Naija Stories: Of Tears and Kisses, Heroes and Villains

By Myne Whitman

A Glimpse in the Mirror – Yejide Kilanko
If Tears Could Speak – Salatu Sule
Too Late – Bidemi Odeshilo
The Catalyst – Meena Adekoya
Illusions of Hope – Ola Awonubi
Wiping Halima’s Tears – Elohor Turtoe
Every Wrinkle is a Story – Pyneapples
Nnamdi – Sonia Osi

II. Kisses

One Sunday Morning in Atlanta – Uko Bendi Udo
Seeing Off Kisses – John Ugoji
It’s Not That Easy – Lawal Opeyemi Isaac
Two Straws in a Bottle – Remi-Roy Oyeyemi
How I Kissed Hadiza – Seyi Osinowo
All I Wanted Was Another Baby – Mercy Ilevbare
Nothing Good – Damilola Ashaolu

III. Heroes

Can I Please Kill You? – Seun Odukoya
Mother of Darkness – Rayo Abe
Showdown at Rowe Park – Babatunde Olaifa
Visiting Admiral John Bull – Adiba Obubo
Kitchen Practicals – Tamo Iruene
A Kind of Bravery – Myne Whitman
The Old Man in Our Neighborhood – Chidozie Chukwubuike
Rachel’s Hero – Henry Onyema

IV. Villains

Blame It on a Yellow Dress – Uche Okonkwo
The Writer’s Cinema – Bankole Banjo
Jesus of Sports Hall – Lulufa Vongtau
What Theophilus Did – Gboyega Otolorin
Best Laid Plans – Kingsley Ezenwaka
Co-operate! – Tola Odejayi
The Devil’s Barter – Raymond Elenwoke

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Someone once said that the one trait all writers have in common is that they watch for the extraordinary magic that lies in the everyday.

This assertion comes alive in this maiden Naija Stories Anthology with the rich collection of short stories that touch on every aspect of our lives, from the topical issues of resource control agitation as seen in Visiting Admiral John Bull, to more lighthearted issues of wooing a lady as seen in One Sunday Morning in Atlanta, and everything in between.

These are stories about us or about our neighbours or something we’ve encountered in the news. They are what our friends tell us, their pain and joy, their passion and rage, their yearning and their cry against injustice. I enjoyed lots of the stories not just because of their simplicity and brevity but also for freshness they bring to storytelling

• Language: English
• Publisher: Myne Whitman
• Release date: Mar 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781452487267

Myne Whitman

Myne Whitman is a pen name I coined myself while still in secondary school and is a play on the transliterated words of my maiden name. I am quiet and laid-back but do like a good loud debate sometimes.

Book preview

Introduction

Many of my formative years were spent in Nigeria. In my early teens I was in secondary school and it was my morning duty to rake up the leaves in the square before the daily devotion. That is what I’m doing here: preparing the square.

The stories in this volume were democratically selected from the Naija Stories Website (www.naijastories.com), a showcase for rising talent from Nigeria. These are tales of the human condition, the Nigerian human condition. They are not necessarily what the literati of the West think of when they imagine African fiction. Most of the writers do not know one another and have not met except on online forums. The making of this book has been an almost entirely online experience.

Here we get a sense of a generation trying to find its voice. We have stories of every genre. We have done away with the clichéd African. Here we are, with our abortions, our bereavement, our lust, our petty showdowns, our pederasts, our In-Law wahala, our problems chatting up girls in the diaspora, our memories of childhood, our fights, our incest, our love, our examination stress, our metafictional accounts, our encounters with university campus cults, our broken families, our…well, you get the idea. We rob banks, but we also eat salty beans to show our children we love them.

Everybody talks about Chinua Achebe’s fiction but it was always his essays that touched me. He shredded Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’ and shattered my colonial-influenced impression of the savage, i.e. myself.

Achebe wanted the West to view Africa as a continent of people—not angels, but not rudimentary souls either—just people, often highly gifted people and often strikingly successful in their enterprise with life and society instead of through a haze of distortions and cheap mystifications1.

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1. Achebe, Chinua. An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’" Massachusetts Review 18. 1977

We are not savages, noble or otherwise.

We are sons, daughters, husbands, wives, and distant cousins. We are secretaries, lawyers, accountants, anthropologists, and programmers. We buy shares, go to the park, eat, sleep, commit adultery, grieve, die, love, and watch television. Most of us have only seen zebras in the zoo. Our stories reflect our experiences. Most of us have no direct experience of the civil war. Perhaps we care about it, perhaps we do not.

