FLASH FICTION
FOR MY FATHER
It took five years, but I got the vengeance I wanted.
“Sweet girl, na you wan take care of me tonight?”
My shoulder stiffens as the voice and the creak of the open door sound behind me.
My chest and stomach are a flaming furnace as my left hand tightens on the metal barricade on the window.
“My sweet customer,” I reply, in what I hope is the manner I answer the gazillion men who visit me each night.
“Na me go take care of you oo.”
“Na there you wan dey take care of me?” He barks.
My jaw is clenched, and I slip my trembling hands to my rounded hips, striking an akimbo.
“I dey come meet you now, my love.”
I pull my lips into a smile and hope that my voice has lost some of its edge.
In our line of business, we could be many things but hostile. Our customers visit to seek refuge from hostilities, not to encounter them. It is one of the first lessons every girl under the tutelage of Oluremi Badmus learns.
“Never forget that you are their wives, mothers, and daughters,” she would warn during every end-of-the-month meeting, not because she cared about the men or our successes but because she cared about her business.
Grit crunches against the worn, plastic carpet under my wooden wedge sandals as I pivot. In our business, bright lights are an anathema, and despite the dim blue light, I can see that he hasn’t changed much.
Ice shoots up my spine as my eyes settle on him, his Iroko tree-like limbs, his barrel-like belly pushing against his shirt, and his handlebar mustache. I shudder as I recall the memories of that night five years ago.
“Why your mama come sweet pass you wey be tear rubber?” He had asked as I fetched my clothes from the floor in his office. That blue room that stank of mildew and stale cigarettes. Hot tears trailed down my cheek and mingled with the sweat on my skin. The flesh between my legs throbbed and bled, but the pain was minor compared to the one in my chest.
Rhetorical questions were not meant to be answered, but I managed a shaky “I don’t know” as I recalled my mother’s words.
“Joy, abeg do anything he tells you to do so that your father would be released tomorrow.” She pleaded before I left her. I nodded. I needed no convincing.
I needed my father back home and our lives to return to normal.
His response was the guttural laughter of the satisfied. I should have known then that my father’s fate was sealed, that my life was forever changed.
In the present, I stretch to my toes, rest shaky hands on his belly, and press my lips against his rough cheek. I am enveloped by the scent of cigarettes, alcohol, sweat, and garlic. I clench my stomach and pray that I don’t vomit.
The last girl who vomited on a customer was flogged for hours by Remi Badmus’s goons before her bruised and broken body was tossed on the street.
That day, I learned an unspoken rule about our business: our job was to take things into our mouths and other parts of our bodies. We were never meant to bring them out as gossip, unwanted babies, or vomit.
“My love, no vex, I dey prepare myself for you, my madam talk say make I give you VIP treatment.”
He shoots his hands in front of him and grunts.
“You know who I be wey you dey waste my time?”
The mattress thumps as my body slams roughly against it.
I grab the sweat and grime-crusted sheets and gasp as pain shoots up my back.
I do not believe in God or Karma; neither had delivered the needed justice in my five years of waiting.
It’s impossible not to think this is a retribution for what I did to Dorcas, the girl who should have been here.
The roadside chemist had mentioned that one laxative pill would purge me.
I slipped two in her beer while she was flirting with a customer.
It was the final act I needed to perfect my plans the moment I heard that the SARS commandant was in town.
“I don’t know why your madam changed my special girl.” He grunts above the jangle of his belt buckle and the shuffle of removed clothes.
This time, I don’t reply with words; I slip my finger into my bra strap and ease it off my shoulders.
I roll my bodycon skirt up and spread my legs.
I groan as he crashes into me. If the stories I heard from Dorcas were true, I would only need to count to ten. Commandant na ten seconds, man, she mocked once.
I am tempted to look away from him at first, but I fear he would recognize me despite the layers of makeup and time. I am also sure he would not. Not at this moment. In my five years here, I have learned how slow a man’s brain functions at the sight of a woman’s body.
I drag my eyes to the ceiling and start a timer in my head.
One.
I shut my eyes and slip the fingers of my left hand into his hair. I move my right hand toward the tapped blade in my skirt. I wrap my legs around his waist and let out an exaggerated moan as I take him in.
Two. Three. Four. Five.
I ease the blade out, and the memories tumble against each other: the good, bad, and ugly.
My father shaving his beard every morning with the blade, the sight of his mutilated corpse on the street, the news announcing the death of the armed robbers who attempted to break out of the cell, the landlord evicting us, my mother and I suffering from the venereal infection, the faces of the men I had slept with in the past five years, the day I purchased the ticket to Ghana in my bag by the bed.
I return to the moment as warm sweat splatters on my face. I tighten my finger around the tapped end of the blade.
Six. Seven. Eight. Nine.
I bring my lips close to his ear.
“For my father, James Ebhota Wike.”
“You say….”
I slide it across the Jugular.
GLOSSARY
- “Sweet girl, na you wan take care of me tonight?” — Sweet girl, is it you who wants to take care of me tonight?”
- “Na me go take care of you oo.” — ”I will take care of you.”
- “Na there you wan dey take care of me?” — Is that where you would take care of me from?
- “Why your mama come sweet pass you wey be tear rubber?” — “Why does your mother appear more enjoyable than you, who is a virgin?
- “Joy, abeg do anything he tells you — “Joy, please do whatever he tells you.”
- My love, no vex, I dey prepare myself for you, my madam talk say make I give you VIP treatment.” — ”My love, please don’t be upset, I am getting ready for you. My boss said I should give you VIP treatment.”
- “You know who I be wey you dey waste my time?”- “Do you know who I am that you’re wasting my time?”
- Commandant na ten seconds, man, — Commandant lasts on the bed for only ten seconds.
