The Things You Now Read

There was disquiet uptown. A deafening kind of disquietude. I wasn't there but Ike gave a bloated version of it. People were shouting for relief: some cursed the government while the others blamed the president for the unfortunate year.
'Do you know that some aboki were burning tyres on the road and the police could not stop them? It was later that army people came and drove them away with tear gas. They said that the government only relaxed it a little on the condition that people adhere strictly to covid-19 guidelines, he argued on.

'You can lie for Africa, since when did army people start going about with tear gas, I thought it is the police that usually use it to scatter crowd?'I had snapped out of mild irritation.
'What do you even know about the military? Today, the army decided to come out with it. Period!'
Whatever!

I had left my mails unchecked for close to an age. There were more serious issues, more urgent palaver that sat in my mind like a contentious wife. They said the lockdown was ending; some said it had ended while many said it was gradually being eased off, and the government had asked people to begin to go about their normal routines with their face faces heavily guarded with masks of various magnitudes.

I was a teacher, a very happy teacher before the coming of the virus. I worked at a new generation British College with a world class facility. It is a safe haven, a beautiful acre where top politicians and privileged Nigerians educate their children at the heart of Abuja, Nigeria. And then, the pandemic came like a maid-in-waiting. I had lost my job. We all did, teachers in Nigeria I meant.

It was October. Early signs of dry season were creeping in. Rains scarcely fell; the harmattan was also rearing its infant head. It was too soon. It was an unusual year; the year of Corona; the year everything went weird.

That evening a friend sent me a recharge card and I decided to subscribe with it. A billion messages rushed into my phone like sperms in fertilization race. I opened my mail box with certain lack lustre. I wasn't scouting for any message in particular, but I was expecting a reply from an editor in Canada who partnered with a local clergy to organize an essay contest. But I was saddened to see nothing even in my spam folder. However, I did see a message from my long time paddy- Farouk.


Farouk was my childhood friend, one of my longest standing friends. We did high school together and even went to the same university. Three years upon graduation, his parent helped him to immigrate to Canada while I remained in Nigeria. We only communicated via email. So when the pandemic broke out like one of the Egyptian plagues in Bible days, we lost contact. It was his mail that I saw: he sent it ten months back. He had sent two other mails beside this particular one.
I simply stared at it with mixed feelings and opened it with little enthusiasm. I unplugged the phone from the wall to enable read with ease. The small bed made funny but disturbing sound, swinging back and forth like a pendulum. It reminded me of Mtshali's poem-  Boy on a swing.  It was the best I could get.
'Do not lie on your back for too long. Balance your weight from time to time. You hear?' One of the nurses advised.
'I nodded.'
She left the room and I sat up on the bed. My waist pained, and I still felt shocking sensation inside of me. My illness had started at the peak on the lockdown; everyone thought I had contacted the virus because I had high fever. Many avoided me. The church was on corona holiday. My work place had been shut down in March. I had nowhere to go. I become trapped in my cold flat. During the early symptoms of my sickness, I had exhausted the lean money in my bank account which was largely as a result of non-payment of my salary since February of 2020.

In September, on the eve of my birthday, an acquaintance, a guy of goodly countenance who lived on my street came to chat with me. He, like me, was a victim of corona lockdown: we both were private school teachers and our employers had failed to pay us for months. 'There's a global crisis' was their anthem. It was he who found me lying almost lifeless on the floor of my dirt-ridden room. I shivered. Eyes dimmed. Worried, he quickly rushed out to get okada that brought me to the Primary Health Centre.