Literature in the Indian subcontinent has been accused of dwelling too much on the Partitioning and colonial rule. Perhaps Nigerian fiction dwells too much on the civil war, the diaspora, the colonisation, or whatever neo-Negro stereotype currently in fashion with our Western literary overlords who determine what is good fiction.

It is said of anthologies that they do not sell.

Well.

I’m Nigerian and there are 155 million of me in West Africa alone. If just 1% of them believe these stories represent them, our job is done.

I’m writing this in Portsmouth, where the author Charles Dickens was born. In fact, I am outside the house where he was born. Imagine a writer so famous that people like me come to look at the bed he had been swaddled in. Yet of black people, Dickens wrote, the mechanical absurdity of giving these people votes. He, like Conrad, was a bit jingoistic, a man of his time, nothing more.

I put aside the rake now, leaves in a neat pile awaiting disposal. The square is ready for you to use.

Begin.

Tade Thompson

Portsmouth, March 2012

List of Stories

I. Tears

A Glimpse in the Mirror – Yejide Kilanko - 11

If Tears Could Speak – Salatu Sule - 25

Too Late – Bidemi Odeshilo - 31

The Catalyst – Meena Adekoya - 39

Illusions of Hope – Ola Awonubi - 47

Wiping Halima’s Tears – Elohor Turtoe - 59

Every Wrinkle is a Story – Pyneapples - 65

Nnamdi – Sonia Osi - 69

II. Kisses

One Sunday Morning in Atlanta – Uko Bendi Udo - 77

Seeing Off Kisses – John Ugoji - 91

It’s Not That Easy – Lawal Opeyemi Isaac - 97

Two Straws in a Bottle – Remi-Roy Oyeyemi - 107

How I Kissed Hadiza – Seyi Osinowo - 119

All I Wanted Was Another Baby – Mercy Ilevbare - 125

Nothing Good – Damilola Ashaolu - 131

III. Heroes

Can I Please Kill You? – Seun Odukoya - 135

Mother of Darkness – Rayo Abe - 141

Showdown at Rowe Park – Babatunde Olaifa - 151

Visiting Admiral John Bull – Adiba Obubo - 157

Kitchen Practicals – Tamo Iruene - 173

A Kind of Bravery – Myne Whitman - 181

The Old Man in Our Neighborhood –

Chidozie Chukwubuike - 185

Rachel’s Hero – Henry Onyema - 189

IV. Villains

Blame It on a Yellow Dress – Uche Okonkwo - 201

The Writer’s Cinema – Bankole Banjo - 205

Jesus of Sports Hall – Lulufa Vongtau - 213

What Theophilus Did – Gboyega Otolorin - 217

Best Laid Plans – Kingsley Ezenwaka - 231

Co-operate! – Tola Odejayi - 237

The Devil’s Barter – Raymond Elenwoke - 245

I. TEARS

Yejide Kilanko

Yejide Kilanko, writer, poet, was born in Ibadan, Oyo State in 1975. A social worker in children's mental health, she currently lives in Ontario, Canada with her husband and three young children. Yejide’s debut novel, Daughters Who Walk This Path, will be published by Penguin Canada in May 2012. To learn more about Yejide, visit her at www.yejidekilanko.com

A GLIMPSE IN THE

MIRROR

Yejide Kilanko

Durosinmi and his newest customer, Mr. Peters, sat silently on a low wooden bench outside the coffin-making workshop. He tapped his scuffed work shoes on the sun-baked clay soil, listening absent-mindedly to the lively human sounds coming from the large open-air market across the road.

It was Friday, the day dusty trucks loaded with fresh tomatoes and peppers from farms in the North arrived in Akure. Hundreds of people from little towns around the State capital flocked in for the bargains.

He dusted off some wood shavings from his overalls and maintained a respectful silence while the middle-aged man flipped back and forth through the black binder that held laminated pictures of his past creations. He knew that the process of choosing a coffin for a loved one was always a difficult one, and it was obvious from the way Mr. Peters squirmed and chewed nervously on his lower lip that he needed some gentle guidance.

Durosinmi respectfully cleared his throat. Mr. Peters, he said, maybe if you told me what you were looking for, I could help.

Mr. Peters looked at him with reddened eyes. It’s just that these coffins look so ordinary, he said, with a sigh. And my mother was not an ordinary woman.

Durosinmi reached for the blue binder placed beside him. He always waited until his customers asked for something different before handing it over. Yes, mothers are special people, he said. You may find these ones more suitable.

Mr. Peters quickly flipped through the second binder and for the first time since his arrival, he smiled and jabbed his finger at a laminated page. This is exactly what I want, he said, in an excited voice. My mother had always wanted to travel on an airplane. Since she did not get to do this while alive, I want to send her off into the afterlife in one.

