Somadina's Adventures
CHAPTER 1- Part 1- Double Life- A Trip to Waltadot
Elated, Somadina climbed down from the passenger seat and down the car, jiggling in her hands a bunch of keys as she tried to find the one she’d unlock the gate with. She found the right key just as she got to the and after passing her hand through a small square opening at the gate unlocked its padlock.
She pushed the gate open, watching her father drive in as a tingle of excitement rushed down her spine; just down the compound and in the house lay her phone which she couldn’t wait to get to, but first she had to carry her baby brother from the car and into his crib, after which she’d have to change from her school cloths into a befitting house wear, but even after all that, she still wouldn’t be able to use her phone —she still had to do the chores she had overlooked in her attempt at getting to school on time.
She closed the gates and headed to the parking car, and on getting to it carried her brother out of his seat after unfastening all the safety belts. She with an embrace carried him towards their front door, unlocking it a split second later after switching him to her left hand. She now only had to lie him in her mother’s room on his crib and head out to change her cloth then she would head for her phone, that sounded a lot easier than it had a while ago, alas, she in her impatient had forgotten her chores, she would never get to hear the end of it if her father was to find her with her phone while the plates they had used at breakfast were still on the sink.
After a rushed bath, Somadina plodded into their corridor and down it in a bid to get to the kitchen.
Her phone rang.
She turned, but had already caught a glimpse of the few weary plates on the sink. She stood to make a choice, she could either ignore the call or answer it, but one, if caught in the act would put her in trouble. She sighed, she had to get the plates washed first, but— But she could do the two at once. She headed for her room.
She had a few ideas of who could be on the other side of the call, her first guess was Lynda, her best friend, and her second guess; Obinna. She’d have to check the caller ID first to know who it was, but it was hidden, it was sure to be Lynda.
‘When did you get home?’ Lynda asked, just as soon as she swiped right the icon on the phone’s screen. As she had guessed, it was Lynda, and she had hidden her caller ID.
‘Just now— why didn’t you come to school today?’ Somadina left her room and made for the kitchen.
‘I was—nothing, did any teacher ask of me?’
Somadina rolled her eyes, couldn’t Lynda just get straight to the point?
‘Not just any teacher, Aunty Akinlade!’ She heard Lynda chuckle.
‘Okay, did our form teacher come to school?’
‘Why wouldn’t she?’Somadina asked, getting then to the kitchen sink.
‘Did she also ask of me?’
She sighed, ‘Yes,’ she stressed.
‘Okay—,’ she hesitated for a while before continuing but Somadina already knew what she had in mind, ‘How many A’s did you get?’
‘You don’t want to know how many you got?’
‘As if I need to ask about it!’
Somadina smirked, she was just trying to make her jealous, ‘Two.’
‘B’s?’
‘All the other ones, but there was a mis—.’
‘What about him?’
‘What about who?’Somadina hid a smile, even though Lynda wasn’t there, she believed she had to stop herself from smiling, the girl had a way of knowing her every disposition at any moment.
‘Stop smiling and just answer naw, was he in school today?’
Caught red-handed. But not exactly. Somadina found a bowl in their store, dropped it in the sink and poured enough water into it, enough to get the plates washed, rinsing them would be a problem for a later time.
‘How am I supposed to answer? I don’t even know who you are asking about!’
‘Okay, did Obinna come?’
A smile, ‘Yes.’ She dropped her phone on the sink and leaned it against the opposite wall, then she with her still dry wet hand switched into hands-free mode.
‘Look at your head, you think I don’t know you knew I was asking about him—.’
‘I didn’t know!’
‘O Yes ma— did you too get same grades again?’
‘This girl wetin sef, why are you disturbing me, if you want to know what he got ask him!’
‘I don’t have his num— forget, are you still coming to my house tomorrow?’
She put the third plate she had washed under the first two. There was no way she’d be able to make it to her house, her mother wouldn’t let her, no wasno point trying to obtain her permission, even telling Lynda she was coming had been a bad idea.
‘I can’t, my mum—.’
‘I know, will show her your result?’
‘I’m not sure sef— it’s just mock result na!’ She was sure her father hadn't heard her, she had a while ago heard him lock himself inside his room.
‘Bad shild, are you the only one at home?’
‘No, my father is around.’
‘Eh, okwa you want him to say I’m a bad friend, abeg Madam, wash your plate fast and come online, gist dey market!’
The line went dead.
