A Loner's Journey Through Lemonade Making

Chapter 14| The Rotten Ones

In all my life as a girl, the hardest thing I'd had to do was walk past a group of males, mostly teenage boys. I was certain other girls could relate.

I looked onto the road through the metal bars that formed the short gates. Walking down the road were four boys dressed lazily in sweatpants and baggy shirts. Their hands held their phones and their necks, their headphones. I recognized one of them when he turned to wave at someone. It was David, the grandfather of toasters, CEO Oniranu PLC. It was a wonder how no-one had claimed to be his baby mama yet.

There was no going back. As it was, the ten minutes I had to spend at the supermarket were already counting.

You've done it before, you can do it again, I told myself as I stepped out and walked down the road.

The plan was simple-- if they noticed me, I'd greet them and excuse myself quickly. If it was too hard, I would take my slippers off and run for my dear life.

While I walked on the sidewalks with the list and Aunty Oma's card in my hand, I kept waiting for a catcall. I got into the supermarket and bought a ton of chocolates, shortbread, bread, milk, grapes and Maryland cookies. Even as I walked back to the house with the big bags in my hands, I didn't hear my name. Up until......

"Yewande!"

Not today Satan, not today.

I turned back sharply. "Uncle David!" I acknowledged him.

"How are you boo?"

Werey.

"I'm fine. It's been long since I saw your face."

"Yeah. I've been busy with school, and you know my school isn't in Lagos."

"I know...Uyo right? Eiyah." I shook my head, as if I was pitying him and actually enjoying conversing with him. "See ehn, I have to go now. See you, oh?" I attempted walking away quickly, but the bags were too heavy. I managed anyway.

Oloriburuku somebody. He did not even offer to help me carry at least one. When David in the Bible was his age, he was on fire for God. Not everyone deserved to be given biblical names, I concluded.

When I got into the house, I wanted to go straight into the kitchen to drop the bags but the sight of a black box close to the door stopped me. My first thought was if it belonged to Aunty Nelo, and if she was leaving already.

That one is good, I thought to myself with a smile.

"...rubbish!" the slamming of the door from a room upstairs put my vision of Aunty Nelo acting like she was going to die while carrying a bag into her cab to an end. I looked up.

Were the sisters fighting?

Making her way down the stairs with her her shoes seriously slapping the tiled floor was Uncle Blessing's mother, the most dramatic and problematic woman to ever walk the face of earth. Patience Ozokwor couldn't stand beside her, and I wasn't even joking or making it up.

Aunty Oma came downstairs after her, holding her forehead in utter frustration. They stood in the centre of the living room, giving each other death glares.

"But you didn't tell me you were coming." Aunty Oma told her. Her voice was low and almost carefree, but that wasn't the case. They were both mad, very mad. But they had different ways of showcasing their madness.

"Are you listening to yourself Ijeoma? I didn't talk you I was coming to my own son's house?" she eyed her furiously. "Come, are you stupid?"

Aunty Oma's eyes widened. "With all due respect ma," that statement usually came with disrespect. She just said it for saying sake. "I'm not stupid. This is my house as much as it is your son's, and I wouldn't like to be insulted here. Besides, you don't just show up at someone's house without informing them. It's just rude."