It’s time for that woman to come to me. I know it’s time, because I hear a rumbling in my throat. It’s that swooshing sound of a sudden rush of fluid, and I feel it in my ear, throat and nose. Sometimes, I hear that sound too, in my stomach, whistling softly like a soda can that has just been open and I shut my eyes and count down from five to one, till she appears and sits with me.
That woman looks like the low budgeted version of Gwen from Merlin, with her flowing mane of black hair, a pair of boobs that never stays in place in a bra, always shooting out for the world to see, as if people doubted the possibility of a melanin goddess like her possessing a mammary gland, and she’s now putting it out there like, ‘see, I told you. I have a pair of breasts.’
Whenever she comes, we have long conversations on diverse topics. I wonder how she does this; how she knows everything about everything, and still maintains the disposition of someone who doesn’t know much. It was she, who told me that Mama Chika, my broad-hipped neighbor, who looks as if she can balance a cup on her big bum-bum if she tries, and who would rather starve than not stick her nose in someone else’s business, had an affair with my late husband, and that she poisoned him because she couldn’t bear the thought of sharing my own husband with me.
It was also she, who told me that my neighbors were all evil, and they were planning to deal with me and my kids, Ebube and Ezinwa. And that is why I barely sleep at night. I’m always awake each night, kabashing, praying in tongues, sprinkling anointing oil on my children. In fact, since my husband died five years ago, I haven’t slept a wink at night.
I am sitting in the living room with Ebube, my daughter, and we are playing WHOT. Every other aspect of my life may be an arrant mess, but I can’t deny the fact that I am a champion in card games. I think they should wear me a sash and crown me the queen of all card games, because no matter how hard my opponent tries, they can never win me.
The other day, Ezinwa, my son, asked if I was a witch, how I always predicted his cards and matched every tactic of his. I smiled and told him it was a God given talent, and I didn’t ask to be that badass, but there I was.
“Last card!” Ebube yells, as she drops her penultimate card, circle, hoping I don’t have a circle or the number 5, for her to win and bask in the euphoria of defeating the undisputed champion. But as soon as I pick a card from my lot to play, that woman comes to me.
Today, she is wearing a yellow, bodycon gown and a pair of brown shoes. She doesn’t wear that wig from before, the one that looks like an original human hair. She’s wearing her hair in an afro; short, and full, and beautiful. She smiles, and I smile back.
I drop the cards on my laps and say, “Nneimaka. This afro suits you better; you should wear your natural hair more often.”
“Abi o, thanks jare,” she says and chuckles.
I turn to ask Ebube to bring water for our guest, but she nudges me before I get the chance to speak. “Mama ogini? Who are you talking to?”
“What do you mean by that useless question? Go and get water for our guest.”
“Which guest?” she asks, eyeing me like I’m wearing panties as blouse.
“Have you no eyes gbo? Can’t you see our guest, or you just want me to shout for you?” I say, my gaze ping-ponging from Ebube to that woman. But Ebube stills in her seat, her lips parting, her eyes searching my face for something.
Then she says, “Mama, nobody is here with us, you’re scaring me.”
But I ignore her and ask that woman what she wants to eat. She says garri. I smile, and tell her I’m coming, then eye Ebube and shove her out of my way. “You’re now growing wings okwaya?” I say, walking towards the kitchen. “Because you have now entered the University, you think you can defy me, anuofia.”
I scoop two cups of garri in a plate, Ebube standing behind me, her brown eyes staring from a distressingly, skull-like head.
I disregard her and go to that woman. She’s reading a book now, ‘Kambili’ by ‘Obiage liIloakasia,’ and smiles when I am in close proximity. She says I should feed her since I’m her host, and I smile, and nod in concord. So I take a handful of garri and throw in her open mouth, but Ebube snatches the plate from me and screams that I’m scaring her.
“Mama, there’s nobody here. Why are you pouring garri on the cushion? Bikokwusi!”
But I don’t stop. Can’t stop. Not when that woman is staring at me so scarily, like she’s about to shoot fire out of her eyes. My heart rate spikes as I continue that numbingly, boring task. And when Ebube sees that water is about to pass garri, she flees outside, screaming that her mother is behaving weird and the neighbors should come to her aid.
