The Day I Left The Village Ep. 2

The conductor’s voice rang through the motor park before I even fully stepped down from the bus.

“Ojodu Berger! Last stop!”

I tightened my grip on my handbag and climbed down carefully, trying not to twist my ankle as passengers pushed and shoved from behind. The moment my feet touched the ground, the noise swallowed me immediately.

Lagos was loud and chaotic!

I had finally arrived.

For a few seconds, I just stood there smiling like somebody in a toothpaste advert. Everywhere was busy, conductors hung from moving buses like bats, shouting at the top of their voices it was hard to understand what they were saying.

Still, my excitement refused to subside

This was Lagos, the land of milk and honey.

The land Labake had been tormenting me with for three years.

Every Christmas, my cousin returned to Isale Ilogbo looking shinier and richer than the year before, her bone-straight wig flowing down her back, looking like my favourite Indian actress, Kareena Kapoor. And then she would parade the village, carrying tiny handbags that looked too small to hold anything useful, blinking her eyes, her lashes so long, they nearly touched her eyebrows.

Meanwhile, I was still rotating the same two dresses in Ogbomosho.

No, enough was enough.

Now it was my turn.

I adjusted my old and scanty wig proudly, excitement bubbling inside me as I brought out my phone and dialled Labake’s number. I was already smiling because I imagined she would scream and start jumping when she heard I was finally in Lagos.

The phone rang for a while before she answered.

“Hello?” she said tiredly.

“Labake!” I squealed excitedly.

“Abike?” she replied slowly. “Why are you shouting? Can’t you talk like a lady for once?”

“Guess where I am,” I said proudly, turning around to admire my surroundings again.

“I don’t have strength for guessing games this afternoon,” she groaned. “Where are you?”

I grinned. “ Ah, Sister mi, I’m in Lagos.”

There was silence on the line, then suddenly; “What?!” she shouted.

I laughed my chest puffing with pride. “I said I am in Lagos; I just reached Ojodu Berger.”

“Abike,” she said sharply, “What do you mean you just reached Ojodu Berger?”

“I entered bus this morning now to come to Lagos,” I replied casually, frowning at the tone ion her voice.

Another silence followed but this time, it was the dangerous, kind of silence, the one that did; boom, before the explosion.

“You came to Lagos without telling me first?” she asked slowly.

I frowned slightly as I could not understand why she sounded irritated instead of excited, abi was she not the one that asked me to come to Lagos?

“Well, I wanted to surprise you,” I admitted.

“Jesus Christ,” she muttered. “Are you joking Abike?”

Before I could respond, one agbero carrying a stick brushed past me roughly. “Aunty move now! Abi na you get road? Abeg shift joor!”, he shouted, pushing me roughly out of the way.

I stumbled sideways immediately and nearly collided with a woman selling pure water.

“Madam, look road abi you just come Lagos?” the woman spat at me, eyeing me from the corner of her red eye as she walked away cursing under her breath.

On the phone, Labake sighed heavily. “You have not even stayed one hour in Lagos and confusion has already started,” she complained.

I rolled my eyes. “What confusion?”

“Lagos confusion,” she replied dramatically. “Where exactly are you?” she asked.

I looked around helplessly. Everywhere looked the same, yellow buses, dust. And angry looking people moving up and down like ants.

“There is one yellow bus beside me,” I answered confidently.

“Abike,” Labake said patiently, “all buses in Lagos are yellow.”

Hmm. See attitude oh! Was she not the one that asked me to come to Lagos?

“There is one shop too,” I added quickly, looking around me excitedly.

“What shop?” she asked, sounding as though she was talking to a daft child.

I turned around to read the signboard behind me, but the spelling looked difficult and I could not understand it, besides I find it hard to pronounce big words, unlike Labake who had gone to Polytechnic in Lagos, I had stopped at Standard six but don’t get me wrong oh, I am a very brilliant girl.

“One provision store,” I replied, feeling proud that I had identified the shop in question.

“Wonderful,” she replied dryly, as a bus horn blasted loudly beside me causing to almost jump out of my skin.

“Why didn’t you call me before coming?” she asked again, sounding stressed now.

I adjusted my bag. “You are always saying Lagos is full of opportunities.”

“That does not mean you should carry your load and appear here like a refugee,” she snapped angrily

I gasped loudly. “Refugee ke?” I repeated.

“Abike, be serious,” she groaned.

I hissed quietly to myself, unsure of what to say, three years in Lagos and this girl had changed completely. The same Labake that used to follow me to the stream to wash clothes was now sounding like one rich aunty in Lekki. This was the same Labake that used to paint her cheeks with blue lipstick back home, acting like she was the queen bee, a local one at that. Imagine her forming and asking me all these questions. Hmm, perhaps she has forgotten, the video I have, of her eating amala, smacking her lips and licking her fingers like a village girl.

Na wa o.

“My apartment is small oh,” she warned suddenly.

Apartment ke? See grammar, so ordinary room and parlour had suddenly become apartment? “I will manage,” I replied quickly. “After all, we are cousins.”

She stayed quiet for a moment like she was calculating how much peace she was about to lose, then finally she sighed loudly; “Okay. Enter Keke and come to Aguda,” she said reluctantly. “I’ll text you the address.”

My heart jumped immediately with excitement.

Aguda.

Even the name sounded posh and expensive.

“And hold your phone tightly,” she warned. “Don’t press your phone carelessly outside.”

“Okay mummy,” I teased.

“And don’t let anybody carry your bag.”

“Hmm.”

“And if transport is expensive, price it well.”

I laughed loudly. “Aunty I am a smart girl now, me Abike, Omo Ologo of Isale Ilogbo? Who fit cheat me? I boasted.

“ABIKE, I AM SERIOUS!” she shouted.

“Okay sorry,” I muttered quickly, rolling my eyes, this my cousin has serious drama oh, haba!

When the call finally ended, I slipped my phone into my handbag and shook my head.

Ha. Imagine Labake oh. After spending three years advertising Lagos to me like paradise, now she is behaving somehow because I actually came. Whatever, that’s her own problem, I lifted my bag properly and smiled to myself.

I am here now and my new motto is “Me sef must make it!”