A story by The Chandelier

The school bell rang in the quiet, early morning; waking the students of Stella Maris Girls Boarding school. The girls showered and dressed hastily in their uniform of “where once” white shirts and brown skirts, scrambling to get to the assembly hall before the teachers on duty started punishing late comers.

 The corridor of the big building filled up with chattering students, ready for the first day of the new school session. I was in JSS 2, still relatively new to being in boarding school but old enough to be somewhat tired of it all. 

“Line up according to your class and by your height! Arms on your neighbors’ shoulder, straight!” Mr Okonkwo, the Physical Education teacher barked out.  That man seemed to think he was still a sergeant in the Biafran army. The chattering continued.

“Can we all be quiet?”, Madam Okoye, the principal asked in a cold voice. It was a command not a request and she moved her gaze slowly around the assembly hall, looking for a culprit. The hall fell so quiet you could hear a pin drop. It was too early in the term to be made a scapegoat. We silently fell into formation and since I was of average height, I ended up somewhere in the middle of the pack.

“Welcome back to school, girls.” Madam Okoye said. She was a formidable woman, tall with her pure white hair tightly packed in a bun at the back of her head. It looked like even the strands of her hair did not dare disobey her. Her glasses were perched on the edge of her nose and framed her eyes, which were still moving around the hall. 

“Today you will receive textbooks for all your classes. I advise you to keep your books safe, if you lose a book, you will not receive another. Work hard and enjoy the term”  Madam Okoye turned and left the Assembly hall for the other teachers to continue. 

Mr Okonkwo gestured to two younger staff members, who carried out cartons of textbooks and began to distribute them by subject; Maths, English, Intro Tech, Agric Science, the stack of books in my arms, getting higher as more and more subjects were given out until only Social Studies was left.

One of the young teachers went to get the Social Studies books but came back with nothing. He whispered into Mr Okonkwo’s ear. It turned out some of the cartons were missing. They didn’t have enough Social Studies workbooks to go around. They only had enough for about a third of students in JSS 2. 

Mr Okonkwo turned around and shouted, “Assembly, dismissed!” the veins on his neck straining 

A murmur rose up in the crowd. “Dismissed, ke? How are we going to study for Social Studies?

“I say, DISMISSED!!!”

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“Okay class, for your homework, complete the questions on pages 3 to 5 in your social studies workbook. Submit your assignments tomorrow” Mrs Alozie, our Social Studies teacher announced.

“Excuse me, Ma”, I said, raising my hand “We don’t have the workbook, some of us didn’t get one”

“Well, borrow from someone who has, copy the questions and write the answers in your notebook” she responded.

For the rest of the day, I was panicked, thinking of who had a workbook I could borrow, since only a handful of my classmates received one. My mind tried to recall who could possibly have it. 

“Naomi!”  I thought with relief. “She is short and would have been in the front of the line the day books were given out”. 

That night, after prep, I went to meet Naomi in the dormitory, as she was getting ready for Lights Out.

“Naomi, how body? Please can I borrow your social studies workbook?” I asked politely.

“I’ve already written my answers in it, and that means you will be cheating”, she responded sassily.

“Cover the answers, or you can read them to me”, I pleaded. “It is a ‘fill in the blanks assignment’. I just need to copy the questions into my notebook and fill the blanks with my own answers like Ms Alozie said”

“No!”, she exclaimed.

“Please I’m begging you, I don’t have anyone else to ask and the assignment is due tomorrow!”.

“No”

What was I thinking? Naomi, lend me a whole book? She was a well known miser. Even ordinary tap water, stored in her blue five liter keg was difficult for her to share. 

“I have not opened it”, she would respond. As if just drinking from a keg required the same “opening ceremony” that a fresh tin of milk or carton of cabin biscuit demanded. 