Suddenly, the room feels stifling and a roar whooshed inside my head. My throat clogs, and I choke out a nervous cough.
“Why not remove your clothes and save yourself the stress? See the way you’re sweating like a goat,” that woman says, sounding disgracefully unconcerned.
I want to fire back, to tell her not call me a goat in my own house, but when I open my mouth to speak, no sound comes out of it. Instead, I nod like a lamb about to be slain. Abi na jazz that woman dey use control me? I don’t even know sef.
One by one, I get rid of every piece of clothing on me; my scarf, blouse, wrapper, everything. Just then, Ebube runs backinside, my neighbors trudging behind her, screaming more than I did when I found out my husband was dead. “Jesus! Mama wear your clothes nah! Anwuo m ooo!”
I try to look casual, to tell Ebube that I’m fine and we should finish our game, but my nerves are sizzling. In my head a group of partyers are dancing zazzu by Olamide and Portable, and as I’m trying to stop them, they switch to Poco dance by Poco Lee.
Where is that woman in all of this? What has she done to me? Ebube and Mama Chika rush to my side and cover me with wrapper so the men will not see my nakedness, but I don’t care for all that. I just want out. The noise is becoming so startlingly loud that I can barely breathe.
Everything is happening everywhere all at once. Then I hear that woman’s voice. “Won’t you take your children and run away? Is it till they kill you like they did your husband?”
I am crying now. “Help me! My neighbor is a witch; she wants to kill me and my children. Ebube, Ezinwa,biakaanyigbafuonu, let’s run away!”
Uche, the young man that moved into our compound last month, who fights with his girlfriend every day, barrels towards me and pins me to the floor, but I bite his bicep and kick his legs, while screaming, pleading to be left alone. I just want to run away; they are coming to get me. But instead of granting my wish, two other able bodied men come in and join Uche in gripping me into captivity.
I have no other option than to accept defeat. But my cries still ring out to the high heavens, as I shout for help. My neighbors are trooping in now, muttering prayers, folding their arms in confusion, and chanting my name, as if to call me back to life. But I am alive, so what’s the need? From the floor where I am subdued, I hear Mama Chika telling Ebube to rush to Nkem’s compound and call Pastor Anayo, the cadaverous-looking young man with a dynamite laughter and the biggest pair of eyes I’ve ever seen. He’s also glib, with the temperament of someone who can save the world by just mentioning the name of Jesus.
Mama Nkiru has already brought her bottle of anointing oil, and is sprinkling the content on me, saying that I am under a demonic attack, but the enemy won’t succeed. One lady I cannot recognize, is singing “Ekwensuakpasuola m iwe…” a belligerent Igbo song, about going to battle with the devil, and everybody in the room joins in the chorus, some already praying, and some speaking in tongues.
In my head, the partyers have stopped, and a voice is telling me to save myself; get up and run because no one is coming to save you. Another is asking me to vomit; put your hand deep inside your throat and puke. Puke and be set free.
All the voices are now clashing together, and I don’t know which one to listen to. I shut my eyes, and let out a loud yell, amidst the prayers and singing and anointing. Apparently, the pastor has arrived, and is hitting my head with a huge bible, screaming, “Devil be gone! Leave this body; it belongs to the Holy Spirit!”
I continue to scream myself hoarse till I reach my elastic limit, that if I make one more sound, then I will lose my vocal cord. So I stop, and just glare at all of them, wondering what in the hell is going on. But the pastor asks the young men to set me free, a victorious smirk on his face, as he intones, “Thank you Jesus, she’s free. Can you all wave your hands to the glory of God? She is now calm, Hallelujah!” And everyone in the room claps their hands and shouts Hallelujah. The pastor tells them I need rest and they should all disperse to their houses, because the Lord has finished what he started.
But I am dying as it is; my insides are warring, I need out. I feel my strength fizzling out from all the screaming and fighting. I just feel like soaking myself in ice water. So I nudge Papa Chika and start saying, “Nyegodi m a bucket of ice,” but mid-speech, I hear myself saying, “Take me to the hospital.”
