The game was on. I never really understood the difference. Premier league, Championship or whatever. They all sounded the same to me. And I’d learned to stop-with-the-questions after the episode he pummelled his fists into my gut knocking the air from my lungs. I remember because it was after this that he stopped apologising. Mentally,
If you are sitting down, stand up! I am about to introduce a queen. Growing up my best friend was the girl next door. We were also classmates. She was very humble and very beautiful. As children. I thought she was weak, after all, when her father called her she always trembled, unlike all the
I smile when I paint pictures of naked women and lazy trees that are too occupied to move, and the consummation of heaven and the earth at the extreme of beach ends, covered in a mist of glory. I follow the trail of the sexy yellow moon that twerks her bottom, returning from the evening
Failure is relative. It is relative to your standards and expectations. If you never dream, you will never fail. It really is that simple. Perhaps this is the curse of the human condition, the fact that the assertion above leaves the weight on our shoulders no lighter. The reality is that those words will not
Red sparks fly out from the centre of the firewood as Nakia makes sure she supplies enough oxygen with her hand fan in order to keep the fire alive. This meal she’s preparing could be the last as she’s running out of supplies in terms of foodstuff, and the market has been closed since last
The conference room is as quiet as a graveyard. It’s been so since Azuke Mazzari stepped in. The Union of African countries has all its members present, except for Ismail Muhammad, the Nigerian president, who, by reports reaching the Union, is still in London. Azuke let out a scornful laugh when he noticed Ismail’s empty
When you are 30, Christmas smells of nothing. Not the smell of burning hides clouding the harmattan air, not the smell of steaming tomatoes or fireworks. Not the smell of excitement. There is no smell. And it doesn’t matter. You are all grown up. You are thinking of how to be many things, stripping yourself
One When Ma tells you she needs grandchildren because she is itching to her grave, you know it is time to learn how to love a girl. Two Look at Kambili from the eyes of your lover. You are addicted to your lover, and to wean yourself from this addiction because of Ma, you need
Harbinger You knew this would happen: The doctor planting death into your body by giving your ailment a name. Madam. you have cancer, he had said. And that began your journey into gloom: a world with no sky. Liar You learnt how to lie with your eyes. You knew that your children heard the groaning
They gathered at the estate like medieval warriors preparing for battle. Some lifted placards bearing signs: WE ARE NOT DUMPSITES,KEEP OUR TOWN CLEAN, DONT TRASH OUR RIGHTS: while others wheeled a huge monster of trash. The street was littered and reeked of rotten banana peels, decayed onions, sachets of beverages, plastics, paper, condoms. The whole