Chapter One
I am Chike. I am the third child of Mr & Mrs Maxwell Okorie. If you are into radios, Broadcasting Corporation of Abia to be precise, you ought to have heard this outro of hers “Angelus sponsored by the family of Mr. & Mrs. Maxwell Okorie. Ezinulo Chineke.”
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About our ezinulo – family – we have in the order of seniority Ada, Eze, Chike, David, Miracle, and Princess. We all attend God’s Grace And Mercy Academy. Ada is a primary 6 pupil and Princess primary 1 pupil, feel free to do the maths.
It was a beautiful Friday morning. School preparations and others as usual. Our family has weekday routines. Wake up time – 5:30 am; Joins the radio for the Angelus – 6:00 am; house chores – 6:30 am; off to school – 7:30 am. Yes, I skipped the interesting part, bathing, and breakfast. For bathing, we bundle ourselves according to gender distribution – Ada and Princess (the girls) do theirs differently while the others (the boys) do theirs. We only get together in our sitting room, where we all sit, surrounding a tray of mostly cereals like hot jollof rice whilst sitting on the floor.
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Our mother is a good cook. Okay, there is no reason she shouldn’t be. She is a housewife and my father is a businessman – he sells bags of cereals like rice and wheat. Every weekend he visits his shops outside Umuahia.
7:30 am we are all set for school, Princess better known as our mother’s daughter hits on her drama button “Mummy, please come to school with me. I want you to help me write. My finger is hurt.”
Princess’s drama is new every morning. Thank God Mother has her way around them. Within a few minutes, everything was resolved. Mother drove with us to the school. Once at the school gate, we bid our father goodbye, he is leaving for Uturu, he has a shop at the heart of Ututu the rich community that hosts Abia State University.
“Chike, this is hard for me to say. But, I will say it anyway. We can not be friends. You are soft. You are just a boy. My friend is Agu. He treks to school like a man would. We all fear him in the class. He is a monitor. Since we became friends, my name hasn’t appeared on the noisemakers list. Chike you cry a lot in the face of an ordinary cane. You should be friends with Kamsi, she cries like you. Drives to school like you. Chim, you two even live in the same compound.” said Rita “But, if you still want to be my friend, take this cartoon, watch it, and tell me about it. My father does not allow us to bring borrowed items into the house. But I want to watch the movie.”
In my hand is a white CD, its name written with a marker, Monsters and Children. I have heard so much about the movie. It’s a cartoon, a scary one. Most boys in the classroom have a thing or two to say about it.
When school dismissed, my mother came and picked us up. We got home. Continued with routines. House chores, angelus, dinner, lights out. And by 11:00 pm I tiptoed to the sitting room, to prove my friendship.
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Chapter two
12:00 am, and 15 minutes to the end of the movie, I felt the need to use the restroom. I need to take a leak. Our restroom is not inside the living room, it is a separate block three minutes away. At night we don’t usually use the restroom, we have a bucket where the children pee into, to be disposed of in the morning by Ada. But at this time, going to our bedroom to get the bucket will wake the others.
It’s just for the night, there is no harm in taking a leak outside just this once. I walked to the door and found it slightly open. How come? I have been in the sitting room alone, how come, someone, is still outside without my notice? Out of the blue, there was a power outage. The CD. How do I get to remove the CD before the others wake up? We also have a standing law. No video is to be watched in the house without proper parental guidance. So many things on my mind, and worst in a dark room.
My saviour would be the glow-in-the-dark rosary on our doorpost. I picked it to guide my path to the restroom. “Chike.” I heard a faint voice.
“Dad, is that you?” I asked. I walked in the direction of the voice. I could see a figure making use of what appeared to be a dimly lit mobile phone.
“Mummy!” that’s Princess. There were rumblings, and it came from the kitchen. My siblings started running outside with their flashlights. Somethings were chasing them, and throwing kitchen utensils at them.
Within seconds a flat stainless plate landed on my forehead.
“Chike, run! The monster is behind you!”
What monster? I felt a grip on my shoulder, whatever was holding me had bony fingers.
“Chike, run! The monster is behind you!”
With the glow-in-the-dark rosary, I fought back, but, to no avail.
“Leave my son-in-law, I can not watch you hurt another member of my household!” that was Kamsi’s father. He is our landlord. He calls me son-in-law. I share the same birthday with Kamsi. He likes me a lot and so does Kamsi. Aside from crying a lot in school, I don’t like Kamsi because she still wets herself at night.
The monster pushed me away and was hard enough to get me off balance. I fell to the ground, next to a body. It was Aunty Nenye’s body, she was Kamsi’s old nanny. She appeared to be eaten. I couldn’t scream, it was as if I lost my voice.
“Chike, run! Take care of Kamsi, she’s all I have got in this world.”Kamsi’s father came landing next to me. The monster ripped him into two. I felt like screaming, but couldn’t. I felt like running but couldn’t. standing before me is the monster, eating the right leg of Kamsi’s father.
I felt frozen, till my dad saved my soul. “Dad, thank you,” I said with watery eyes. He carried me on his shoulder and made a few runs. The monsters appeared everywhere, chasing everyone both my family members and our neighbours, everyone was on the run in no exact direction.
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Dead bodies dropped like flies and the monsters had arms on their sides killing and destroying everyone and everything they saw. Suddenly my dad’s foot got stuck against a large stone and he fell, blood was gushing out. He laid me down. I wanted to help him but he told me to keep running for my life. I refused. Then I saw them come our direction. “Run! Chike run!” I couldn’t believe how fast my world crumbled before my eyes “I love you and I will always do.” the monsters caught my father. They ate him in my presence. Tears ran down my cheeks as I watched my father die without doing anything.
One of the monsters came to me, bent over, and whispered “My delicious Chike,” he licked my face, “Very delicious. Let us pray.” he was about to make a mockery of our prayer before meal when Kamsi ran him over with her bicycle.
She rode us to safety. It was a moment of reflection. Did all these happen because I opened the door to use the restroom? Speaking of the restroom, I couldn’t hold the build-up on my bladder anymore. I took a leak in a nearby bush.
In a matter of minutes, we had lost everything. I lost my father and so did Kamsi. I am yet to know the fate of my mother and siblings, for Kamsi, her nanny is already dead. We sat and cried.
“Chike, wake up.” my eyes met my mother “Why are you crying?” I shared everything that transpired from school till the nightmare. “Nothing will happen to your father, freshen up. Then come for your breakfast. Eze told me you peed on the bed and were yet to wake up, I couldn’t believe my ears. Are you now friends with Kamsi?”
“Ezinulo Chineke! God’s own family! I’m home!” that was definitely my father, this time.
I ran into his waiting arms. It was a big hug “I love you Dad,” it was as if he had been away for three months. He said loved me too, before my siblings came for theirs.
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About the author
Bernard Amarachi Stephanie is a Nigerian author and contributor of Goals Initiative. Her works notably features characters that explore their curiosities and instincts to the core, An aspirant law student and Senior Advocate of Nigeria. An advocate for mainstreaming and prioritizing girl child education in Nigeria. A student of Amazing Grace High School, Umuahia. Her short story My Strange Neighbour is a beautiful peace of art.
About Goals Initiative
Goals Initiative aims at the actualization and localization of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. It is a product of General Soccer Company Limited, that practically turns ordinary people especially children, adolescents and young adults into well informed stakeholders for the actualization and localization of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