The next morning which was the same day the assignment was due, I went from person to person, frantically looking for anyone who had the elusive workbook.  I finally found someone; Funke. We had never spoken the entire time we had been in school, but she was very helpful. She allowed me to copy the questions whilst she covered her answers. I got 7/10 in that homework, not the best but at least, I completed the assignment. It was still too early in the term to be made a scapegoat.

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Three years later

The school alarm bell rang, rudely interrupting the sweet, early morning sleep of the girls at Stella Maris. As it had consistently done for the last five years of my student life. I took my time to get out of bed, gracefully taking my bath and wearing my clothes. I was in no rush at all.  As a senior – rules did not apply to me anymore. I took my time and even conscripted one of the rushing junior girls into carrying my bag as I strolled to class.

The first period was Further maths, my favourite subject. It was the subject that differentiated ‘real’ students from just mere students. I looked back at my confused peers, who were staring at the teacher’s back as he wrote on the blackboard. The lost look in their eyes made it seem like Mr Ojo; the Further Maths teacher was speaking in an unknown tongue. His thick, Yoruba accent serving only to confuse them the more.

“…heeev hand honly heeev, hangle hay his hequal to hangle heeee…” 

My seat partner, Agnes turned and whispered to me; 

“Is this man speaking English at all?” Her eyes darted from the blackboard to me and then back to the blackboard.

I whispered back, my eyes focused on the board;

 “Yes, he just said ‘If and only if angle a is equal to angle e..’.”

Unlike the others, because I understood the subject, I could listen past the accent to the concepts he was teaching. But not so with the rest, as the class progressed, the only voices heard were Mr Ojo’s with his h-factor, Chimamanda; the class genius and mine.

 “Your hassignment will be from page 35 – 40 hof the tesbook. Hi will collect hit tomorrow by 12pm sharp” Mr Ojo said as he dusted chalk off his hands and walked out.  He had barely made it out the door, before the class broke into two noisy groups, one around Chimamanda and the other around me.

“Biko, explain this thing to me”, one person said.

“Na me first come, abeg”, another responded.

It was complete chaos. I did my best to explain the work to as many people as I could. Talking fast to different groups until eventually the class emptied out, except for one person- Naomi.

“Umm…, please can I see the formula you used for the assignment”, she asked.

“You can’t copy my answers o!”, I replied.

“Of course not, I won’t. Cover your answers, I just want to see the formula”, she replied.

“But if you see the formula, you will see my solution”.

She gave me a puzzled look, knowing I had just spent the last one hour, teaching half the class how to solve the assignment. 

“Naomi, remember something like this has happened before? The difference is that our roles were reversed.” She was still looking at me like Lukemond, more confused than ever.

“Do you remember when we were in JSS2, I asked to borrow your Social Studies workbook but you refused to let me simply copy out the questions?” 

It was clear she did not remember. “Me?”, she said incredulously, touching her chest with the tips of the fingers on her right hand.

“Yes, you!, I searched and searched for someone that had that workbook. You were the only one in our hostel. I begged you almost in tears but you called me a cheat.”

She looked at me as if I had given her a dirty slap. But slowly, the expression on her face changed as trickles of memory became a rushing stream. She didn’t say anything but it was clear she remembered.

I dropped my notebook on the desk in front of her “There, you will see the formula in it. Just make sure you return it to me by 12 noon tomorrow”. I smiled sarcastically and strolled out of the class. 

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I stood in the middle of the dormitory on Sunday morning, looking for someone who wanted an exchange; 

“Trade by barter!” I shouted in a sing-song voice.  “Please, who wants garri for milk?” 

Before anyone else could respond, Naomi called out to me hastily. She gave me milk and refused to take the garri in exchange, even though I pressed her to. It was the beginning of great things. For me, Naomi suddenly had ‘opened’ water, she had Titus – anything I wanted, Naomi shared.

When it came to others though, Naomi was still Naomi of old – “I have not opened it. It is almost finished, I am taking the Indomie home to my younger brother” were just a few of the excuses she gave not to share. Many people wondered why I was the only one that knew where her ‘mumu’ button was. Only if they knew.