MY LEAD

"It is Eleven pm in the night, but I still have to go home cos that has always been my time, but this time as a ghost".

My name is Judth, a 28 years old girl, who has been visited by uncertainties. I struggled and swam against this tide Yet fate has sworn to keep me perpetually in the dark.

Hi I have worked in several groceries and hotels, In fact I am always twenty minutes away from the application and appointment. Why have I not worked for a particular company...?, why have I always moved from one establishment to the other..? Is it that I am detestable or I have a bad attitude...? Well... you will find out..Is it another time of resistance. In K&Y hotel, all the men in the bookshelf wants a lip of toe. The last one I got was so adamant and I got fired because I avoided him. I thought to myself "Instead of working for them, I'd rather work for myself". That was how I started working for my self. My name is 'Judith', getting paid all night was not planned. I stayed in a small house, my landlord was always disturbing, it is a face me I blow you apartment. 'It is either you have kept your slippers along the way or the wind carried it to his doormot'. Everyone started calling him "butcher" . He was always on my neck for house rent and Electricity bill. When I started getting the wraps, paying my rent became easy away from a month, I was even giving him extra. He was enjoying the money but as well displeased over my late night. My neighbor Victor, who has been on my path started suspecting. It was love on the side roll. I had nothing else to do but to keep the ball rolling, two jobless youths cannot build a home, my mum in the village was always calling to know when she will come for a visit. In as much as I was sending her money, she still persists on coming to see me, it has been long but,

"Mama I can't take care of you now, just wait, let me make enough money soon" "oh my daughter" She will return unhappy.

Everybody now knows I am a night keeper, but I always make them feel alive once I open the rusty gate, it reminds them that it is 11 o'clock in the night, as I am the only 11pm alarm in our vicinity. Apart from my arrival the only unusual disturbance is the one from the landlord who wakes everyone up with his loud radio sound, before he can reduce the volume, you are already out to work. Once I return Everyone knows it remains 5 hrs to actively begin a new day.

As I was making plans to bring my mother over, I met this dude, Osi,they call him "Osijapan",he was into drugs trafficking , I didn't get to see what he was up for, for me it was a one night stand. I went home. But that night I felt like I have come to the end of my struggles, as the guy lashed a whole lot of money on me. It was right time to call my mother over, but on that faithful afternoon,my phone rang while I was making noodles. I picked it up, it was a male voice. "Hy babe can we meet up tonight?" I looked at the number it was not saved. It was Japan, he said. Then I realized another deal was about to drop down. What I have been missing all this while. Now I will have enough money to take care of my mother, because I know I won't be going out when she comes and I have no other means of income. That night I let lose of my body and spirit and took him to the top most height of sensual satisfaction. We both moaned in joy. It was that point that I heard that sound. At first I thought that short was fired outside his villa, I forgot to tell you we hooked up in his house, his cushion could cover the space of my landlord's house. His bedroom was twice bigger than 4rooms where I lived . I couldn't make anything out of the shot until I heard it a second time, at this time I was already on the floor. As I was trying to understand where the sound was coming from, Japan had already gotten to his gun. I didn't know how I reached to the bathroom door. He only pointed at the stairs downwards to the backyard, It was when I got to the hide out gate that i remembered to thank him. As I was about zipping off my bag, I could hear Japan screaming in pain as gunshots fired on and on..

I didn't wait to wear my shoes before I took off to the lonely road. I have ran into some distance when I saw a light coming from the back. I thought it was a bus, I was about stopping it, when I saw my body on the floor and still standing. I couldn't explain the transformation, but I could see some people passing, looking and shrugging. I could see my bag on the floor, with blood all over my body. I couldn't understand myself, I tried in futility to get hold of my bag and money, as I tried to pick it up, it seems I was surfing in the air. I could see some police men coming to pick the body but I couldn't stop or imagine what they were doing and why they were carrying the body. I was stuck, I wasn't prepared. "I am here, that was all I was saying". I couldn't imagine I would be dead, so sudden and unprepared. How could my mother bear it, the loss of her only child? I could not allow the poor widow face such uncertainty, I moved over to the other side of the road, I saw a banner of an old witch doctor. I ran over to her house, there I saw so many bodies lying down like mine. But their spirit were not around. I asked her how she could help me, she said the only problem she has is my body which the police has taken, that my people my recognize the body and the plans would crash once the secret is revealed. I had to beg her to help me, even if it was for my mum. Let her see her only daughter for the last time after 23 yrs, I left with my aunt to Lagos. That one is a story for another day. She showed me a Calabash, inside the Calabash I saw my mother packing her things to come and visit me. I could have cried but I was no longer mortal. The coven has no shell to break off, if not I would have come out of it. The plea in my eyes could melt her heart, that she agreed to help me. On my way I could feel my legs weren't touching the ground very well but I could manage. I reached home, everyone could feel I have come back but there was something sudden and strange. The breeze was blowing much and there was unsual noise from our hood, which I heard my neighbors discussing in the morning. I couldn't come out because I wanted to see only my mother before my time is up.

But there is something unusual after my mum's visit, the body did not return to the old witch after two days, as the witch doctor said. I do not want to return the body But now how do I recover and dispose my own dismantled frozen body?