Somadina chuckled, Lynda must have heard the numerous pokes of the plate she was washing on the sides of the sink. Her last remark had reminded her of her mother had told, and of course, she had told Lynda about it, and since then she rarely called her whenever any of her parents were at home. And even if she was to call, she would have asked her online if her parents were around, and she always answered in the positive, except of course a few times when she had gone with her phone to buy something.
She rushed through the remaining plates, rinsing and returning them their rightful place, before heading back to her room— taking her precious phone along.
She got to her room just as soon as a message entered her phone, she opened it with a grin; it was Obinna, and he had sent her a saucy message, the type that had gotten her in trouble with her parents twice before. Even with its sauciness, it had made her laugh.
Somadina lay down on her bed to compose a reply, and just as she was about to start she heard a loud squall; her brother was crying.
When she got to her mother’s room, her brother was on the floor, how he got there wasn’t really clear but she had to do something to make his cry stop. She could prepare him a bowl of pap, she thought, knowing that might be effective and what he probably desired. She hesitated for a while and soon began to rock him back to sleep; she was in no mood to prepare anything. Her plan worked perfectly and she placed him back in his crib and rushed back to room, but on getting there she already knew she was in trouble; the shadow she had seen beneath the door told her so. She pushed the door ajar and looked at her bed before entering, the phone she had dropped there wasn’t on it anymore and her father was holding something that looked like hers’. She remembered she hadn’t closed the message Obinna had sent her, stupid her she sighed, ready to be confronted by a brief speech followed by two weeks of absolute boredom, boredom from what she knew was now inevitable.
Her predicament at this particular moment had occurred previously, a year ago to be precise, she had also forgotten to close what she was doing, but then it had been her mom that walked into her room, she must have seen a snippet of the message she was reading because she then demanded her phone from her. She could have closed her messenger app but she probably didn’t want to or was too afraid to do so, and thus she ended up with two weeks’ boredom resulting from the deprivation of her phone.
She sighed once more amid gazing at nothing in particular, expecting her father to talk. He only waved her phone before her and raised a 2-sign with his fingers as he turned the phone off, then he left her to her misery. At least, all her apps were locked! And he wouldn’t in any way be able to read all that chats she had screenshot. She smiled at herself as she slumped on her bed, ready to be taken away by a far-off sleep.
Her eyes became weary and her vision blurred, she blinked severally. Believing something was blocking her sight. She rubbed her finger on her eyes, trying to remove whatever was in her eyes but was also subtly fighting off the fangs of sleep which was sucking away her strength. Somadina soon succumbed at the feet of her former desire and was then taken away from all the sorrows and fatigues of reality.
***
The terrain was rocky as well as steep, Somadina had wanted to quit climbing the hill they both were on but the competitive Joe ahead of her would only make fun of her if she were to stop.
She dug her climbing stick into a space between two rocks and with it she pulled herself up the hill. She knew well enough that any miss step would result in her plummeting to the hostile ground below.
She pulled the stick up, and dug it into another crevice and pulled herself up, a weak footing on a slippery rock sent her crashing to the ground, making Joe run after her as she descended down the hill with her otiose short gown offering no protection whatsoever— lucky for her, Joe had already gone ahead of her to stop her fall. His gray knee reaching coat stopping its continuous flap as soon as he stopped, if she hadn't been falling, she was sure to have laughed at his coat and at his shorts that stopped where his coat also stopped, everything he was wearing was gray and if she hadn't seen him before she would have had reason to believe she had lost her sight. He pulled her, carrying her up into his arms and heading up the hill amidst her protest to be let down. He in his stubbornness only set her down when they got to the flat peak of the hill.
Up on the hill, the houses and farms below seemed too small to even be able to accommodate a person in them, they also were far away from the hill, and this contributed to their small sizes and she knew this, but had to quit gazing down hill when she realized Joe had left her side— how couldn’t he see she was in no mood for such games? His departure however gave her time to attempt figuring out where in the world she was. She was pretty sure she was no longer in Nigeria, and clothing had made her believe she was no longer in the 21st century. Now, if she wasn’t in her home country in the century she had grown in, where then was she? And how had she gotten there?
She looked down, Joe was nowhere to be seen, at least, she would be able to get answers to her question without any disturbance. Now to business; the last thing she had done before seeing herself here was fall asleep, what harm could that have done?
She must have somehow been carried to this place, this could very much be Lynda’s handiwork or Obinna’s doing. They must have done this to scare her, and they have done it at the beginning of their holiday— bad timing, couldn’t they wait at least until she had enjoyed a small portion of her holiday?
But then, how had they done this? Was the view she had been looking at just a screen or a drawing?
