“Mummy, mummy, I am not going to night vigil,” Demola whined.

“Demola, how many times do I have to tell you that it is vigil, not night vigil. And you must come with your brothers,” his mother said on the phone.

Demola was 12 years old and a smart but lazy boy. He was also the last born. “I don’t like going to vigil. I don’t usually enjoy my sleep, with all those mosquitoes and people shouting when they pray.”

“You are wasting my airtime,” his mother said. “Follow your brothers.” The line went dead.

Demola’s eldest brother snatched his phone from his hand and dropped it in his pocket. “Let’s go now.”

“I’m not going.”

“Let us go and stop wasting our time jor,” Laide, the second born shouted.

“I can carry him if he doesn’t want to follow,” Demola’s immediate elder brother said.

“I will fight you all the way. I won’t go to the vigil,” Demola declared.

“See, I will lock you inside o,” his eldest brother said.

“That’s even better.” Inwardly, Demola smiled. If he were locked inside, he would wake up in the midnight to play PlayStation 4. His mother would beat him tomorrow but it would be worth it.

“Let’s go. We will tell mummy that he is too stubborn.”

The older boys locked him inside and proceeded to church. Demola was elated. He jumped up and down. His mum would beat him tomorrow but he would cry for a while and stop. It was worth it. If only NEPA or whatever they call themselves these days, would provide electricity.

Three hours later, he was awakened by a noise. His room was dark and when he switched on his torch, he saw it was 1 a.m. He imagined his mum and brothers in the church singing and dancing, while he was at home enjoying his sleep. He smiled. He was about to go to sleep when he heard the noise again. It was the sound of shoes treading on the cement floor.

He wondered if his mother and brothers had returned, but it was impossible. The vigil always ended around 3 a.m. and everyone would wait till 5 a.m. in order not to meet with vigilantes and other dangerous people who roamed the night. It could only be a trespasser. He was afraid, but he decided to go check it out.

His brain and mind alert, he opened his bedroom door cautiously and crept down the narrow hallway to their living room. When he got to the front door, he heard voices, many voices.

He wondered how they had gotten inside the compound since his brothers had locked the gate. The only other option was that they must have climbed the fence. His mother had seized his phone the previous day, so he could not call her. He wondered if he should scream, perhaps the neighbors would hear.

Then he heard windows breaking. They were coming in! His chest beating wildly, he ran to the kitchen, quietly opened the door and walked inside. He switched on his torch and used his palm to cover it so the thieves won’t notice anything.

He took two knives, a turning stick which his mother used to turn eba or amala, the long pestle used to pound yams, a frying pan, five forks which he put in his pocket and a stainless plate.

He heard another window breaking in another room and followed the noise. It was his room. He peeped and with the aid of the moonlight, he saw the silhouette of someone struggling to get into his room. Demola crawled towards the person.

The thief put his leg first inside the room. Demola crept up to him, raised the leg of the thief’s trousers and jammed his fork in the thief’s leg. The thief screamed and jumped back outside, the fork still stuck in his leg.

Demola waited. The thief stopped and put his head inside the room to check what had jammed a fork in his leg. Demola was ready. As the head moved inside the room, he smashed the pestle hard on the man’s face; he heard the crush of bones as the head snapped back.

Demola ran back to the hallway and into the sitting room. He saw another thief climbing through the window and just as the person climbed through, Demola flung the stainless plate at the thief. The plate hit the thief on the nose and the thief fell in surprise.

Demola ran to the hallway, dropped the pestle and like he used to do when he was younger, he climbed the wall up. Using his hands and legs on both walls, he lifted himself up until his head touched the ceiling.

Soon, the thief from the sitting room showed up; he didn’t know that Demola was above him. When he came directly under Demola, the latter dropped and landed on the man’s head. The man went unconscious.

As Demola got back to the sitting room, he was suddenly grabbed. “I knew it!” a voice exclaimed. “I knew it was a human being. Did they forget you at home or what? So you are home alone.”

“What should we do to him,” the second voice asked after turning the glare of his torch on Demola’s face.”

“Well, we can’t kill him because we are not murderers, but we can kidnap him for ransom.”

“Before you do that, I must teach him a lesson.” The owner of this last voice staggered towards them. From the torches and the moon’s glare, they could see the bloodied and swollen face of the man.

“What happened to you?” one of the thieves asked.

The fellow pointed at Demola. “It is this bastard. He hit me with a stick. I saw Bolaji unconscious in the hallway. I wonder what this idiot did to him.” In anger, the man delivered a stinging slap to Demola’s face.

Using the man who held him as leverage, Demola jumped up and kicked the man in his swollen face. As the man fell back, the other thief punched at Demola’s head but Demola dodged and the punched landed on the man who held him. Demola was released. He ran, and the thief who had punched him chased after him.

Source: https://opinionsandstories.com/home-alone-nigerian-version/