Icy End (Chapter 2)

Chapter 2

“Faith, faith… faaaittthh… ! ” came the call. I was far away in dreamland and about to board the aeroplane that would take me to hellfire. 48 hours without food or water!. My roommate Queen has just gotten back from her weekend outing.

I manage to open my eyes and mutter a faint “what is it” to assure her that she hadn’t come home to a corpse.

She eyed the pile of me strewn carelessly in a corner and handed me a white Mr Biggs nylon. Queen is a lifesaver. She’s one of those babes that knows everyone, everything and everywhere. She was my lifeline out of the other hell I used to live in and into this life.
Queen threw her bag carelessly on the bed and prepared to remove her dress, a red tight fitting dress with gold italic letters that spelled ‘fab’ written across her large chest. “You dey dull yourself babe, I’ve told you… her voice faded off with the warning.

“I know these line well well, in fact, e dey my head, sitting in this room to depend on poor parents sitting down probably hungry cannot help me. I am a pretty slim girl and I can run the world if I choose to”. Queen was in charge of arranging girls for the men in a night club at ikeja.
It wasn’t anything big and fancy, but it put food on the table for a lot of youngins. Skimpy dresses, lots of make up, a fancy cigarette and some slow moves. You can go home with a nice guy and guarantee as much as 5000 naira that night. If you were super fun, he can become a steady customer. 5000 times as many times you can think of is a lot of money.

That evening, fully energised from the fried rice and peppered chicken. I borrowed one of Queens night time dresses. They were about two sizes big, but my desperation was heavy enough to fill up the empty curve spaces.

Should I go on to tell you about my first night?

I really wish it was a Pretty Woman story, but this was much better. I was picked up by an oyinbo guy, white man with ‘smelly dollars’. All the doubts I had cleared up as he handed me a shiny straight 100 dollar bill and dropped me off at the taxi park. I was fully in.

The minute his driver reversed the heavy ford Jeep out of the taxi garage, I left the taxi men I was pretending to haggle prices with and boarded a bus to my dorm.

I got to my dormitory, and entered my room with the elegance of the English queen. “Who say money no dey cure problem ?”

After discussing the nights affairs. I realised i should have collected my sponsors number. But, I shrugged it off as there was always a next time.

In no time, I was living, learning and earning. Making money and sending some home to the family.
Working nights didn’t always go so well, some where bad day, or fuck boys who suddenly developed issues with their ATM card the next morning. Along with the glamour was horror. But I lived through it each day.
After staying in the dormitory for a few more months, I was sent out due to a minor quarrel with one of the hall security.

I needed a place to stay urgently, I couldn’t go home or go and live with any runsco as that would lead to free work or someone policing my precious time. It was during this period that I met Vero.
Vero was one of the regulars at the club then. Way older than me but she was nice.

Ashewos aren’t supposed to be friends. We fought for the same piece of meat on these streets. Vero told me about Iya Pato where I could stay for a little fee and make money round the clock. Monday till Friday evening and Friday at midnight in the club. The prospect of more money was more than exciting.
Not that I wasnt living a good life, I was, and hunger was far from me. Not only could I afford 3 meals a day. I could send money home too but I needed a place to stay. It takes a lot of disrespect and zero values to operate as a prostitute from your parents house. How would you explain leaving the house at odd hours?

I made up my mind and called Vero the next day, she picked me up in her red small Volkswagen and we drove to the place. It’s was a shanty shack at the far stretch of a deserted road somewhere in Lagos island. The best part about Iya Patos was that it wasn’t crowded with lots of girls, and it was directly opposite the construction of a new mega property. There was less competition and a steady stream of runsco. This was the life.

At iya Pato’s I usually would wake up during the weekdays by 10, bathe, wear make up and use my small bottle of special perfume. The perfume was for good luck and attraction. All the other babes; Kpeme, Vero and Lilian all had theirs. A special blend of ancient scents and a ritual that is meant to protect the uniqueness of my star against the other girls. On the streets, we do not call it juju, it is a necessary evil for the hustle. After bathing and dressing, there is almost nothing to do.

My clothing were mostly small skimpy pieces and an occasional Jean. After washing, I would sit all day in my phone chatting on dating apps, pursuing John leads. Other times, one or two casual who couldn’t wait till evening time would stroll in for a little beat. Quick, hot and sharp just like 1000 naira in the hands of a greedy man.

Night time was the main, the bar was full, plenty ogogoro in the system, the men are needy and we the girls were always ready.

Money for hand, back for ground.

So finally chapter 2 of icy end is here. I hope you enjoy reading, don’t forget to drop your 2cents, like and follow my blog

To catch the full gist, please read Chapter 1

Until next time

Love, Chukulee

Icy End

Chapter 1

As soon as the sun goes down, hiding it’s orange face behind the semi dark, greying clouds. it’s dark enough to play.