She stretched her hand forward, there was nothing there but air. She sniveled, her surrounding smelt like it appeared— of dust. She rubbed her eyes, hoping it would clear the illusion before her; nothing changed. This wasn’t a prank after all, it seemed real, very real that she could feel the velvet maroon gown she was wearing. The ground also seemed firm and emitted dust when she stamped her feet on it. She was doomed. How would she ever get home?
She turned around, either this was a dream and appeared otherwise, or she had travelled back in time to the 18th century— or whatever time this was. Whatever this was, the approaching Joe would have the answer, and would most likely take her home, to her real home!
She remained up there until he came back up to carry her down; she rejected his offer, and then scrambled down the hill with him behind her, giggling out his heart. They soon got to the foot of the hill and parted ways without exchanging any words.
Somadina had been the mastermind of all their previous and current silence games, and was now walking away from him in zigzag along the path to her little home where her parents were working on the wheat farm beside the house and her sister with her husband in the small farm house farther away from the house, when she was a bit younger, she had been their greatest admirer but that perhaps was before Joe. She walked past the spiked wooden fence around their house and headed for its front door that sat beside a raised modest-sized verandah that had a series of stairs leading up to it, as opposed to the flat slabs she believed she had seen before, leading up and into famous alehouses.
She walked into the house and upstairs to her room which she had left in a mess probably in a bid to find a cloth she would go out in this evening with Joe.
Somadinapondered upon what her relationship with Joe really was. They both had been friends ever since she could remember, and every memory she had of herself having a good time had something to do with him except of course when she was probably with her sister or her parents.
She sighed as she tried to find a way past the littered cloths on her way to the chamberpot which was in her bedroom. She still had to pack up the mess at the end of the day but at least it couldn’t be compared to when she had been trying to find a cloth to wear for a wedding function which Joe had also invited her to, she smiled to herself as she left the chamberpot on remembering the few delightful moments of that day.
She left the chamberpot and walked to her bed where she fell on, also falling on the cloths which were on it; she needed to get a little rest in preparation for where she was planning on going with Joe. Even though she had pretended to be angry on her walk home, deep down she knew she could never hold a grudge on someone, most especially Joe, and he probably also knew.
Somadina was disturbed by the cry of a baby coming from her sister’s bedroom, she was sure they didn’t have a baby—unless her sister or her mother recently put to bed, but how wouldn’t she know about it.
CHAPTER 1- Part 1- Double Life- A Trip to Waltadot
Elated, Somadina climbed down from the passenger seat and down the car, jiggling in her hands a bunch of keys as she tried to find the one she’d unlock the gate with. She found the right key just as she got to the and after passing her hand through a small square opening at the gate unlocked its padlock.
She pushed the gate open, watching her father drive in as a tingle of excitement rushed down her spine; just down the compound and in the house lay her phone which she couldn’t wait to get to, but first she had to carry her baby brother from the car and into his crib, after which she’d have to change from her school cloths into a befitting house wear, but even after all that, she still wouldn’t be able to use her phone —she still had to do the chores she had overlooked in her attempt at getting to school on time.
She closed the gates and headed to the parking car, and on getting to it carried her brother out of his seat after unfastening all the safety belts. She with an embrace carried him towards their front door, unlocking it a split second later after switching him to her left hand. She now only had to lie him in her mother’s room on his crib and head out to change her cloth then she would head for her phone, that sounded a lot easier than it had a while ago, alas, she in her impatient had forgotten her chores, she would never get to hear the end of it if her father was to find her with her phone while the plates they had used at breakfast were still on the sink.
After a rushed bath, Somadina plodded into their corridor and down it in a bid to get to the kitchen.
Her phone rang.
She turned, but had already caught a glimpse of the few weary plates on the sink. She stood to make a choice, she could either ignore the call or answer it, but one, if caught in the act would put her in trouble. She sighed, she had to get the plates washed first, but— But she could do the two at once. She headed for her room.
She had a few ideas of who could be on the other side of the call, her first guess was Lynda, her best friend, and her second guess; Obinna. She’d have to check the caller ID first to know who it was, but it was hidden, it was sure to be Lynda.
‘When did you get home?’ Lynda asked, just as soon as she swiped right the icon on the phone’s screen. As she had guessed, it was Lynda, and she had hidden her caller ID.
‘Just now— why didn’t you come to school today?’ Somadina left her room and made for the kitchen.
‘I was—nothing, did any teacher ask of me?’
Somadina rolled her eyes, couldn’t Lynda just get straight to the point?
‘Not just any teacher, Aunty Akinlade!’ She heard Lynda chuckle.
‘Okay, did our form teacher come to school?’
