Black Sunday

Chapter One

For miles in the city, the only thing that was visible was a pair of shed snake skin but it meant something even in the recently quiet village of Emuoha. Few trees lined up the streets; palm trees separated twenty feet apart, mud puddles on the street lay about half the distance of the palm trees and along the wet roads.

The city had been in turmoil for quite a while. Each week came with its own bad news of kidnappings, robberies or shootouts. Once there had been news that a group of young men had gone to the palace of one of the town's Chiefs and village heads dressed as policemen to kidnap him.
They had come straight through the front door of his house saying that they had had orders from Abuja headquarters, the Federal Capital territory to arrest Chief Nwanze only for his wife to have received calls from them three days later asking for ransom for his release.

Much of the rich people had left to the city, and for those who dared to stay, they had built higher fences with barbed wires and stronger gates. Guard dogs were in demand more than usual; the kinds whose barks would echo, ''arff, arff'' at the littlest of sounds; security cameras became a necessity for the wealthy who dared stay.

Papa had been making plans for us to leave the town. Each day he went to the farm and stayed till evening, he would call at least three times, asking mama if she was back from the market or if we had come back from school, if there were any gunshots at the market and if we had made sure to lock the doors. Day after day, mama worried and complained that the turmoil had made papa to ask less of if we had eaten and more of if we had locked the doors.

It was before the day papa got his job, the day papa had first gone to see the Parish Priest of St. Patrick's. Papa didn't attend church. He would however ask us to go to church on special occasions like Christmas and New Year but he would never attend with us.
The day before it happened, I choked on a salmon fish bone; it hurt my throat like a knife slowly drawn on skin. I had to swallow another Garri mould to gulp down the bone that came from the fish papa had cooked that evening. He wasn't the kind of man to cook but that day like every once in a blue moon, he would cook and for the rest of the week he would sound the praises of how he was different from other men who never went to the market at all or who saw cooking as a woman's job. He would tell us- the boys- that we should not leave cooking to our sister or to mama alone and that one day we would be bachelors living on our own and we had to be aware of how to take care of ourselves or else we would squander whatever money we earned on buying food. He told us that even though hand-cooked food was cheaper than bought food, it didn't taste what it cost- cheap.
But that night, he wasn't talking about his cooking or anything, we spent most of that evening petrified by the fact that I had almost died. Mama lay me on her chest with her elbows behind my back and her palm at the back of my head ''the devil is a liar'' she said ''so this is how we would have lost our first son, my crown, Chimo, Chimo, My God, My God''. I didn't say much but I wondered how death would have been like for a twelve year old boy; maybe I would be able to see the wealth and gold that was preached by our church Priest, Father Amadi, wealth that existed in heaven only for those who were poor on Earth. My mum of honey coloured skin had tears running down her cheek bones. She would tell us of this hope and wealth that was made only for those who didn't have wages on earth, she believed it was our hope since we couldn't afford very much. I wondered why she was afraid to let me die that night since paradise would be much better than it was here, she held me tightly.
The candle that lit the room smelt of a light smoke and was melted past the middle; it had dropped a lot of wax from when we tried to place it on the floor but it was clear enough to see my younger sister's face as she sat down on the cemented floor that was our parlour surrounded by plastic chairs.
Onyinyechi was my younger sister's name; she was the one I was closest to besides my mum. During the night time, we would stay awake talking and laughing even though she was the one who did most of the talking; her company was something I looked forward to. From where my mum was holding me, I could see her oblong face and her complexion may have glistened from the candlelight but she was of a honey complexion and had already begun developing into the early stages of womanhood. She was the one every boy at Community Secondary School had a crush on or wanted as a girl friend. At school closing we would walk home together just so she wasn't disturbed by my or her classmates. Papa had given me the role of her guardian angel.
It was an awful thing to see her quiet that night. She sat down holding together her knees beside papa who sat on the only upholstery chair we had owned chewing on his chewing stick. He mentioned something to mama about a job interview that he was supposed to have the next day; he said it was big and that it would change us.
My throat didn't hurt much. I opened and closed my eyes just in time to see the candlelight go off. I turned and papa's face was the last thing I saw before it went off and I remember my throat hurting just a little more.