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After the rehearsal and his chat with sister Jane, Tonye made his way to the hostel. He had been living in the notorious boys hostel named hall 3, and it would take a few minutes to make his way down there. As a leader, he was supposed to stay at the campus fellowship secretariat but there had been a need to accommodate some stranded new members of the fellowship and hence he had to stay in the poorly maintained and appointed school hostels. His fellowship president had assured him that he would be given a good place as soon as some space cleared up. He took it nicely and moved into his room in the second floor which he shared with seven other people. At first, his room mates had regarded him indifferently, but as time went on, they seemed to take special pleasure in playing pranks with him, and poking fun at him due to his fervent religious beliefs. The first night he had moved into the room, he had summoned all his roommates to join him in evening prayers, the look of indifference and lack of interest he had received from each of them had effectively stopped him from ever extending such an unwanted invitation in the future.

He decided to walk to his hostel, since the rain had stopped completely, leaving only small pools as reminders of its visit. The basement hall was not far from his hostel, and he finally trudged in weary and hungry into his room. He noticed that there was only one other person in the room beside him, Henry, the 400 level student of sociology and anthropology who was his arch nemesis. He was a sworn atheist and was almost always ready to provoke an argument with Tonye in a bid to discredit him. He was also always fond of regaling the rest of the roommates with loud raunchy tales of his sexcapades, especially when Tonye was in the room all in a bid to get him annoyed. Tonye tried as much as possible to ignore him at those times, but sometimes, when his revelry became unbearable, he had no choice but to leave the room and pitch camp elsewhere.

He greeted Henry as he walked in, hardly expecting a response and was actually surprised when he grunted a greeting in reply. He slowly took off his clothes, leaving on his boxer shorts and approached his cupboard. He had cooked rice that morning, a whole pot full, and he expected it would last him for at least two days. When he had first come to the room, he always invited his roommates to eat with him whenever it was that he cooked. He stopped when he noticed that they were all feeding fat from him haven all stopped cooking, and whenever it was that they cooked they never asked him to join them. He brought out hi key from the empty hair cream cup by the window where he hid it and opened the cupboard where he kept his meal. He was really hungry and looked forward to relishing the meal in the warm comfort of his bed, probably without warming it, there was just no time for that. He was very pleased when he saw that the pot had been exactly in the position he left it, and properly covered too. He had half expected to see his cupboard broken into and his food consumed. He did not put it past Henry to do a thing like that, he had been watching him silently and suspiciously through the time he had been cooking in a way that made him uneasy.

He bent down and lifted the pot with a bit more force than was necessary, expecting the pot to be filled, but he noticed that it was remarkably lighter, empty even. With fingers shaking, he lifted the lid and peered inside the pot and realized to his horror that the entire contents had been removed. He immediately spun around on his feet, looking in the direction of his roommate, only realizing at that point that Henry had been watching him all this while. He must have really cut a pitiful and pathetic sight because Henry burst out in a heady derisive laugh at that moment. Tonye was livid. It was obvious that Henry was the culprit and Tonye was tired of being bullied like that. ''How dare you eat my food Henry'' He stormed ''did I cook it for you?'' ''How can you accuse me of eating your food? did you see me eating it?'' Henry replied him defensively.

''Dont pretend like you are not the one Henry. You are the only one who can do a thing like this'' Tonye continued ''Ehn, young man please do not harrass me, what is this? Yes it was me, I ate your food. I was hungry and what did you expect me to do?'' Tonye was taken aback by the admittance of guilt from his nemesis. He was too stunned for a few moments to speak and as he tried to frame his words, Henry quickly added. ''Are you not a christian? what would Jesus have done?'' Those words effectively shut Tonye up, as he jumped on his bunk, leaving his pot on the floor and his cupboard open. It was going to be a long night in hunger, and as he turned on his side to try and sleep, he could not resist but mutter terrible curses at Henry for the pain inflicted on him, and Henrys father for bringing him into the world.

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Tonye King, 22 year old student of Education at the university of Benin was late for choir rehearsal. His last class had closed later than he had expected, finishing at 6 pm instead of 5. His rehearsal was supposed to start at exactly 6:30 pm and he had to go across school to get to his rehearsal venue. As he hastily made his way from his classroom to the nearest busstop, he flirted with the idea of skipping rehearsals, considering the fact that he was both tired and hungry, haven been in class since eight that morning, but quickly discarded the idea when he remembered that he was not only the lead tenor, but also the present serving choirmaster. He had missed one rehearsal in the past, and it had badly affected the morale of his members, they were still rallying and waxing more serious, and another miss so soon would render at least half of the choir members unserious.