‘Why wouldn’t she?’Somadina asked, getting then to the kitchen sink.
‘Did she also ask of me?’
She sighed, ‘Yes,’ she stressed.
‘Okay—,’ she hesitated for a while before continuing but Somadina already knew what she had in mind, ‘How many A’s did you get?’
‘You don’t want to know how many you got?’
‘As if I need to ask about it!’
Somadina smirked, she was just trying to make her jealous, ‘Two.’
‘B’s?’
‘All the other ones, but there was a mis—.’
‘What about him?’
‘What about who?’Somadina hid a smile, even though Lynda wasn’t there, she believed she had to stop herself from smiling, the girl had a way of knowing her every disposition at any moment.
‘Stop smiling and just answer naw, was he in school today?’
Caught red-handed. But not exactly. Somadina found a bowl in their store, dropped it in the sink and poured enough water into it, enough to get the plates washed, rinsing them would be a problem for a later time.
‘How am I supposed to answer? I don’t even know who you are asking about!’
‘Okay, did Obinna come?’
A smile, ‘Yes.’ She dropped her phone on the sink and leaned it against the opposite wall, then she with her still dry wet hand switched into hands-free mode.
‘Look at your head, you think I don’t know you knew I was asking about him—.’
‘I didn’t know!’
‘O Yes ma— did you too get same grades again?’
‘This girl wetin sef, why are you disturbing me, if you want to know what he got ask him!’
‘I don’t have his num— forget, are you still coming to my house tomorrow?’
She put the third plate she had washed under the first two. There was no way she’d be able to make it to her house, her mother wouldn’t let her, no wasno point trying to obtain her permission, even telling Lynda she was coming had been a bad idea.
‘I can’t, my mum—.’
‘I know, will show her your result?’
‘I’m not sure sef— it’s just mock result na!’ She was sure her father hadn't heard her, she had a while ago heard him lock himself inside his room.
‘Bad shild, are you the only one at home?’
‘No, my father is around.’
‘Eh, okwa you want him to say I’m a bad friend, abeg Madam, wash your plate fast and come online, gist dey market!’
The line went dead.
Somadina chuckled, Lynda must have heard the numerous pokes of the plate she was washing on the sides of the sink. Her last remark had reminded her of her mother had told, and of course, she had told Lynda about it, and since then she rarely called her whenever any of her parents were at home. And even if she was to call, she would have asked her online if her parents were around, and she always answered in the positive, except of course a few times when she had gone with her phone to buy something.
She rushed through the remaining plates, rinsing and returning them their rightful place, before heading back to her room— taking her precious phone along.
She got to her room just as soon as a message entered her phone, she opened it with a grin; it was Obinna, and he had sent her a saucy message, the type that had gotten her in trouble with her parents twice before. Even with its sauciness, it had made her laugh.
Somadina lay down on her bed to compose a reply, and just as she was about to start she heard a loud squall; her brother was crying.
When she got to her mother’s room, her brother was on the floor, how he got there wasn’t really clear but she had to do something to make his cry stop. She could prepare him a bowl of pap, she thought, knowing that might be effective and what he probably desired. She hesitated for a while and soon began to rock him back to sleep; she was in no mood to prepare anything. Her plan worked perfectly and she placed him back in his crib and rushed back to room, but on getting there she already knew she was in trouble; the shadow she had seen beneath the door told her so. She pushed the door ajar and looked at her bed before entering, the phone she had dropped there wasn’t on it anymore and her father was holding something that looked like hers’. She remembered she hadn’t closed the message Obinna had sent her, stupid her she sighed, ready to be confronted by a brief speech followed by two weeks of absolute boredom, boredom from what she knew was now inevitable.
Her predicament at this particular moment had occurred previously, a year ago to be precise, she had also forgotten to close what she was doing, but then it had been her mom that walked into her room, she must have seen a snippet of the message she was reading because she then demanded her phone from her. She could have closed her messenger app but she probably didn’t want to or was too afraid to do so, and thus she ended up with two weeks’ boredom resulting from the deprivation of her phone.
She sighed once more amid gazing at nothing in particular, expecting her father to talk. He only waved her phone before her and raised a 2-sign with his fingers as he turned the phone off, then he left her to her misery. At least, all her apps were locked! And he wouldn’t in any way be able to read all that chats she had screenshot. She smiled at herself as she slumped on her bed, ready to be taken away by a far-off sleep.
Her eyes became weary and her vision blurred, she blinked severally. Believing something was blocking her sight. She rubbed her finger on her eyes, trying to remove whatever was in her eyes but was also subtly fighting off the fangs of sleep which was sucking away her strength. Somadina soon succumbed at the feet of her former desire and was then taken away from all the sorrows and fatigues of reality.
