“Agbor! Onitsha! Abeg everybody hold your change oo” croaked the bus conductor. You have boarded a bus for your village – Igbodo. You jostle your bag gently to avoid cramping the sneakers you bought for your sister. She had told you severally on the phone about you buying it for her for Christmas. Your head stuck out of the window, looking at the busy street of Benin. Just like you, students are leaving the town for their villages, and the school has locked their hostels and sent everybody home to celebrate the yuletide season with their loved ones. You hear Christmas music booming in a barbing saloon, everybody is feeling the season.
“Driver! This your jalopy never full? I go come down o” said one of the passengers who just entered the vehicle.
“Na your yansh be jalopy o, you go tell me how many new buses you get for this government” the driver retorted.
“Your papa, see you, if you no do fast now, I go comot for this motor enter another one o”
“Oya where you dey…”
“Driver o! Load this thing fast o” chorused the three brothers behind your seat. You knew they were brothers because they looked so identical.
“Oya make una bring money,” said the conductor as he stretches his arms forward. You carefully examined his broken teeth, he must have been a fighter. Though he was trying to be cheerful, but the smiles he wore on his face quickly faded away when a pregnant woman on the bus screamed-
“Which money? You will drop me for Umunede first before I pay you” she said.
“Yes o! Na so them go carry you go drop for Agbor, say go slow too dey road, conductor abeg enter motor make we dey go,” the fat woman beside you said, pushing her hands as she speaks. She smells of dried fish. She is a market woman who has come from far end of Delta State to trade season.
“If you no wan pay me abeg come down!” shouted the conductor now looking like those rickety rough and careless conductors in Oshodi. Everybody paid, though they grumbled.
The journey had begun and thoughts of missing your friends crept in. You will dearly miss your girlfriend Mary. She had slept in your house all through the weekend just to make up for the days you both will be away. You remembered the nights and engulfed your cheeks with a smile. You both have had sex severally and you wished she was there with you, resting her tired head on your shoulder. Your sweet thoughts were aborted when the bus ran into potholes.
“Gbrigbri” the bus yanked. You whisked your buttocks all about for comfort, the fat woman beside you was eating akara and drops of it perched violently on your blue shirt.
“Ah madam!”
“Wetin! Abeg no vex joor, no be small just touch you?” she said. You felt like punching her, but your thoughts are clouded; she may be pregnant as well with this her bulging stomach.
Conversation was brooding at the front, the driver was telling the person beside him a gripping story. You stretched your ears to sieve the words of the driver.
“… na so o, na so the man take die” The man shook his head in sorrow, he kept on hissing. “chai!, all these things are because of this Christmas o, blood-sucking agents are solely on this road seeking for blood to suck. Hmm! My blood shall be bitter in their mouth!” you noticed he is a pastor and his black rumpled shirt blurred your sense of colours. His tie hung carelessly on his neck. He must be a hungry pastor, you thought.
Your eyes peeped through the phone of the girl sitting in your front. She is on Facebook. You saw a video of a young man being held by people. “What could have happened?” you asked, tapping the girl on the shoulder.
“Oh, they said this boy came back from Ghana o, after six months that he left, and while returning, he returned with luxurious riches…” “Yahoo!” you chipped in, she nodded her head in approval.
“so he came back with a wrapper which he bought as a gift for his father” she continued, “he then kept forcing the old man to hang the wrapper on his shoulder to see how beautiful, the old man became suspicious and threw the wrapper at him, instantly, madness came upon the young boy”
“Chai! All this ritualist them bad oo” the fat woman beside you said, gulping down a sachet of water carelessly. “Na so them take sleep with one girl finish, worm come dey comot for her toto, na for hospital she take die yesterday for Umunede”
“Them no dey hear word na,” said the driver, looking through the mirror to catch the woman’s face.
The bus is not moving fast, the traffic is very discouraging, and horns blaring from all corners. Your clock says 12:27 pm, and you are still in the heart of Benin, you looked at the battery percentage in your phone, you still have battery, and you plugged in your earpiece into your ears.
The music “Gelato” by DJ Cuppy filled your eardrum, you quickly swipe your phone to the next track, DJ Cuppy sounds better, you swiped back and just nod to the beats, wishing you were as lucky as her. The bus came to a halt. Other vehicles at the front were making sharp turns. “Thieves them o!” one of the swerving drivers screams.
“Blood of Jesus!” rented the air as the driver made a hard turn, his steering was faulty. “Jesus!” you all screamed again. He almost hit the pavement on the road. He was on the road again, going back to where he was coming from. Your heart is pumped. It seems as if your spirit is about to leave you, you removed your earplugs and you all cursed the driver for his poor jalopy steering.
“wao! Wao! Pi pi pi! Por! Por! Por!” Gallant soldiers were zooming by, positioned to fire! You all hailed them, and finally, you agree they are heroes unlike the police who would come to the scene after the incident. “Driver please stop o!” you all chorused. You all scampered out of the bus into bushes and gutters like buzzing bees.
