Chapter One- Nostalgia

The year is 2022(the month of April precisely) in Lagos, Nigeria. The time is 9:23 PM.

The night feels warm and quiet. The echoes of the busy Lagos life have long calmed down. It feels like a good time to write the first chapter of what I hope will be a documentation of events as they have happened and continue to happen.

So here I am, seated on a swivel chair in a dark room across a window overlooking a fence. Honestly, it is not so much of a view, but I like it. 

My whole room smells like lavender, and for some reason, it reminds me of a time in the past. Maybe, just maybe, my childhood home smelled something like lavender. Little wonder the scent of it brings me sparks of nostalgia.

There is not a lot I can remember about my childhood. Or maybe I remember, but not so vividly. But I must tell a few stories from the past to help you understand how I got here—I mean right here at this moment with me typing these words on my computer.

One of my earliest memories of love and sisterhood(the central focus of this series) was a bright morning in September of 1999. It had rained at dawn, and the scent of the damp soil filled the air as we filed into the ash-colored Peugeot 504 car parked in front of our house. 

Even though I had taken the 25-minute drive to school with my brother every day for the preceding three years, that particular day felt different. My brother Omoayena sat in the front seat with my uncle behind the wheel. I sat in the backseat with my younger sister Enesomi, dressed in mufti, with her hands clenched tightly to a blue lunch box. It was her first day of school.

Drops of rain slowly trickled down the window as we drove past the market square. Women mostly dressed in somewhat faded Ankara materials were opening their shops for the day. 

I was born in the early 90s into a family of four in the southern region of Nigeria, a small village called Igbanke in Edo state. Omoayena was the first, followed by me and my two younger sisters, Enesomi and Ebhokhasomi.

If there is one thing I can remember as clear as day, it is my childhood neighborhood and home. It was a mid-century-styled African building with a large compound. Originally the exterior was painted white, but many years of rain had washed off the color leaving it off-white. The railings on the balcony had rust patches, and the pavements outside had cracks. 

Although the compound had no gates, the fence was high enough to block the view of the dusty street. When the rains came, the same sun-baked road would turn muddy from the erosions that ran through them. One of the favorite stories I loved to tell my friends growing up was how my dad jumped into a drainage gutter on one of those rainy days to save a young female child who was getting washed away by the flood. I always had a proud look on my face whenever I told it.

We had an open balcony in front of the house with a nice view of our neighborhood. One of the ceilings in the balcony had pulled off, and in its place was a sagged-down piece of brown material. To this day, I cannot understand why my brother made us believe that the sagged part of the ceiling was where Jesus sat in our house. Funny, right?

Igbanke, at that time, was what you would call a thick village lacking stable electricity and good roads. We didn’t go out much or mix with the locals. We were not allowed to. Our lives were routine, revolving around school, church, and the occasional market runs, which we highly sought after.  

When we were not reading books or doing homework, we either played or explored new ways to pass the time. Our house was big enough to allow us. Like every other African home in the early 90s, the main living room had large cushions, a large box TV set, and picture-filled walls. Occasionally, we were allowed to sit and watch movies here. At other times, especially on school nights, we snuck behind the curtains to watch when we were not allowed.

Growing up, Omoayena would make us stand at the top of the staircase and try to jump as far as we could to see the number of stairs we could cover in one jump. Rough as this game was, we somehow loved the thrill of attempting to cover all 11 steps in one leap. 

The time was about 7:40 AM when our ash-colored Peugeot 504 drove into the school premises. Holy Infant was one of the best schools in Agbor, Delta state, with a large compound and playing field. The main building was a crescent-shaped structure, painted wine. 

My brother was four classes ahead of me. Our uniforms had similar colors. He wore a peach and white shirt sewed with check material tucked neatly into peach shorts. He always had close to knee-length stockings worn into the famous brown Cortina shoes. On the other hand, I wore a peach and white gown made with the same check material, styled with a short tie. 

School mornings were always busy with parents dropping their children off, pupils hassling to get to the assembly grounds and classrooms, teachers co-ordinating the assemblies, and the first-timers who wanted no part of the chaos and craved to return home to familiar faces. 

The walk from the car to our classroom block seemed longer than usual on this day. Enesomi already had tears in her eyes and had started sobbing softly. My brother waved absent-mindedly at a few friends as they ran by us. I did not look at his face, but I could tell his eyes had welled up with tears. I had tears in my eyes too. 

This was the first time Enesomi would be away from home. And even though our classes were blocks apart, it still seemed like she would be far away from our watchful eyes. On this day, for the first time in a long time, I was among the category of school goers that longed to go back home. I wanted to hold their hands, turn around and chase after our Peugeot car as my uncle drove off in the direction of home.

“I want to go back to where I’m coming from,” Enesomi blurted out as we dropped her off at her class. 

She was pointing her blue lunch box to the classroom door. By this time, she was crying out loud. My brother and I could not hide it anymore. We were sobbing softly, my brother trying hard to conceal his tears. I let mine flow freely. We barely knew how to console her, so we did not try. Our attempts to get her settled did not work. Finally, it was time for us to leave.

My brother turned to give a quick wave as he hurried off to his class. I lurked around her classroom for a few more minutes before I made my way to my class. Somewhere deep down in my young mind, I felt responsible for her. 

I had to take care of her. I had to.