GHEN GHEN

“Baby Boy, I am Pregnant”. The SMS was succinct, surreal and well timed to without doubt, deliver the shock the sender wanted me to have.
After three straight days of drinking Garri in school, my parents finally decided to send me something instead of their customary “Manage eh! Nna” which I always got whenever I requested for money. On receiving the Alert I proceeded to MAMA G restaurant to chop Life.

Rice 100, beans 30, spaghetti 30, 2 moi-moi, salad, three meat and one mortuary standard orobo Coke. Their daddies. I didn’t care about the exact mixture. My village people had made sure hunger played with my feelings for the last week, and all I wanted to do was shame them by eating to my fill no matter the cost and letting out that satisfying belch, which prevails, when cold coke passes through your throat and makes your stomach its final resting place.

The Funny thing is that the SMS didn’t come when I was about to order the food. It didn’t come when I was about to pay either. It didn’t come when I was eating the food. Rather it came, when I was about to eat the meat after finishing the food (as all properly brought up Nigerians should do…LOL). I read the SMS over and over again. Turned my phone over to be sure it was mine. (just in case one of this my village people that will be having sex up and down, don come change my phone) . Alas it was mine. My Nokia Xpress music became heavier the more I held and looked into the phone. I took a sip of the “ex-cold” coke to try and calm myself down and it tasted like the Devil’s Pee (or what I assume the devil’s pee would taste like)

The more i digested the contents of the SMS; the more vivid the memory of the exact day it must have happened came to my mind. Such was the kind of life I lived. my own was always different.What other people did effortlessly, I did and had problems. My friends would be like “Steve, go and take orange from that tree. we have been taking from it for the last two years without anyone seeing us and no problems”. The day I’ll decide to go there and take orange will be the day Police, army, navy, OPC and even issakaba will hold their once in twenty years Convention near the same orange tree and catch me.
And now it has happened again. I remembered the words of ONOS my friend. “Na help wen dem tell water make e help boil meat Na him e take turn to soup”

Everything that happened from the moment I received that SMS just kept pointing towards the raising of children.
As I was leaving Mama G’s restaurant, I bumped into one of my guys who for some inexplicable reason decided to start hailing me from far with “dadieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee”. My own has finished I said to myself. So everyone knows. Why me oh Lord. To make it worse after shaking me he was like “see guy eh. You be father aswear…… azzin Father Father”. Wazzaldis. This can’t be coincidental. I was disconcerted until it became clear that all the adoration, glorification and exaltation, was for something different as he revealed by saying “that your show yesterday eh killed it my brother. You be murderer I swear. I dey always tell people for this school say once your hand dey any show or party na die.” Whew! At least no be say him know . He finally parted with the words “daddieeeeeee you’re good abeg and I sure say your babies dem for this school go just dey multiply dey mutltiply ah! Oshey baddest”. In my mind I was like



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Got home that day, to the news that my caretaker’s wife had put to bed a bouncing baby boy. Onyeoma our caretaker was good to us and the guys had decided to contribute money to buy pampers and some baby food. Guess who dey delegated to go to the market and get it? Who else if not the daddieeeeee, the father father, me. Hot tears were streaming down the insides of my soul. Na when I reach the store I realize say this entire baby something no be childs. How much for cerelac and I heard N4,000. Wait what? Baby food??, Blood of dasuki. To make things worse, the attendant was trying to explain to me that some babies go through 3 tins in a week. N12,000 in a week N48000 approximately in a month. This is without factoring in Money for pampers, baby cloth and I don’t even know what else babies use o. It didn’t have to be a new day for it to dawn on me that I had screwed and I was screwed.once more, I remembered the words of ONOS my friend “pikin wen say e wan use agbada start guy, e go talk Wetin e go dey wear for old age ”


Wetin go kill you most times dey usually sweet my brother. Becky was from another planet I tell you. We were Adventurous and young the perfect recipe for disaster. Becky loved me, but inexplicably was not really ready for the commitment of a relationship. You know when you and someone are doing everything that people who date do but without the title. We had always used protection but on this particular night, we threw caution to the wind. Friends and alcohol are sometimes all you need. “see eh! Nothing like skin to skin my brother. E get as e dey sweet. E get as e go dey touch you for the back of your head” I remembered ONOS my Warri friend say while touching the sweet spot at the back of his head,for emphasis.
With alcohol in our system, there was nothing to rein us in. what about STD ? a voice said to me. But that Tom and Jerry devil with fork appeared on my shoulder and told me “all die na die my brother. Something must kill a man”. which I reinforced with another ONOS quote which says “whether nyash face east or west na still back e go dey “

Becky was from another planet. I know I’ve said it before but add the alcohol and the ice cream she had poured and licked off my entire body, nwanne I too had joined her in being from krypton. She just wanted to be bad....

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