Durosinmi glanced at the page. The coffin Mr. Peters wanted was a replica of the Nigerian Airways Boeing 727-200 plane. It came with both the landing gear and cockpit. You have very good taste. This model is very popular. In fact, I just finished two last week.

Mr. Peters frowned. Hmm, I don’t want something that everybody has seen. He ran his fingers across the picture. Can you paint my mother’s face on the side of the plane? he asked. I will bring you her picture.

Durosinmi nodded. I can get someone to do it. But that would be an added expense. With the high cost of imported wood, these ones go for at least N350, 000.

Money is no problem, Mr. Peters said, with a confident wave of his hand. I’ve already secured a bank loan to pay for the funeral. It is a lot, but I know that my mother’s spirit in heaven will reward me doubly for whatever amount I spend.

Inwardly, Durosinmi snickered. People who erroneously believed in the idea of an afterlife constantly amused him. Death for him would be like a peaceful sleep from which he would not awaken.

But who was he to complain about making a profitable sale? In that case, he said, I’ll need at least a 25 percent deposit to start work.

Mr. Peter scrambled to his feet. Let me quickly go to the bank and withdraw the money. I’ll be right back.

Durosinmi watched him go, knowing that he would come back with an amount that he probably did not spend on his mother while she was alive. He loved guilty customers the best.

***

Later that afternoon, after Durosinmi finished the final touches on the Marlboro Red coffin ordered by a tobacco merchant’s widow, he wiped down the dusty machines and swept up debris from under his work tables in the cramped one-floor workshop. He had decided to close the shop early because of a headache that refused to go away.

Tidying his tools for the next day’s work, Durosinmi reflected on the need to get an assistant. He had played with the idea when his father died five years back but then business had been manageable. It was no longer the case. The combination of bad roads, poor medical services and the scourge of AIDS had contributed to a high demand for coffins. He could barely keep up with the orders that came in every week. He decided then to send a message to his mother. There had to be a responsible relative willing to learn the trade.

Driving home, Durosinmi’s mind went back to the conversation he had with a friend the previous week. This friend had wanted to know if he said prayers to ensure the success of his business. The truth was that he had never been a praying man. When he arrived at his workshop in the morning, he mumbled something over his tools. Yet he doubted that the ramblings qualified as prayers. He clearly remembered the look of horror that had contorted his friend’s face. Don’t you realize that when you pray for more business, you’re praying that more people should die? he had asked.

The logic behind his friend’s question was why Durosinmi had wanted nothing to do with the family business. His father, Baba, had inherited the business from his father who also inherited it from his father. It was what their family did.

As a young man just out of secondary school, all he had wanted to do was leave Akure for a bigger city. Baba’s disappointment was very evident when Durosinmi had finally summoned up the courage to tell him of his plans. Baba had raised four sons and he was the last. His older brothers had each decided not to work in the family business. Durosinmi knew that he was his father’s last hope.

Why, my son? Baba asked him. Why do you want to leave me too?

Eyes downcast, Durosinmi shuffled his feet. But Baba, how can I make money off the pain of others?

Look at me, Baba commanded. He did, and he saw the understanding in his father’s eyes. Baba patted him on the shoulder. My son, we’re all going to die someday, he said. We build coffins because we don’t throw our dead out on the streets. We can only pray not to bury the young, and for our elderly ones to grow old and grey. It’s an honest job.

Baba’s words had not convinced him to change his plans and he had insisted on leaving.

His mother came running at the sound of his father’s angry voice. She pulled him out of the sitting room. But Durosinmi, Mama chided gently when they sat in her bedroom, I told you to let me find a way to tell him.

Durosinmi shook his head. Mama, you told me to wait two months ago. I want to go now. It’s not fair that I should have to stay when my brothers have gone.

Please my son, Mama pleaded, with tears in her eyes. Your father is an old man. He needs a son to help him.

But I need to find my own way.

Three days later, Baba summoned him to the sitting room and asked if he had changed his mind. No, sir, Durosinmi said, in a low but firm voice. He loved his parents but he was no longer a child.

Baba’s look of disappointment quickly turned into anger. If you will not do as you are told, he barked, leave my house and don’t come back!

Durosinmi packed his bags that evening and left for his brother’s house in Lagos. But he did not stay away for long.

Five weeks after his departure, Baba had a massive stroke and became paralyzed. He later recovered some mobility in his limbs but he was never the same man. When Baba returned from the hospital, Durosinmi picked up his father’s tools, knowing that he could never again speak of leaving home.

A couple of years later, his father had another stroke. He was the only one at Baba’s side when he passed. As life ebbed out of him, Baba was unable to speak. Holding his limp hand, Durosinmi’s heart thumped fast from the fear and desperation that widened his father’s eyes in those last minutes. Baba’s mouth opened and he gasped. He had the feeling Baba wanted to tell him something, but could not. That look in Baba’s eyes haunted Durosinmi every time he thought about his father.

