HAMZ MUSINGS: #Campus Chronicle 1; Shattered Heart

#Campus Chronicle 1

Shattered Heart

By Hamz.

Lokoja 2018.

She was resplendent with a sort of beauty that defied description. She was a little tall, had a coffee-coloured complexion that shone, a slow and controlled carriage that made her nicely carved hips sway sensuosly and her soft but firm and beautifully proportioned behind jerk mildly.

So, I asked her for a date...and, dear reader, that was how I nearly walked with my eyes wide open into trouble and embarrassment.

On that day, the day we were to go out, I did everything possible to make sure it ended successfully- if you know what I mean. I called to remind her and she called me 'Baby'. Baby? Chai! I couldn't believe my ears. Miss World calling me Baby? I danced around my shabby and sordid little room, did a somersault on my mat-flat mattress, danced into my kitchen that had a pot of rotten beans that swirled with maggots right on the grimy sink overflown with dirty plates and cups, danced into my bathroom and right back into the room, sweating like I was deep-fried. I had a quick bath, whistling tunelessly, humming noisily and finally bursting into a love song that I knew not past the first two lines and the chorus. She called me baby!

Two hours later saw me walking with faltering steps towards her hostel wearing a frayed-at-the-edge slacked white shirt that had turned yellow as an inevitable result of constant and relentless washing, an equally dead, stone-washed pair of it-was-once-blue jeans, big enough to contain two of me, and a pair of glorified slippers I called a 'pam'. I wasn't so sure of myself now. I very nearly walked back but I screwed and steeled up my nerves, dialled her numbers with shaky fingers while I cursed the overpowering effect of my poverty, and made the call to get her out. In a minute, She was out. She wore a flowing, baby blue gown that stopped an inch above her knees and a simple flat shoe. She looked more resplendent than ever. She walked up to me, ran her large eyes over me with a thoroughness that made me uneasy and suddenly angry and then, forced an obligatory smile. I must've felt, with her, as out of place and as embarrassed as a eunuch in a reproduction class. I said 'Hi' and that was it. I should've backed out but I stubbornly refused. Either shame or pride prevented me. I'm sure it was a sizeable portion of both. We walked. As we walked, u suggest where could be the best place for a hang out.  I opined we dash into Kiza eatery which is sited right opposite the school gate in an overt plaza, but she obliged,  and suggested we go to Treasures Eatery which is a stone throw from the street of the school. 

In a couple of minutes, we were at the Treasures eatery, sitting opposite each other. I had just two thousand on me- my light bill for three months . Whatever put the idea in me that this classy babe was some cheap, low-virtue floozy that said I love you for a bottle of Coke, had started to retreat and guffaw at me from a distance. I suddenly wanted to run away.

'What do you care for?', the lean-faced, female willowy waiter asked us in a thin, hard and perfunctory voice.

I modestly ordered for bottled water and beans-pie.

For what seemed like ten seconds, the waiter gave me a long, dirty and disgusted stare that made me flinch. I stared back, surprised. 'I said I want...'

'This is not mama put', She cut in in that thin, hard voice that made everyone turn in curiosity to look at us. I grumbled, briskly rubbed my palms together, blew air into my balled fists and in a small voice punctuated by an uneasy chuckle, ordered for 'the lowest but delectable food available'. All the while, she was staring at me- my date, I mean.

The waiter asked her and she twirled her hair, hummed a little, indecisively and eventually asked for 'a plate of rice and fowl'. It took every ounce of my self control not to laugh out loud. 'Rice and FOWL'! No be only rice and fowl, na beans and bird. The waiter moved slowly from us, shaking her head and most probably wondering what manner of a combination we were.

The food was brought in a jiffy- and so was the small,white bill in which was boldly written THREE THOUSAND, FIVE HUNDRED NAIRA. I stared at it, nearly having a heart attack. And I had thought it was, kpata kpata, one thousand two, highest. I nearly stopped her from eating but she had nearly finished her rice, scooping it in spoonfuls in quick successions, tugging at, tearing and stuffing the 'fowl' in her small mouth and drinking MY water and her Smirnoff ice with such ferocious gluttony. Now, I was in deep, deep soup. I suddenly lost appetite, hated myself, hated her, hated the waitress and hated my poverty and stupidity. I was in for it. While she struggled to swallow, totally oblivious of my predicament, she tried to talk. I felt like hitting her over the head with a bottle. In seconds, she was done. Then, she settled down and proceeded to crack the bones and suck out the juicy marrows, after which she let out a long, loud and satisfied belch. I glared at her, wondering if this was the same gentle lady I saw and 'loved'.

When she was done, she excused herself, saying she wanted to go receive a call outside. That was the last I saw of her. She'd run away. I knew because for twenty minutes, she hadn't come back.

So, there I sat, with a plate of broken bones, bottles and scattered rice in front of me, trying not to think of the impending consequences of my actions- or inactions.

I stood up and began to dial my phone- or telephone, as my friends called it, pretending as though I was making a call. I was about to run. Each step was a risk, a dreaded expectation of something unknown, but terrible. But nothing, no one called me back. My heart fluttered against my ribs. I continued walking. As I was about to open the door, I heard that familiar thin, hard voice cut through the air and stopped my heart,

'Heeeey!'

I froze...My body set for flight. She'd already marched up to me. Jutting her chin forward with an annoying sneer at the corners of her drawn down lips, she drove a piece of paper into my hand and marched off. I stared at her, confused. Then, I opened the crumpled piece of paper and my face lit up in a smile. In it was scrawled the words in block letters,

'STUPID GOAT. HAV DOUGH B4 U TK A CHICK LYK ME OWT'

I walked out into the warm sunshine, free... and a little wiser.

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