Ozichi and her mother, Chika, were storytellers. After dinner, while her father drank his soul away at Mama Nki Bar, Ozichi and her mother would sit under the watch of the moon and take turns telling stories. This was the ritual every night, unless Chika had a long day at St Joseph’s Hospital, where she worked as a cleaner. On such nights, she would lie in bed, fatigued, her legs stretched out for Ozichi to massage.
Chika’s favourite story, always the first she narrated, was Mother Hen, which Ozichi loved for the song woven into it.
Mother, Mother, guardian angel
Please, don’t leave me and fly away
Children, children, little angels
Grow your wings to fly one day.
Some nights, while her mother sang, drumming her thighs, Ozichi would clap her hands and shake her head to the rhythm of the song.
Ozichi’s preference for the story also stemmed from the realisation that life was transient — that she could wake up one morning and find her mother, or her father, or even herself, dead. After their storytelling sessions, she would gaze into the darkness of the room and wonder what would become of her, if her mother, with whom she shared a special bond, exited from life. The thought of this possibility frightened her.
“Mama, I don’t like this story anymore,” Ozichi had said one night, with her brows knitted in worry for the chicks who, according to the story, scamper about, cheeping noisily and sadly after a car has trampled on their mother.
“Why, nne?” Chika asked.
“It makes me sad.”
“But you enjoy it. I see how you shake your big head to the song.” Chika laughed, fondling Ozichi’s cheeks. She was fond of that and spoke often about how Ozichi’s cheeks as a baby were so full and soft, like fat doughnuts.
“I like the song, but I don’t like how the story ends. It ends with death. It makes me think about death.”
“It ends with death because death is the end of everything. And that’s why you should love the story. It reminds you that life can end when it wants. You can’t determine that. Can you?”
Ozichi shook her head.
“Good. The chicks and their mother were on their way to a party. All they thought about was the awaiting feast, until that reckless driver ran over their mother. Such is life.”
“Don’t leave me yet,” Ozichi said.
Her eyes were misty, lined with anxiety. She let them pierce deep into her mother, searching for assurance that there would be many more nights ahead of them to share stories.
“I’m not leaving you.” Chika clasped her daughter’s hands softly.
Ozichi smiled, drew closer, and placed her head on her mother’s lap.
“But you must grow your wings to fly one day,” Chika added and tickled her.
They both laughed, the moon smiling on them.
…
It was a Friday evening. Ozichi was on her way back from school, holding a collection of past JAMB examination questions, which she was eager to show her mother. She had desired it for a while because her teacher had told the class that it would help in their preparation for the examination. That morning, Chika had given her money to purchase the collection and Ozichi had hugged her tightly, showering her with prayers.
Close to her house, she spotted a crowd in the middle of the road. She noticed some of them shrugging and snapping their fingers. At first, she wondered if they had caught a thief.
As she got closer, she saw some men, with hands gesticulating, bellowing from their heart’s depth. They had used three big logs of wood to barricade the road, and a short, pudgy man directed oncoming vehicles away from the scene of attraction. Ozichi noticed a bashed Toyota Camry, its broken headlamps removed from their sockets.
A MACK truck loaded with bags of cement was parked by the side of the road. Its driver, a young man of about twenty-six, sat on the sun-scorched asphalt while some men formed a fence around him. His kaftan was torn at the shoulder, and his cap had morphed into a handkerchief, which he used to wipe the blood dripping from his broken nose.
Ozichi realised what had happened. She could tell that, while there were other people injured from the accident, someone else, stretched on the road, was the spectacle. She meandered through the crowd, craned her neck, and her eyes caught the dead woman. Her mind immediately flew back to their conversation the previous night — her mother saying that life can end when it wants and charging her to grow her wings to fly one day.
She wondered if her mother had ended their session with that charge because she had foreseen this moment when she would die like Mother Hen.
“No. No. No,” she screamed, as she ran her hands across her mother’s mangled body.
