashes out at his assailant, catching him square on the jaw with a powerful blow. The man groans but holds onto him, pinning him to the ground with the superior power of a strong, healthy youth.

Within seconds, they are surrounded by an angry mob.

* * * * * * * * * *

As she watches her husband storm out of the house, Adanma feels remorseful, and she immediately wants to go after him to apologize, but her pride overrides her remorse and she merely seethes in silence. The baby is starting to fall asleep, and she gently removes her breast from its small mouth as she carefully places her on the bed. She takes the short trip around the bed which takes up most of the room space, and she quietly lay beside her little daughter, planning to fall asleep beside her.

She suddenly remembers that she hasn't seen Emeka in the past hour. Panicked, she gets up quickly and rushes outside, where she sees him intently trying to nail bottle caps into a piece of wood on the sand.

"Emeka, leave that thing and come here"

The boy is very reluctant and as he sees her turn toward the house, he deftly slips the wood and the bottle caps into his pocket. She sees this but decides to ignore it and let him have his fun. She makes a mental note to throw the items back out as she leads him back into the room.

Once inside, the thoughts of her behaviour earlier start to affect her again, and this time, common sense prevails, and she grudgingly concedes that she overreacted. She starts to worry about her husband, wondering where he stormed off to, and what she has to do to make things right with him upon his return.

She reaches under the bed and pulls out her small box of belongings. She unzips this and, groping under the carefully folded clothes, her hands come in contact with what she is looking for. She takes out the small black nylon and unties it, revealing the contents. It is all the money she has left in the world, and she almost changes her mind about recompense. Five thousand, five hundred naira. She removes a thousand naira note and replaces the nylon to its original hiding place. This would afford enough ingredients for her to make her husband his favourite meal.

Decisively, she tells Emeka to watch over his sister and she leaves the house, locking the children inside. She steps into the street and hails a kẹkẹ. They argue briefly over the fare and she eventually gets in, headed toward the town market.

* * * * * * * * * *

Ike stumbles down the bus that has just stopped him at the junction to his house. It is dark already and he is slightly drunk. He is used to this now though, and he can still manage to find his way. His friends have all gone to their houses, the snakes. They had contributed to making sure he left the beer parlour with barely any money left, but once that was done, each one had given some excuse or the other, eventually leaving him there by himself. The shameless snakes.

He briefly wonders if his father has noticed the missing money. The five hundred naira that he stole earlier that day before leaving home, when he discovered that the money he had with him might not be enough. This makes him laugh to himself, another small victory against the man that had caused his life to take such a sour turn. The man that had forced him to stop schooling, even though he was doing so well. Score one for Ike!

He drags along the deserted road, barely taking in his surroundings, following a path that he has become familiar with in the past week. He takes a turn and moments later, he tramples on something that crunches beneath his feet. He looks down and although it is dark, he makes out the shape of what looks like a burnt portion of some animal's leg. He steps around it but he has hardly taken four more steps when he steps into some sort of soft matter, his slippered feet sinking slightly into it. Disgusted, he kicks himself free of it and his toe comes in contact with something hard, rolling it a few feet away from where he stood. He moves closer to it, slowly,and as a sliver of moonlight catches on it, he makes out the shape of a nose, an ear, a mouth,and he realises that the burnt body part that he had stepped on earlier did not belong to an animal.

Convulsing, he sprays a stream of vomit on the floor at his feet. Not waiting to recover, he half staggers, half runs the rest of the way home. Terribly scared, he begins to scream.

* * * * * * * * * *

Well structured and organized
bottoms up

Taniaa:
Well structured and organized

bottoms up

Thanks!

Greg smiled to himself as he stepped into the public toilet. It felt good to help people in need. He thought about the old man in the white jalamia, and how he'd struggled endlessly to lift the heavy box he'd been dragging onto his back until he came along. He briefly wondered about the curious dressing of the man - all the necklaces and wrist-bands - but he dispeled the thought as quickly as it came. These Nigerians dressed in all sorts of weird clothing so it was probably no big deal.

He whistled softly as he strolled to the urinal for a pee he'd been holding in for hours. He dragged the zip of his shorts down and tried to pull out his member, but his palm grabbed air. He looked in the mirror and he saw a smooth, unblemished mound of soft flesh that was now where his penis had been. As he opened his mouth to scream, a stream of yellow liquid escaped his throat and spattered the mirror in an endless avalanche of piss.