•••

Lagos state

At about 5 pm, the birds are all oiled up, trimmed and pruned. They come out to play. Iya Pato’s bar, at first glance, is just a large rusty caravan with odd color paintings of lewd sayings where the tired construction workers can have a glass of ogogoro and hot peppered pieces of ponmo to just cool off. But looking round, really intently, you’ll find that there’s a beaded curtain that leads to hell or paradise depending on who’s looking.

—

Barely furnished rooms and thread bare mattress in the red dim light.
For as little as 500 naira, you can get to pound a piece of fresh flesh. Every evening, the construction workers pile there, taking turns, taking numbers, powered by the false feeling of ogogoro excitement. 4 rounds, 2000 naira less than their daily take home of 4000 naira. Indeed! Something must kill a man.

For the girls: Faith, Ose, Lola, Kpeme, Vero, Katherine, and Eloho. Iya Pato’s was just a step in the journey, an inevitable rite of passage, the wilderness where they all must pass through.

It is not what you think. They aren’t forced to work here, iya Pato is not a wicked madam that uses them as slaves yet pays them peanuts.

This na Lagos, “we dey hustle”. Apart from the room charge which is 1000 naira per day, the girls are entitled to their earnings, their time, and customers.

Amongst the girls, Eloho is the youngest and perhaps the prettiest, if you liked tall, dark skinned girls, she had the looks of an exotic Sudanese princess. Long face, pointed nose and rich dark hair. It was hard to believe she is Nigerian. She would have passed fully as a model if not for the over fullness of her chest and roundness of her waist. The agent had told her after paying a hard earned 10,000 naira “you have to loose weight, to fit into dresses you know. .. these fashion designers like lepa” which translated to “I can’t help you”.

Maybe she could do better, but it was easier to make money as a working girl. You’re in charge of the show, everywhere and elsewhere the men still want to fuck you and they are in charge. Your oga, the landlord, your uncle, even the preacher.

All the girls think Iya Pato is God sent, they owe her a lot. It is better to be working from a safe house than off the streets. Lola can tell you that “it’s cold, too cold and you’re scantily dressed waiting and waiting and waiting and walking, on the bad days, the policemen come, pack all of us into their van, beat us, take all our money and still want to fuck. They say we are illegal but they don’t mind if we pay the registration fee. Yeye people”

Katherine’s case is a tale of a long struggle, her mama, her brother, her sister and her twin children. Losing her father at an early age plunged the entire family into the poverty drain. She stopped schooling and began hawking fruits, it was there she met oga loco.
Oga loco was a nice young carpenter, nice enough to always buy the entire oranges off her tray on the days when business was bad, saving her the hot lashes her mother would have prepared for her bare unripe buttocks. Oga loco carpentry shed was cosy. A large bed of sawdust where she and other underaged hawkers gathered to rest their aching feet. From buying the oranges, Loco moved onto the real oranges, ate them and discarded them like trash. Katherine was three months with child, barred from visiting Locos workshop. He and his boys even swore she was crazy and that he Loco had never even seen her pants, he didn’t even like fat girls.

Katherine’s mother that could barely feed her family off the proceeds from the fruit trade could not even afford a proper abortion if she even wanted to. One candle lit evening, after series of failed concoctions in their small one room apartment, Katherine mum ‘mama Katy’ told Katherine the sad news “my Pikin, this tree wey you plant, E go grow o and you go chop the fruit.”
With child comes responsibilities, an additional mouth to feed meant more energy put into hustle. With big belly and swollen feet Kathy went on to be a cleaner. Life would be better earning 4000 naira per month. Unfortunately, Kathy wasn’t paid. Her Madam insisted that she was missing her gold necklace, a gold necklace she placed on the dressing table, the dressing table in her bedroom, her bedroom where only Kathy and her had access to.
The tummy kept on growing despite the hardship and hunger that abound and yet there wasn’t any silver lining in sight. Kathy went back to selling oranges but life wasn’t any sweeter.

Suddenly the babies came, two bouncing babies. she set up a small business selling used clothes from donations gotten from her neighbours and well wishers. Things started getting a bit better. But eventually life happened, a new government banning road side hawking removed all possibilities of making enough money.

Unlike Katherine, Vero always had it in her. If anybody was ever born to work the streets it was Vero. Pretty, hot headed and without a care in the world. She came to Lagos on her own at age 16, with only the clothes on her back. Worked her ass off to earn every naira she had, built a small house in port Harcourt for her parents on her back.
Vero had dark eyes, those kind of dark pupils that seem to tell a story of the hard life they have seen, dark, captivating eyes that if you looked deep enough you could read the sorrows: the days where a John used her all night and yet refused to pay in the morning. There’s nothing to do except fight cause a scene, risk public embarrassment then still go back home empty handed.

Friday nights are usually the best days. There are enough guys who come out to flex, some young and unmarried living the ‘wasting their youth stage’ many very married escaping their sour spouses and the smell of children at home.