Her mother’s hands lay at crooked angles. Her bag lay beside her, its contents spilling out. A gash on her head leaked blood.
Ozichi glanced around, searching for proof that this wasn’t happening. That this woman, who had assured her the previous night that she wouldn’t leave her, couldn’t possibly be dead. But when she overheard some of the men planning for an ambulance to take her mother to the mortuary, the finality of the moment, the clarity of it, struck her with a brutal force.
Yet, she still hoped that her mother would laugh, open her eyes, hug her tight, and tell her that everything happening was a prank. Sometimes, after they had no more stories to tell for the night, they would lie side by side on the mat, their ears deafened to the snoring of her inebriated father, if he were home. Her mother would cease her breath. Ozichi would shake her, screaming for help. Then her mother would open her eyes and laugh. “Prank! Prank!” she would scream playfully.
But, this time, lying on that expressway with giant trucks speeding on the other lane, this wasn’t a prank.
A man tapped her shoulder. “Do you know her?”
Ozichi ignored him and the others asking questions. Her wailing echoed in the wind as she stamped her palm on the tarred road. Some were offering sympathy. Others were hurling curses at the MACK driver. Ozichi was hugging and shaking her mother, even as some people were trying to pull her away from the corpse.
“Mama, you can’t leave me!” she kept screaming.
More people gathered, but she ignored them and their sympathies. Right there, her only desire was to join her mother wherever she had gone.
…
It had been three days since her mother was interred. In the nights that followed, after telling the story of Mother Hen to herself, she would recount that moment when, in the sight of the few people who gathered at the funeral, she scooped a shovel full of earth and poured it into the grave, right on the wooden casket that her father had managed to buy.
She would turn towards the gravesite and imagine her mother smiling at her, assuring her that, even though she had been sealed off under the heap of red earth, she was still very much around. Other times, she saw her mother levitating until she became part of the clouds.
“Story, story,” Ozichi would say and imagine her mother saying “Story!” from the sky.
Sometimes, her stories came as tears. Nothing had prepared her for this biting solitariness. Her father, ever since the day he came home to the news of his wife’s death, had stretched the distance between them. He mostly sat on a plastic chair in front of the house, smoking, drinking, and brooding, sometimes muttering indiscernible words to himself. Only on a few occasions did he visit Mama Nki Bar.
Some days, Ozichi’s pain was bearable, and she would wash the plates, cook, sweep the compound, even around her mother’s grave, while humming her favourite songs. On other days, it was something she couldn’t handle, and she would break down and wail until her voice failed her.
There were times when she believed that death, her death, could be the ease she longed for. She wished for it. Prayed often for it. Beseeched God to send death her way. She gave God many reasons why she had to die. My mother is my life, and without her, I can’t live, she thought, hoping that God would hear her. But it appeared that He would not answer her.
So, one day, she went to the kitchen, grabbed a sharp knife from the cupboard, and stared at its shiny blade, studying her reflection in it.
She went to the back of the house, where her mother grew a small garden, and sat on a stone. She closed her eyes pondering her gloom. She hoped to muster some strength from it. She hoped it would choke her enough to convince her that slicing her wrist was the appropriate thing to do.
“Ozi.”
Startled, she sat up.
Her father, Laz, was approaching her, fumbling with his wrapper.
“I’ve been calling you. What are you doing here?”
He scratched his bushy chin. He glanced around the scanty garden with just a few stalks of waterleaf and pumpkin leaves. He turned back to her, expecting an answer.
“I came to pray,” Ozichi replied, hoping he wouldn’t notice the knife that she had placed at the other side of the stone.
“Pray? Pray for what? That your mother comes back to life?”
She didn’t answer.
“My friend, go and buy Benson for me,” he ordered.