After Baba’s death, his mother moved away to live with one of his brothers. Mama told him she needed grandchildren to keep her busy. Just a few months shy of his twenty-fifth birthday, Durosinmi saw no need to rush into marriage. He considered himself a good man. Unlike most of his friends, he did not drink, smoke or chase women. While his parents had raised him as an atheist, they had always emphasized the importance of being good to others. They had rarely turned down requests for help and as far as he knew, wished no one evil. If indeed there were a supreme being, surely he or she would see that they had earned their place in heaven. That was, if such a place existed.

***

Durosinmi sighed and turned off the main road into a windy, untarred street named after his father. Their family had been the first to move to the street. He winced as the bottom of the car scraped against the large stones jutting out of the road. He could not afford another emergency visit to the mechanics. He had just stopped the car in front of his house gates when he saw Baba Ibeji standing in front of their bungalow, dressed in the usual white shirt and blue trousers that were a holdover of his days as a school principal, and waving to him.

Smiling, Durosinmi wound down the car window. Good evening, sir.

Baba Ibeji smiled back. Good evening. You’re back early today.

Yes, sir. I’m not feeling well.

Baba Ibeji’s face filled with concern. It’s because you’re working too hard. Go and rest. I’ll come and see you later.

Thank you, sir. My greetings to Mama Ibeji.

A year back, Durosinmi had stepped out of his gate early in the morning and heard someone shout out a greeting. He turned and saw a small elderly man with a contagious smile standing in front of the opposite house. He then recalled seeing some people move in the week before. He walked over and prostrated in greeting. Good morning, sir.

Good morning, young man, the elderly man had replied. My name is Baba Ibeji.

Nice to meet you, sir. I’m Durosinmi Ojo.

That meeting marked the beginning of their friendship. He learned that Baba Ibeji and his wife, Mama Ibeji had just moved to Akure from the mountain city of Idanre. They were retired teachers with married twin daughters.

While Mama Ibeji took him under her wing and became his other mother, Baba Ibeji became a father figure and a friend. He had quickly found out that they were Christians and their faith was a big part of their life.

For months, Durosinmi had been convinced he was the subject of their conversion experiment. Why else would two elderly people go out of their way to spend time with a young man they barely knew? He had eventually concluded that all they did for him – the visits, the cooking – were all done out of love. It was very hard for him to understand, particularly because he had turned down all invitations to their church services and prayer meetings. Maybe one day you would come with us, Mama Ibeji said, with a hopeful look after he turned down yet another invitation.

Not wanting to hurt her feelings, Durosinmi smiled. Yes, maybe one day. But as far as he was concerned, that day would never come.

On evenings that Mama Ibeji had left for her Women’s Bible Study meeting, Baba Ibeji would visit him. They would sit and talk until she came back. Soon, Durosinmi began to leave the side gate open for Baba Ibeji, waiting with anticipation until he saw him walk in with his worn bible tucked under his arm. Their conversations often started with discussions about events at the workshop. During the course of the evening, Baba Ibeji would unfailingly open the bible and share different scriptures related to the matters they discussed.

Just like the invitations to come to church, the bible readings made Durosinmi very uncomfortable. His way of handling what he saw as an intrusion was to tune Baba Ibeji out as he read. Some days after Baba Ibeji returned home, Durosinmi would berate himself for not telling the old man not to visit with the book. He knew that his reluctance came more from affection than from any need to conform to suffocating traditional ways. The couple had become like his family, and one tolerated transgressions from family members because of love.

Then one day, Durosinmi found himself listening to the words as Baba Ibeji read. He mulled them over and remembered his father. Before Baba Ibeji left, he shared with him what had happened on the day his father died. Many of their conversations after became centered around death and dying. There was an urgency in his spirit to talk about these issues and they debated them far into the night.

On a slow afternoon at the workshop, Durosinmi was on his way to buy some supplies when three long-faced men from the church down the street arrived to place an order. Their youth choir had been traveling to Lagos for a revival service when their vehicle had a head-on collision with a trailer. Five young teenagers died on the spot.

When he sat before Baba Ibeji later that day, Durosinmi remembered the sorrow on the faces of the church elders and anger surged through him. Baba Ibeji, where was this ever-present God? he asked, in a mocking tone. This loving God you tell me about, was he on holiday when the accident happened? What kind of God allows wicked men to live long healthy lives while striking down young people serving him?

Shaking his graying head, Baba Ibeji sighed. "Their God is alive, Oga Duro. I admit there is still so much I