They weren’t all the same. Some were drunk, loud and bold but couldn’t get it really up. others too shy and tried to read permission from your face. Those ones were the easiest, time was ticking by and soon it would be an hour. The worst ones were the ones that talked too much.

My name is Faith, I was born some years ago in a small house to a small family, I shouldn’t be here naturally but life has it twists. My parents were neither poor nor rich, we ate two times a day, they were neither religious nor faithless, but caring and kind. I wasn’t really much of a bookworm. I was a long faced child with eyes that made lot of people think I had it in me. Random people on the streets never failed to complement my eyes, they were a strange shade of bright blue that looked full of wisdom.

So I guess it was my choices that brought me here.

*Betty’s Body Battle.

You’re on your bed, twisting and turning, hoping to find the most comfortable position for sleep, then suddenly your hands brush against a strange, hard and lumpy feel in one of your breast.

In an instant, all the sleep goes away, but you’re not yet sure it isn’t a dream so you touch it one more time to confirm.

There it is, round, almost stony and different from the rest of the breast. The reality hits you fast and hard, breaking itself in bits and sinking into your thoughts.

The tears just fall freely and you grope in the darkness for your phone

“Hello Google, I just found a lump on my breast”

It is there, the dreadful word you would never have dared to draw into a sentence with your name ‘breast cancer!’ God forbid.

‘WebMd’ is never subtle, they shock you further with the possibility of what it may be. Even as your mind tries to argue with the glaring reality, you feel for your lump again and it’s still there.

The internet says you’re at a greater risk if you’ve had any relation that had battled cancer.

Woe betide you orphans.

It says you have to be at least 40 to even start worrying.

But your 22 year old self is right here, right now, doing this.

You run this train of thoughts until you’re exhausted then you turn to faith and hope that by tomorrow when you wake, the episode is all over like a bad nightmare.

I’m sorry, but tomorrow is here and the lump remains.

In the midst of the confusion you shower and get ready to go to the hospital, alone. This is to critical a news to let out now, not now when you still want to believe it’s all a big joke.

*Betty Be..

Your name cuts through the maze of your worry and you realise it’s your turn to see the doctor

Sobbing” doctor, there’s a lump on my chest”

Doctor, lie down let me check you.

He straight facedly checks you, dwelling a little on the lump and raising his doctor-ly face a little too high as he touches the hard spot.

Oh, how you wish you could read his dark brown eyes and poker face.

Damn! Did you just imagine some new lines forming on his face.

This must be really bad you think, suddenly goosebumps and tears all over again.

Doctor: when was your last period?

*Betty: I’m seeing it now

D: are you on any birth control

*Betty: (the sirens in your head just won’t stop) yes sir, I started last month

Doc: scribbles down some notes while looking at you.

You’re scared and you start to explain.

“I just got a new boyfriend and we just started to have sex and I wanted to be safe. I actually only took it for one week but I stopped because I kept on forgetting. It’s those dail…y (sobs)

Doc: well you see, Betty there are two types of lumps benign or cancerous, because of your age we can only hope it is benign. I would refer you to the surgery department to get it properly checked.

The fear, the worries, the hope, the search for courage and knowledge. You suddenly know what lymphnodes are.

Your own body feels strange, you wonder if this newness has come to betray you.

You blame yourself, maybe you’ve been a bit careless about yourself

“Oh if I can live through this, God, I swear I’ll be better” you cry out looking up.

You trudge through each day, trying to pretend that it’s fine. Nothing else matters when what’s worth waiting for is the doctors appointment.

“I’m strong

I can do this

Why me

I do not deserve this

Have mercy oh God “…

My hands are always reaching to check my breast and some moments, I’m crazy enough to believe the lump has disappeared .

There’ll not be enough words to describe the way you’ll fell, every second as uncertainty eats up your insides.

First a scan, then a mammogram, then surgery, then radiation but no manual will ever prepare you for what you’ll face in a battle with your own body

The day of the scan, I try to walk confident.

I’m already used to taking off my clothes and laying naked waiting for the curios touch of the doctor,

He prodes, touches, but those towers lay dead

I’m even to weak to try read the lines on his forehead as he inquires into the scan machine.

“Please dress up and wait outside”

I jolt back into reality.

This is about to be a very long wait

And when I’m called.

My mind is alert

And I hear it clear.

“The features are highly suggestive of fibroadenoma, hence the decrease in size you no… however, …you can come back in a few months …..for a routine check.”

The veil is suddenly lifted and I walk happily out of the doctors office. I call my best friend to shed some tears of joy.

I have won, yet again another battle with my body.

This is how freedom is spelt.

This post is dedicated to everyone who has ever felt a lump on their breast either benign or malignant.

You will conquer fear.

This is standing with those who are battling the big C. I can only pray that you find grace and more strength in your battles. You’re already a winner.

And for those who have had to bear the pain of a loved ones battle. You will be comforted.