As she followed behind him, she noticed his weary gait, which hardship and intemperance had imposed on him. His shoulder blades swayed beneath his dry, patchy skin. Those shoulders were no longer as broad as they used to be. She remembered how, as a child, she used to beg her father to carry her on his back in the evenings after he returned from his electronics shop at Uselu Market, bringing along gifts for them. That was how she got a wristwatch, wristbands, clothes, and books. That was how her mother got new pots, handbags, shoes, and perfumes.
Then, one day, fire gutted lines of shops in the market, destroying goods and lives. In the process of quelling the fire, her father sustained a mild burn on his left hand. But his efforts, along with those of the other traders, were insufficient to protect the bulk of their goods.
After the incident, he would sit in front of the house every morning, making loud calls to different people, asking for a loan to start afresh. When the loans weren’t forthcoming, he gave up and focused more on smoking, drinking, laughing coarsely, and heaping curses on the government. When Mama Nki Bar opened two months later, it became his abode. He would leave in the morning and return at midnight, boozy and chanting gibberish, sometimes bumping into trees or falling into gutters.
To make ends meet, Chika began to sell akara in front of their house, while Ozichi hawked boiled groundnuts after school. Then, Chika’s friend, Uka, advised her to apply for a teaching job in a primary school, which paid better than her akara business. Her mother took the job, which lasted only a month. She continued her akara business until St Joseph’s Hospital opened in town, and she got a job as a cleaner.
Drowned in thought, Ozichi nearly rammed into her father’s back. In front of the house, he sat on a plastic chair and pulled out some naira notes from his pockets.
“Get me two packs of Benson.”
He handed the notes to her and waved her away.
On her way to Amazing Grace Stores, a Peugeot drove past. The driver, a middle-aged man with receding hairlines, swallowed her with his eyes. He parked on the side of the street and called out to her. She ignored him. She was used to men calling out to her. The construction workers, who worked on building sites in the neighbourhood, often flirted with her. The commercial motorcyclists, who clustered at the junction, calling out to passengers, would beckon her, hoping to get her attention. There were the men at Mama Nki Bar, who called her My Wife whenever she went to call her father home.
A recent story had made the waves. A university female student had been lured into a vehicle and never returned. Some days later, her corpse was found beneath the bed of a hotel room. Ozichi thought of the story now and walked briskly.
When she returned, she found the same man sitting outside with her father. His Peugeot was parked opposite her mother’s grave.
The man was startled when he saw her.
“Laz, is this your daughter?” he asked just as Ozichi turned to leave after handing her father the packs of cigarettes.
“Yes,” Laz replied, lighting a cigarette. He faced his daughter. “Ozi, this is Jude Okonji, my good friend. He’s here for something important. Something that concerns you.”
“I saw her on my way here,” Jude grinned.
Ozichi stood, her hands folded behind her back. She side-eyed Jude as he reached out to accept the cigarette her father offered him. He mumbled an appreciation, lit the cigarette, and puffed, letting the smoke curl out through his nostrils.
“Grab that stool and sit down,” Laz instructed her. He tapped his cigarette to release the accumulated ash at the tip. “How old are you?”
“Seventeen, sir.”
Jude smiled, smoke puffing out of his mouth and nose.
“I told you she’s ripe,” Laz said, taking a long drag on his cigarette.
Ozichi fretted where she sat. It was clear to her that her father and Jude were up to something that wasn’t good. While a part of her, a greater part of her, wanted to run away, far away from the men, she found herself unable to lift her legs.
Laz turned to her. His eyes were reddened and sleepy, unsure whether to settle on her.
“Ozi,” he said. “Jude has come to take you with him. You’ll leave with him tomorrow.”
“Follow him where, Papa?” Ozichi asked, her voice shaky.
The men were silent.
After a moment, Laz said, “Go and pack your bags.”
“But, Papa…”
Ozichi’s legs wobbled as her eyes darted between the two men. When they finally rested on her father, she wanted to ask him so many questions, but remained mute because it was clear that he wouldn’t provide answers.
That night, after Jude had left, her father called her into his room, which always smelled of alcohol and heat, no matter how many times she sprayed it with an air freshener. He was sitting in a chair. His bed was unkempt. His clothes were littered around.
