Good morning folks, hope your weekend was fine. Before i dive into today’s post, the photo of the week competition was very stiff for me to judge. So i brought in 3 other judges to help me to this, they include @JosephEParker @lola_creme and @weird_oo. So if you feel bad about not winning, they’re the ones you should give boko haram their handle…loool ofcourse iKid.
Moving on, this monday’s post is supplied us to by @osisiye.Enjoy the short story.
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08:00 p.m, Magodo
My house is beside the Orisa River. In times past, there were all sorts of myths surrounding it and people from afar came to worship and pay homage. These days, several waste disposal trucks come to pay homage and worship it with deposits of refuse. Now at night, the smell seeps in-a sickly sweet smell of putrefying organic materials.
The lights in the room are off.
My mouse glows brightly-neon red and blue. The wall switch is a pale white square on the wall with a red marker on it. My generator, the I-better-pass-my-neighbor type is busy pumping out black smoke as am working night in my room. This is my room, more like a Pinball table; so many colors signify life, possession and my present state. One color blinking right now is red; that’s the blinker of my Blackberry phone charging.
There is a chattering sound in my head, oh! It’s my teeth; I bite on them that way when I’m working. Bad habit, but all workaholics have one annoying habit I hear. That ruffling sound, like two swathes of linen material being rubbed together, it’s me scratching my genitalia, pulling on the hairs, rubbing the skin coarsely, jiggling the entire region. All guys itch that way at night I hear. The soft breathing on the bed close to my working table, that’s my girlfriend, Anna, she’s spending the night because tomorrow we’re going somewhere.
In all honesty, I don’t wanna go there at all, not for even a split second but I have to go there for the sake of Anna, things we do for love
***
I hail from Ogori Magongo, a tiny picturesque village in Kogi State. My Uncle told me that during the Civil War, soldiers en route Enugu marched through our village. They camped for a few days. At night, they shot sporadically and the sounds of the mortar and high velocity bullets flung closed doors open. Many villagers took their most treasured possession and snuck out or attempted to leave the village at night. Many men took fleshy, pink-eyed goat and left behind their young wives. Many maidens took metal portmanteaus and fled without their suckling child. What they took at that moment showed their values.
I was lost in thought, remembering the stories my uncle told me about our village during the civil war.
I cant exactly pinpoint why am daydreaming about this story right now although Anna has forcefully brought me here, my mind was back in the church, this isn’t my own idea of a church but am doing all this for Anna, I scanned around the church with my eyes back and forth, people were singing worships songs that will lead to the deliverance which is why we’re in here.
Anna was singing with all her heart, almost lost in spirit…
‘I am married to Jesus…married to Jesus…Satan leave mi alone’
I thank the Good Lord that he have make me to see another morning. As soon as I wake up, I pray for thirty minutes. I don’t bother to wake Bode up because I know he not be interested. I won’t say Bode is pagan, I just say Bode is funny.
Well, that’s not my own. My father is acting somehow and they sack him from his security work. Today we carry him to church for Father Simon to pray for him, I tell Bode to come cos I can like Bode to see that I serve living God. I want Bode to believe cos you see, if Bode not believe, no marriage, no nothing.
‘My helper oooooooooooo…My helper’
***
We have been in this white garment church for over 2 hours now and the deliverance hasn’t started yet, I am losing patience. One scrawny looking guy at the gate had explained calmly to me the difference between cele and white garment, hence why I had to leave my shoe outside. ‘Cele no dey wear slippers, white garment dey wear slippers’. I nodded as if that was something that would help with my GMAT exams. Then we met the aladura himself, a dramatic looking man, dramatic not because of his long, charcoal back eyebrows or long moustache that tapered to a point; but dramatic in the set of his limbs, they moved like a leopard’s, as if he was ready to spring up at any moment, and spring he did.
It was just like a surgical operation because they washed Anna’s father, scrubbed him clean with the native sponge and a brown, rough looking soap, changed him into a gown and as he stood with that leprous whiteness you get from bathing and not applying cream in the harmattan period, the aladura to conduct the deliverance session stepped out again after the bath. This man may not have seen a Hollywood movie in his life but he unconsciously cloned one of those action movie actor’s moves. He stepped out in a deliberate slow motion raising each leg highly as if avoiding invisible laser beams like those ones used in movies, his Bible and bell held tightly close to his chest, and without warning, he dived and somersaulted, the coup de grace. I was shocked by this move and wondered if he was really a Pastor or he has always envied Obafemi Martins and Julius Aghahowa.
WTF………………………………………as if this wasn’t enough, he seemed to beat himself with an invisible horse whip and shooed invisible houseflies, blabbering, croaking and groaning at every point. At this point am wondering if this is how deliverances occur but Anna was sucked into this whole fiasco, totally absorbed into all this spiritual battle, then he gave the verdict; someone had shot her father’s brain with an invisible arrow, and it was there lodged in the medulla, preventing any thoughts from inception, thus he was falling back on the thoughts he had thought as a kid, hereby making him reason like a child, hence the reason why people think he is mad, soon the little thoughts of his childhood will dry up and with no more thoughts, he would be thoughtless; ‘Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadd’ he screamed with glee and a sinister smile.