***
I wake up to the smell of antiseptic stinging my nose, causing me to flinch. I want to jump up, but my whole body is on fire, and everyone around me is watching me burn down in flames. I don’t know where I am, or when I got there, but I know I’m not in my house. The bed I’m lying on is flatter than a slice of bread, and thinner than a ruler, and my children; Ezinwa and Ebube are dozing off on two plastic seats beside me.
I don’t realize I’m in a hospital emergency room, until I look up and see the drip that’s connected to my arm, and some young boys and girls, clad in lab coats, whom I assume are student doctors, walking about, making rounds. One of the boys looks a lot like spongebob, with his square head, and crooked dentition.
Aman is rushed into the ward; he’s bleeding from the leg so copiously that one would think he’s desperate to form a red sea in the hospital. He has been involved in an accident and needs immediate medical attention, but the nurse in charge is either a stoic witch, or just doesn’t care about the dying, young man.
“Nurse, biko I’m dying. Help me,” the bleeding man says, whimpering in agony.
But the nurse replies, “Die nah. Shebina you be the first to die? Oga, spell your name osiso…”
The ward is frenzied with so much noise; sick people screaming, chattering, and whining. Thenoise causes my children to jolt, and when they see me awake, they sigh in relief and start bothering me with questions.
“Mama, are you okay?”
“Should I call the nurse?”
I want to respond, to tell them I’m okay and we should go home, because there is nothing wrong with me. To ask them who will foot the hospital bills because I have no kobo on me, but when I open my mouth to speak, I say, “Take your demonic hands off me, you cultists,” and wriggle free from their feeble hold.
It’s as if I have relinquished the control of my life to a weird force, that no matter how hard I try, I cannot say what’s on my mind, but the exact opposite.
The thin, grey-haired woman beside me has a catheter placed in her, and a young woman with frizzy hair, and a large nose, whom I assume is her daughter, is showing her something in her phone, and the woman is laughing and speaking a weird Igbo dialect.
I want out. This hospital is not a place to be. The doctors and nurses are witches and wizards, and their covens are in perpetual need of blood.
“Mamaogini?” Ebube says, when I try to remove the drip that’s firmly placed in my arm. But I ignore her, and continue trying to tear the goddamn drip and flee for my life. But she dashes out to call a nurse, and I hear her saying, “Hurry please, my mummy is acting weird.” The nurse comes and tries to talk me into calm. “Madam please, we need to…” But I grab his arm and bite deep into his flesh before he can finish his sentence. He screams out in pain, and his colleagues race to my bed.
I am shrieking now, “Let me go, you demons!” but they overpower me, pin me down, and one of them brings out a syringe and injects the entire substance into me.
My body starts to relax and I struggle to stay conscious. I hear one of them saying, “She is manifesting symptoms of schizophrenia, we must call Dr. Ogbodo, from the psychiatry department.”
I want to tell them I’m not mad. Mad people are the lunatics with disheveled hairs and half-torn clothes, who roam the street, not a healthy widow like me. I want to tell them I’m a bit stressed; I just need to go home and relax. But I have no power over my vocal cord.
In my subconscious, I hear Ebube and Ezinwa crying, and someone comforting them. And in the farthermost corner of my mind, I see that woman; her afro, a tousled mess, laughing at me. Then I close my eyes and slide into oblivion.
EZIOMA KALU is a fast rising Nigerian writer and book blogger. Her works have appeared on some online literary platforms like Isele Magazine, Kalahari Review, Writers Space Africa – Nigeria, Terror House Magazine, Libretto Magazine, Salamander Ink Magazine, African Writer Magazine, One Black Boy Like That Blog, Livina Press and elsewhere. She runs a book blog, Bookish Pixie, where she writes amazing reviews on books. Kalu writes from Enugu, Nigeria. Connect with her on: Facebook : EziomaKalu., Twitter: @EziomaKalu, Instagram : @bookish_ezioma.
Website: bookishpixie.wixsite.com