“Come here,” he said, looking at her intensely. “Come closer.”
She took cautious steps towards him.
He leaned forward and pulled her closer. He placed his hands on her breasts and felt them.
“Papa!” She recoiled from him. “What are you doing?”
“Shut up,” he glared at her.
She shivered, fighting hard to remain calm. She struggled to shield her breasts, but his bony hands probed harder into her flesh.
“Good,” he said. “Turn around.”
Ozichi hesitated, still shivering.
He swung her around. “You think I’m playing with you?”
“Papa… please.”
“This is not about Jude. It’s for us. For our good.”
Ozichi was crying now. “What’ll I do for him?”
She fidgeted as her father, ignoring her question, placed his hands on her buttocks and squeezed.
“Good. You can go.”
“Papa, what’ll I do for him?” she repeated.
“Leave,” he ordered her. “I want to rest.”
He stood up from the chair and moved to his bed, stretching his length on it.
…
Jude’s house in Isihor was a fenced two-bedroom bungalow along a quiet, sparsely populated street. When Ozichi arrived, he unlocked the second room and directed her to move her things there.
The next morning, he asked her to sweep his room while he gargled loudly in the bathroom. She wondered if she had been brought here to serve as his maid. When she mustered the courage to ask, he ignored her.
Jude’s mother, Madam Akudo, in her sixties, carrying remnants of her beauty from her younger years, visited on the second day of Ozichi’s stay. On the day she arrived, she examined Ozichi intently. She asked for Ozichi’s age, nodded, and waved her off.
Whatever Ozichi did, she felt Madam Akudo’s eyes trained on her, quiet and probing. Sometimes, the woman and her son would exchange whispers, their eyes on her before darting away. Their glances worried her, scared her even.
On the second day of her visit, in the evening, Madam Akudo summoned Ozichi into the sitting room. Dread washed over her as she wondered what she had done wrong. Jude was seated beside his mother, his eyes fixed on his phone.
“Can you read?” the woman asked.
“Yes, Ma.”
She handed Ozichi a piece of paper. There was a large heading: Girls World Organisation. Then a subheading: Contract Form. Someone had already written down her name and signed.
“Your father has signed,” Jude said, lifting his eyes from his phone. “You’re his price for getting his business back.”
Ozichi felt her head exploding. “I don’t understand, sir.”
“You’ll get yourself ready for work,” he continued. “Tomorrow, Mama will take you with her.”
The words struck Ozichi hard.
When she regained herself, she asked, “What work will I do, sir?”
“Have you heard of akwuna before?” Madam Akudo chipped in.
Ozichi nodded.
“Good,” she said. “You’ll make money for me with your body.”
Ozichi shifted uneasily in her seat. Feeling the anxiety twisting her stomach, she sank on her knees, pressing her palms in prayer, pleading with them to consider her for anything else than this.
“There is no other work,” Madam Akudo said. “You’ll get used to it.”
Ozichi turned to Jude.
“The decision is final,” he said. “You’ll leave tomorrow.”
Ozichi broke out in loud sobs.
“I’ll be leaving this evening, but will return tomorrow morning to pick you up. Don’t think of escaping. If you do, there will be consequences,” Madam Akudo said and waved her away.
Back in her room, Ozichi continued weeping. She imagined herself in scant clothing, presenting her body to men. Shame crawled beneath her skin.
She woke up an hour later and used her hands to guide her way in the dark room. She located her torchlight, switched it on, and packed her clothes in her bag. She walked out of the room, tiptoed to Jude’s door, and placed her ear against it. She could hear his loud snoring. She made for the front door. It was locked, but she knew where the key was — in a ceramic cup on the dining table. When she got the key, she tried to steady herself before inserting it into the keyhole. She turned twice, unlocking the door.
Then, a flash of light froze her.
“Stop there! Where are you going?”
Her hands remained on the door’s handle.