As he got to the busstop, the skies which had otherwise been calm grew suddenly dark, and droplets of rain started drizzling. He was almost inside the bus stop but was nevertheless spotted with the first few splashes of rain with hit the dry and caked brown earth, releasing a heady scent that tingled the nostrils. He hoped to catch a bus from that would take him directly to the schools basement hall where the rehearsals were billed to start any time soon.

He was a thin and willowy lad, never being able to gain any weight despite the amount of food he consumed. His extremely fair complexion and average height made him stand out in a crowd, and his calm and gentle manners had endeared a lot of people to him. He had joined the fellowship in his first year, haven been introduced to the exuberant crowd by his elder brother who was the pastor in charge, and had risen steadily in the ranks, thanks to his unique and reliable tenor and his marked humility. His steady rise had been watched and monitored by a number of the members of the fellowship, earning him admirers and as often comes with success, quite a number of secret haters. He never seemed to notice all this, as even his die hard critics would often observe that Tonye was the kind of brother who personified the typical christian life. His elder brother had since graduated, but had placed him in the hands of a veritable mentor and veteran of the fellowship, Sister Jane to offer him close monitoring and spiritual guidance. Sister jane was the immediate past choir director and the present vice president of the fellowship. She was very passionate in discharging her responsibilities both as a leader of the flock and an integral member of the coordinating team of the fellowship. Never before had the fellowship been so blessed with one so alive to her responsibilities.

Tonye knew that Sister Jane would be at the rehearsal and his determination to make it to the venue on time doubled. The rain was gathering strength when he was fortunate to see a cab approaching. He hailed it and gave directions to his destination, settling in and calming his nerves in preparation for the rehearsals. He managed to arrive the venue at the nick of time and after paying the cabbie, he hurried into the hall, defying the freezing rain droplets and the accumulating mud. A few members of the choir were already seated at the venue when he rushed in, and apologizing to them for almost coming late, he opened the special choir box, a wooden contraption about a foot high, which was held all the essentials of the choristers, and which was always kept at a corner of the hall, and distributed the manuscripts for the songs they would be performing that evening. As the raindrops pelted outside, he took stock of those who had made it for the meeting that evening.



At present, there were thirty active members of the choir out of which ten were present that evening. At the front of the group stood sister Ronke, a rotund soprano who always managed to get on everyone’s nerve with her constant bickering and complaining, behind her was brother Wale, a quiet and reserved baritone who managed to get along with everyone, there was also shy Sylvia, Gossiping Gloria and Lazy Lanre. The odd mix and assortment of his members contributed in no small measure to increase the fun and intrigue in the choir. It took a while for him to get his members adequately prepared to begin rehearsals, and when he started, he was so enraptured in the flow of the music as he always was, despite the absence of any instruments and instrumentalists that he lost track not only of time but his hunger and weakness as well. It was about an hour into the rehearsal which was going on very successfully when the vice president sister ane walked in through the rear exit. Tonye had no idea she was there and kept on with his rehearsal for another full thirty minutes before he turned back and noticed her sitting on one of the benches in the hall.

He quickly broke up the rehearsal, looking at his watch, and deciding that it was time to call it a day. He told brother Lanre to lock up the valuables and rushed to where sister Jane sat, apologising profusely for not seeing her earlier. ''I am so sorry sister, I did not know when it was you walked in'' He started '' Oh no, its fine, it is not a problem, I was really enjoying the rrehearsal and I wished you had not stopped. You are doing a really good job brother, I must commend you'' ''thank you very much ma'' He replied ''Anyway, that is not why I am here today, there is an issue of extreme importance I want addressed as soon as possible'' she continued ''Ah, ma, I hope there is no problem?'' he inquired ''No not at all, brother Tonye, as a matter of fact things are going on well, there are just some issues I want us to trash out'' she finished ''Oh okay. Please tell me, what are they?'' he asked ''No, wwe can not talk about them here.

I want you to come to my room at the secretariat on sunday evening after service. It is important that we discuss them in private'' she told him sunday was a good three days away, but Tonye did not allow curiosity to overwhelm him as he readily agreed to meet her there. She thanked him and walked away, and he could swear he noticed a sly grin cross her face. Somehow he could not help but shake away the uneasy feeling that settled in the pit of his stomach as his hunger and weakness returned with a rush.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

All writers and readers on nairaland Literature forum. Thank you.


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To the loving memory of Mr & Mrs. Ozode, my inlaw.



I would appreciate your comments and constructive criticism. The title is not too strong as far as I am concerned and will appreciate suggestions on the title.

I will update weekly or twice weekly as my tight schedule permits

Thanks for the update.
Is this really the end??

Wonderful.
OP can i have your digits?

This is wonderful....
Superb..

twoderful..

Op, please inbox me your digits for appreciation

olanshile2016:
....

Thanks for the mention.
This is a very interesting piece.

One love bro