***
The terrain was rocky as well as steep, Somadina had wanted to quit climbing the hill they both were on but the competitive Joe ahead of her would only make fun of her if she were to stop.
She dug her climbing stick into a space between two rocks and with it she pulled herself up the hill. She knew well enough that any miss step would result in her plummeting to the hostile ground below.
She pulled the stick up, and dug it into another crevice and pulled herself up, a weak footing on a slippery rock sent her crashing to the ground, making Joe run after her as she descended down the hill with her otiose short gown offering no protection whatsoever— lucky for her, Joe had already gone ahead of her to stop her fall. His gray knee reaching coat stopping its continuous flap as soon as he stopped, if she hadn't been falling, she was sure to have laughed at his coat and at his shorts that stopped where his coat also stopped, everything he was wearing was gray and if she hadn't seen him before she would have had reason to believe she had lost her sight. He pulled her, carrying her up into his arms and heading up the hill amidst her protest to be let down. He in his stubbornness only set her down when they got to the flat peak of the hill.
Up on the hill, the houses and farms below seemed too small to even be able to accommodate a person in them, they also were far away from the hill, and this contributed to their small sizes and she knew this, but had to quit gazing down hill when she realized Joe had left her side— how couldn’t he see she was in no mood for such games? His departure however gave her time to attempt figuring out where in the world she was. She was pretty sure she was no longer in Nigeria, and clothing had made her believe she was no longer in the 21st century. Now, if she wasn’t in her home country in the century she had grown in, where then was she? And how had she gotten there?
She looked down, Joe was nowhere to be seen, at least, she would be able to get answers to her question without any disturbance. Now to business; the last thing she had done before seeing herself here was fall asleep, what harm could that have done?
She must have somehow been carried to this place, this could very much be Lynda’s handiwork or Obinna’s doing. They must have done this to scare her, and they have done it at the beginning of their holiday— bad timing, couldn’t they wait at least until she had enjoyed a small portion of her holiday?
But then, how had they done this? Was the view she had been looking at just a screen or a drawing?
She stretched her hand forward, there was nothing there but air. She sniveled, her surrounding smelt like it appeared— of dust. She rubbed her eyes, hoping it would clear the illusion before her; nothing changed. This wasn’t a prank after all, it seemed real, very real that she could feel the velvet maroon gown she was wearing. The ground also seemed firm and emitted dust when she stamped her feet on it. She was doomed. How would she ever get home?
She turned around, either this was a dream and appeared otherwise, or she had travelled back in time to the 18th century— or whatever time this was. Whatever this was, the approaching Joe would have the answer, and would most likely take her home, to her real home!
She remained up there until he came back up to carry her down; she rejected his offer, and then scrambled down the hill with him behind her, giggling out his heart. They soon got to the foot of the hill and parted ways without exchanging any words.
Somadina had been the mastermind of all their previous and current silence games, and was now walking away from him in zigzag along the path to her little home where her parents were working on the wheat farm beside the house and her sister with her husband in the small farm house farther away from the house, when she was a bit younger, she had been their greatest admirer but that perhaps was before Joe. She walked past the spiked wooden fence around their house and headed for its front door that sat beside a raised modest-sized verandah that had a series of stairs leading up to it, as opposed to the flat slabs she believed she had seen before, leading up and into famous alehouses.
She walked into the house and upstairs to her room which she had left in a mess probably in a bid to find a cloth she would go out in this evening with Joe.
Somadinapondered upon what her relationship with Joe really was. They both had been friends ever since she could remember, and every memory she had of herself having a good time had something to do with him except of course when she was probably with her sister or her parents.
She sighed as she tried to find a way past the littered cloths on her way to the chamberpot which was in her bedroom. She still had to pack up the mess at the end of the day but at least it couldn’t be compared to when she had been trying to find a cloth to wear for a wedding function which Joe had also invited her to, she smiled to herself as she left the chamberpot on remembering the few delightful moments of that day.
She left the chamberpot and walked to her bed where she fell on, also falling on the cloths which were on it; she needed to get a little rest in preparation for where she was planning on going with Joe. Even though she had pretended to be angry on her walk home, deep down she knew she could never hold a grudge on someone, most especially Joe, and he probably also knew.
Somadina was disturbed by the cry of a baby coming from her sister’s bedroom, she was sure they didn’t have a baby—unless her sister or her mother recently put to bed, but how wouldn’t she know about it.
0 comments:
Post a Comment