K A I R A

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"It's true."

"But that man is something else. Always a killjoy."

"I can't agree more." I gathered rice into my spoon. "I'll always wonder how you managed to spend time with him while growing up."

"God's grace, my sister. I swear, guy. He doesn't know when to stop. Like during her eight birthday party, he didn't even let her play as much as she wanted to." Daniel lifted his fingers, counting off as he continued, "The bouncing castle? No. The train ride? Nope. The normal card games? Still no. Now he's forcing her to do a subject she isn't good at just because he supposedly liked it when he was in secondary school. Omo, I don tire!"

I reached out for his hand across the table and begged him to lower his voice. I got that he was annoyed by everything. But first, we didn't need people facing our way; and second, as much as we disliked Amara's father, there was nothing much we could do except wait till her dad finally understood not to be overbearing.

After sharing more words of complaints, we were joined by the other guys. Nathan returned to his sit by my side while Caleb sat by Dan's left. Caleb was the only one, out of all of us, that didn't have as much as a dent between his eyebrows when he got to the table.

"You finally came here, eh?" Caleb said, knowing fully well my reasons for not wanting to be here at all. "Nnoo."

Nathan paused stirring his rice and stew to look up, asking, "What's the meaning?" He turned to me for help.

"Welcome in Igbo," Dan explained, and Nathan nodded, probably registering it in his head. Daniel's face gave away a pity-like expression for Nathan's lack of knowledge. "It's Kaira's mother tongue."

"He knows that." Caleb chinned up. "I also told him abo—"

"He told me about the major tribes," Nathan interrupted, already back to facing his food, as if he didn't want Caleb to continue with his statement. That caught my attention. "And his own tribe, of course."

Caleb nodded. "Yeah."

The three boys around communicated silently with one another, no matter how short. I couldn't understand why they did that.

"You." Daniel drew his chair forward, aimed his empty pepsi bottle at Caleb, eyes narrowed to slits. "Mister man, aren't you eating?"

Caleb puffed up his chest like a gorilla and said, "Yes. I ate my salad about an hour ago."

"Ugh." Amara scrunched up her nose, dropping herself on the chair beside me. "How will human being be eating mostly vegetables? I doubt you'll even survive on the basketball court if you continue eating like that."

It was a good thing that Daniel sat in-between those two because Caleb lifted a warning finger at Amara, stating at her as if she truly offended him. Caleb followed a strict, self-made diet, and Amara referring to what he made with such revolted expression on her face must've hurt him a bit.

"Ezeh, mind yourself." Caleb pointed his index at her.

"Yeah, whatever."

"By the way, how was the furt––" Daniel quickly clasped his hand of Caleb's mouth, muffling the rest of his words. Brushing Dan's hand aside, Caleb almost shouted, "What was that for?"

"We can't discuss Further maths now," Daniel explained.

Caleb shrugged like what Daniel just said didn't matter and before he could talk again, Dan warned, "Don't test your luck o."

"Chill, guy. I wasn't going to test it," Caleb chuckled, surrendering. He was well aware that he couldn't win when Daniel was that serious. "So what do you want us to talk about?"