Bullets were flying in the air, you could hear the sounds of solidified weapons, the robbers came prepared. You pulled your rosary, and you began to render catholic prayers while in the gutters.
“Voom!” their cars zoomed by, they are in hot chase with the robbers. They had gunned down two of the thieves and a soldier was badly wounded. This was the first time you are seeing a dead body this close, your body shivered, goose pimples growing underneath your skin. The soldier was wailing and wriggling in pain.You felt pity and vowed never to be a soldier any day.
The bus was filled again, everybody was singing praises, and the Hausa man at the other side of the window kept screaming “Allahu Akbar!” the traffic jam became worse, you all were in a fix for hours. You switched games on your phone – puzzle, temple run, chess et al. You are beginning to feel dizzy, your eyes were itching and you decide to shut your eyes for a while.
You jumped up from your sleep at the loud “Blood of Jesus!” Chorused by the passengers. An accident has occurred, a Toyota Corolla has had a head collision with a petrol tanker. The driver stopped, and your eyes fixed on the signpost it read, “Church of divine ministry, Agbor, Delta state” You are in Agbor, soon you will get home.
“Chai! This motor fail brake oo!” one of the eyewitnesses said. He came towards your bus and continued after being asked about the cause of the accident by the driver. “This motor dey high speed o, fail brake, swerve come this lane, come hit this speeding trailer” “But no death sha?” you asked, praying to hear “no”.
“Why death no go dey? The driver, wife, two children and their baby girl all died instantly, na the truck driver we never see, but the motor boy dey okay” he said. Goose pimples resumed their office on your pores again, and you felt like vomiting. You tilted your head away when you saw them bringing out the dead bodies, disjointed legs, another was holding a hand cut off in the accident, you spat through the window. You wonder what they will tell those they were going to see; how sad the news will be to their ears. Silent prayers were whispered in your heart, to meet your family alive.
“Na so them dey drive for this road during Christmas, everybody dey rush,”said the driver.
Your bus just passed Uromi junction, the driver has hurriedly driven out of the accident scene to avoid heavy traffic jams, his final stop is Onitsha and it is 3:16 PM already. Boney M’s Christmas carol was heard from a loudspeaker of a cassette vendor. Different kinds of cars zoomed by. Your friends too will be home this Christmas, those who went to Ghana, Malaysia, and other parts of the world, they will call you to come join them in clubhouses in Umunede. You thought of how different you will look, “I won’t go with them” you decided.
“Wonders shall never end o!” said a woman sitting close to the door as she dropped her phone, she has been on a call. “wetin happen again?” the pregnant woman asked.
“My sister is telling me now, that a pastor is selling keys to apartments in heaven, that God has told him that the world will come to an end on the 26th of this December o”
“Fake prophets! Signs of the end time! Thieves! Savages! Idiots! Using the name of God in vain” clamored the poor pastor. “Things dey happen sha,” you said as you plug your ears again.
The bus has driven past Umunede after the pregnant woman and another man have alighted from the bus. The fat woman beside you refused to adjust to the spaces created. You kept quiet, inhaling the pungent stench coming from her wrapper. Everybody was tired of the journey as the bus slowly drive through. There was another congestion, but not as serious as in Benin. All have resigned to resting their heads and taking a nap.
Nothing serious happened from Umunede to Igbodo, except the cool breeze under the hot sun. The sky looks so clear and you could see birds jubilating in the far heavens. Beside the road in Ekwuoma, children were seen wearing Christmas hats with blinking colourful lights, they had gone to a Christmas carol.
The bus came to a halt in Igbodo. You waved them goodbye as you alighted from the bus. Loud music rented the air, and fowls were being carried about by men, women and boys, market women trot their legs, and everywhere is busy, hustling for the season. You waved at a bike man and described your stop for him,
“Na one hundred naira o”
“Ahn! Na fifty naira jooor”
“Oya pay eighty make we go,” he said. You hesitantly agreed and he told you that he even pitied you because he knows your parents and you look like a student.
At home, your sister ran towards you, giving you a warm hug, brothers followed too. You dipped your hands into your pocket to bring out your wallet, to pay the bike man. It was missing. You thought of where it might have been stolen but could not fathom, you just dipped your hands in the bag and gave him a thousand naira note to give you change. He pitied you and let you go without paying.
“Thank God I did not put the main money and cards in that wallet,” you said as you dragged your feet into the house. They have made stew.
About the Writer
Chukwuemeke Bright Nduka is a graduate of English from Delta State University Abraka. He is a storyteller, content/copywriter, activist, critic, poet and spoken word artist. His works can be found in both print and online journals. They include; “My Encounter” (Short Fiction Series), “The lurking eyes of Death and other death poems” (Poetry
collection), he has as well performed his spoken words and storytelling on several stages around Nigeria. He is a budding Nigerian writer, whose dream is to become a bestseller.