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THE ADVENTURES OF A FIRST CLASS OLOSHO

A Memoir by Ese

Chapter One – The Day the Sky Fell

I was nineteen when the sky fell. Not the literal sky, but the kind that sits over your life and makes you believe the world is safe. My parents went to a wedding in Ibadan that afternoon. I remember helping my mother tie her gele before they left. She promised to bring me a plate of jollof from the reception.

They never came back.

A trailer with failed brakes crushed their car. They said my parents died instantly. Instantly. What does that even mean? The bodies I saw in the mortuary weren’t instant. They were slow, broken things that smelled of blood and petrol.

At the funeral, Uncle Bassey took my shoulders and looked me dead in the eyes.

“Don’t worry, Ese. As long as I’m alive, you will never suffer.”

I didn’t know then that his words were a curse.

Chapter Two – The Man in the Doorway

Living with him was supposed to be temporary. He had a wife who traveled often for her trading business, and two noisy boys who barely noticed me.

At first, he was kind. Gave me a small room, bought me toiletries, asked about my day. But then came the nights when his eyes stayed on me too long. When his hand brushed against me in the kitchen.

One night, when his wife was away, he called me into the sitting room. I remember the smell of beer on his breath. I remember the way my chest tightened.

“You’ve grown into a fine woman, Ese,” he said, moving closer.

When he touched me, I froze. I thought if I didn’t move, it would end quickly. I was wrong. That night, my world broke for the second time.

And it didn’t stop. Whenever his wife was gone, he came. He told me no one would believe me if I spoke. He told me I would be blamed.

The day I refused him, he threw me out. He didn’t shout. Just told me to pack my clothes into a nylon bag and dropped me near CMS.

“Go and feed yourself in the streets if you think you’re too big.”

It was raining. I had three thousand naira in my pocket and no place to go.

Chapter Three – Lagos Nights

The streets are loud at night. Too loud for a girl who has nowhere to sleep. I curled up under the Obalende pedestrian bridge, holding my bag like a baby. Men walked past, some offering “help” with their eyes and voices. I learned quickly: no one offers anything for free.

By the third night, hunger was a sharper pain than fear. That’s when I met Amaka. Tall, light-skinned, wearing jeans so tight they looked like skin. She was smoking by a buka.

“You no go last for here if you no get sense,” she said, eyeing me.
“Sense?” I asked.
“Use wetin you get to get wetin you want.”

She took me in for the night, fed me, and the next day introduced me to the streets properly.

It started small: standing by the roadside, leaning into tinted windows, quoting prices with a shaky voice. By the second week, I learned the rules — cash first, never trust a man without a condom, and always carry a blade.

Chapter Four – First Class Olosho

Months later, I wasn’t the girl who cried under a bridge anymore. I was small pepper — the girl who could make men empty their wallets for a night. My hair was Brazilian, my nails perfect, my clothes loud.

I moved from street corners to high-end clubs in Victoria Island. Soon, I was flying to Abuja on weekends, wearing heels worth more than the rent of some flats in Ajegunle.

We called ourselves First Class Oloshos. We charged in dollars, drank champagne with politicians, and posted perfect selfies.

But no matter how high I climbed, I carried that night with Uncle Bassey like a weight tied to my chest.

Chapter Five – The Diagnosis

It began with a cough. Then the fever. Then the rash. I told myself it was stress. But Amaka looked me in the eye one night and said:

“Ese, this one no be stress. Go check yourself.”

The clinic was small. The nurse didn’t look at me when she handed me the paper. HIV positive.

I laughed at first. Laughed so hard I cried. I told myself I could manage. I had survived worse.

But the streets are cruel to the sick. The men stopped calling. The money slowed. My body weakened.

Chapter Six – Revenge

Revenge came to me in the middle of a fever. I thought of Uncle Bassey, the man who had taken my innocence and thrown me into the streets.

I went back to him. Wore my best dress. Smiled like the girl he thought he knew.

“Ese… my dear, you’ve come back,” he said, grinning.

That night, history repeated itself. He didn’t know my blood carried death now. Days later, I heard he was sick. Very sick.

Chapter Seven – The End

We died the same month. Me in my small Surulere apartment, him in the flat where my nightmare began. Both from the same disease, both rotting from the inside.

People say revenge is sweet. They’re wrong. Revenge is empty. It doesn’t give you back what you lost. It only makes the darkness bigger.

Epilogue

I am Ese. I was once someone’s daughter, then someone’s prey, then someone’s fantasy. Now I am gone.

If my story reaches you, let it be a warning: sometimes the world doesn’t kill you in one blow — it kills you in pieces, and it starts with the people you trust the most.

The End