Jude repeated the question.
Ozichi’s teeth clattered as she groped for words. He approached her, the torch firmly in his hands, its rays flooding into her eyes. He snatched the bag from her and flung it away. He slapped her hard across her cheek. She screamed, falling to her knees. He slapped her again.
“How dare you think of escaping?”
Ozichi rubbed her burning cheeks. As she stared at Jude, who was still yelling at her, her fingers curled into fists. Grow your wings to fly one day, she could hear her mother say.
“Take your bag and yourself inside my room.”
“I’ll not.” Ozichi’s tone was firm.
She lifted her head to face him fully. Her resoluteness stunned him. She noticed his eyes widened, and the hand holding the torchlight dropped to his side.
“What did you say?”
“I’ll not take my bag to your room. I’ll not sleep in this house. And I’ll not use my body to make money for you,” Ozichi said, surprised by her temerity, but held on.
Jude raised his hand to slap her again. This time, she dodged it and rammed her fist hard into his stomach. In that moment of brief scuffle, he hit her bag and lost balance, his torchlight crashing to the floor. He held on to the wall for support. When he regained balance, he turned to her, wild with indignation.
“You hit me?!” He groaned like a wounded beast.
He reached for her and slapped her harder than before. When he lifted his hand to hit her again, she surged forward, screaming, and hit his chest. He gripped her hands, but she wrenched herself free, and in that moment of freedom, she punched his jaw. He stared at her, shocked at her strength. But this time, he concluded that he had tolerated her enough.
He grabbed her and threw her to the ground. Seeing that she had been overpowered, she remained still, screaming and hoping that his neighbours would hear and rush to her aid.
Like a hungry predator, Jude ripped her blouse.
“You have the guts to hit me!” he yelled at her. “I’ll punish you!”
She spat on his face, screaming curses at him.
“I’ll punish you!” he kept yelling.
He pulled down his trousers, struggling to spread her legs apart. Ozichi tried pushing him away, slapping his shoulders, hands, chest, any part of him her hands could reach. When he forced himself into her, she screamed out in pain, fighting with all the strength she could muster.
After a while, Jude pulled up his trousers and dragged her to her room.
“You’re mine!” he shouted and slammed the door.
She heard him lock the door from outside. Her body burned, her legs hurt. “I belong to no one,” she muttered in tears.
She turned to face the spot where her bag had lain and found the shape of something lying there. When she realised what it was, she recalled the day she sat in her mother’s garden, the same day Jude visited her father. She had intended to slice her wrist with the knife before her father interrupted her.
She grabbed the knife and her mother’s face appeared before her. Grow your wings to fly one day, she heard her mother say. She wept more. She stared at the knife for a long time, cut her wrist deeply, and screamed like she had never screamed before, as her blood painted the room red.
Then she lay still, oblivious of everything around her.
Chukwuemeka Famous is a writer and academic whose novel, We Will Live Again, was published in 2023 by Griots Lounge Publishing and was listed as one of Top 60 Notable African Books of 2023 by Open Country Mag. A 2024 Ebedi Fellow, his works have been longlisted for the 2020 Quramo Writers Prize, the 2022 Bold Call Writing Contest, and shortlisted for the 2020 Pack Light Writing Contest and the 2023 Sevhage Prize for Short Fiction. In 2022, he was nominated for the Young Writers and Creatives Award and emerged as a finalist in the 2024 Moon City Short Fiction Award. He co-authored the international collaborative novel, Poles Apart, which was published in 2024 in Bulgaria and Japan. His personal essay titled Departures, published in The Republic, was listed as one of the Top 50 Notable Essays from Africa by Afrocritik in 2024. He is an alumnus of the Nigerian Academy of Letters Creative Writing Workshop. More of his writings have been published in Ibua Journal, The Shallow Tales Review, WSA Magazine, The Republic, The Journal of African Youth Literature, Sudo Journal, All Ears Magazine, and elsewhere.