Anna was thinking to herself in her deplorable grammar, if her father will be okay, she wanted to prove to Bode that God exists and can do anything.
Today, Father Simon is on point. If you see the way he break down Papa case. Since we leave, Bode e quiet. I know God have touch him. As we leave, I try to touch his shoulder…you know make him know e alright and that I happy for his conversion. If you see the way he remove my hand and look at me like scary something. Don’t tell me this boy e not convinced, after the way Father Simon e jump, throw backflip. Well, if I want to make heaven, I don’t need a Thomas like Bode. He wee dull me.
***
When I was 10, I had a pup-Jasper. She had a golden brown coat with a white star on her forehead. We used to race (believe me) and she was a good gamesman. She never beat the gun. She was no match for me and at the finish line, I would watch her-pink tongue lolling, chubby legs go blur as she raced to the finish line. During the family devotion one fateful Tuesday, I heard her whinnying. Dad said to ignore her would mean choosing God. I chose God. After the devotion, I went out and saw she had entwined her chain around the iron bars of the metal protector and unwittingly hung herself over the railing. We stayed on the Third Floor and Jasper had died, legs kicking feebly.
I was 18, an undergraduate in the University of Lagos. I had an exam for 8:00 a.m. I rushed in from night class at 7:00 a.m. and knelt to say my morning prayers. Going for exam without prayer would mean I believed in the arm of flesh. ‘Father, thank you for this day…’, that was the last I remembered and I woke up at 11:30 a.m., I had a carryover in that course. At the age of 21, I stopped choosing and believing in God-nothing for it.
Some of the things I cared about, I lost all because God didn’t think they were important, I pretty much make my our luck, you all will judge me but I have my own reasons, I know the Dog issue shouldn’t be enough excuse to doubt if he was a good God or not.
How about the my exams, I completed blanked out after I bow my head to prepare before the exams which might be due to reading throughout the night but all the same, he could have helped in those 2 occasions.
I was still trying to justify my own stand on God issue to myself in my mind, when Anna brought me back into reality.
‘So how you find it?’ her eyes are expectant, awash with the glow of belief-a false belief.
‘Hocus pocus, why do you believe in these lies eh?’ I asked Anna
‘Bode, you mean you don’t feel the spirit moving? You don’t feel the floor vibrate? You don’t feel the burden lift?’
Now I laugh-a dry, mirthless laughter. The way they deceive themselves, taking about burdens when they came in with no loads, asking for forgiveness for being human, talking about being moved when it is only their collective footstamps and loud voices that make the atmosphere electric.
‘Anna, you really should stop being silly, these men use your offering to eat goatmeat and…’ I couldn’t finish my sentence, as her eyelids are white orbs, white orbs glistening with tears, her lower lips quiver. At that moment, everything is inverted, the noise of passing buses is dimmed and my peripheral vision is obviated. All I see is her face, larger than life, willing me to believe….
‘I haven’t been a believer for long but its never too late to start’
I bet you’re all wondering why am dating or even hoping to marry a lady who cannot construct a simple English sentence. Anna is one of the food attendants at S.U.B, I eat a lot at her shop, she is nice also very pretty with the right curves.
She liked me, always over sold my food also for my friends as well, she was very nice to all of us, until she started making advances at me, which I didn’t decline, how many times does a lady woo a guy besides the only bad thing about her is when she tries to speak else, she could pass for any hottie, big boobies, perfectly shaped ass, tall as well. She is a real price.
All that definitely isn’t enough to want to marry her but during my final year, I was sick almost to the point of death. I lost almost everything, dropped behind in school, my friends were going for service while I was bed-ridden in the hospital, she was the only one for me, visited me every week atleast twice, I fell inlove with her, all my friends and babes in school deserted me after a few weeks.
I regained my full strength, went back to school to finish.
I made sure she went back to take GCE to go back to the university to study, Anna is my saving grace, so when she specifically asked me to join her where her sick father was to go for deliverance, I didn’t hesitata, she was trying to make me a complete man.
Anna’s father was sleeping sound before I left, am here standing at the bus stop about to head to my house and am staring at the beautiful Anna, a lady who gave all for me.
I cannot tell her that I don’t believe her father will recover from his illness, so am keeping faith with her , the Aladura said he needs to sleep for another week and then everything will be fine.
I’m waiting for the week to elapse; I will be back to see if he has made full recovery, I pray he does for Anna’s sake.
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Hope you enjoyed it, let me know what you think of the story, i know its long but ……..
Here is the link for the photo of the week competition for this week, click here
Wonderful week ahead.
Keep Reppin’
‘Deolu Bubble (Notice i removed the ‘s’ from the Bubbles, i wanna rename)
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