Like a miracle the fire stopped, the matron came and informed us that the canal had doused the fire. We all breathe a sigh of relief. That's when she noticed our bags.
"And where do you think you are going" she pointed to our boxes.
"We just wanted to save it from the fire" a girl lied.
"Well thank God the rooms were not burnt. Just your windows". She looked at the time on her phone. " You all should go and sleep now. Its almost dawn though, you have two hours before the bell rings".
We all groaned, grumbled and murmured as we moved back into our hostel. We had anticipated going home but that was not to be anymore.
"I hope the witches were burnt too" Princess whispered to me touching her scars.
"Probably"
"Or they ran away to come back for you" Suliat replied in a spooky way.
I laughed and nudged her "cut it off, you are scaring the girl to death".
We couldn't sleep for the remaining hours left as we all continued to talk about the events of the evening.
"Keep quiet everyone and go to bed before you get punished"
I still had the previous annoyance in me and didn't know when I hissed "I would like to see you try". My friends looked at me all at once as if I had gone crazy.
" what are you doing? " Fathia whispered.
I rolled my eyes and shrugged "if you are scared of her I am not".
"oh really?" Snr Ogechi appeared in my bunk space freaking us out.
I sat up confidently. My minds was telling me I was acting crazy but my body kept misbehaving. I looked her in the eye ignoring the sudden silence in the room.
Suddenly she faced my friends. "I can see you all have been teaching this newbie disrespect"
"No, she was just joking" Fathia said in defence
"Well, if she can't be punished then you all will have to suffer for it"
"What?!" We all exclaimed at once and I bounced out of my bed. "That's unfair! I'm sorry" I quickly apologized.
"Tell that to the birds" she walked to the middle of the room. "Now everybody out!" She pointed to the door, we all got down from our beds and began to grumble. Funny enough, no one blamed nor attacked me.
The students from the other rooms heard our squabbles and came out to watch. As soon as we were outside, she closed the door or net on our faces. The door was made solely of net and twisted coppers which barely holds weight.
"This is so mean, how are we supposed to sleep outside now?" One of the girls complained sitting on the floor.
"Especially with all we have gone through all night" said another.
I looked at my friends, none of them were even looking at me. They didn't support the act but neither did they want to blame me. I couldn't take it again.
I stood akimbo and took a deep breathe "And are you just going to accept it that way?"
"What are you saying?" Suliat asked with her eyebrows raised.
I scoffed "I never knew I had weaklings as my roommates" that got the attention of the rest of them.
"Weaklings?" One short dark girl stood up angrily "Do you realize you put us in this mess?"
I moved closer to her raising my voice also "Now you are in it, what are you going to do about it?"
Fathia tugged at my dress pulling me back "Ruth that's not nice"
I ignored her and continued "can't you all see my point. This can't keep going on. We are either punished by sleeping under the bunk, working on the dump, cutting grasses, washing toilets for irrelevant reasons when its not even a day of sanitation." The other students from the other rooms began to join us one after the other as my voice rang through the night. "Its uncalled for, we are not animals and we weren't sent here to be your slaves, we deserve equality"
"Yes!" They all chorused in support.
Then I faced the hostel in general and increased my voice. " The time of slavery is over seniors. If you don't know, we all outnumber you so you better be careful from now on."
"Yes, Yes, Yes!!!" They all chanted in support going towards my room door now. They began banging it. I joined them "Snr Ogechi, if you don't open this door now, you will end up being the one sleeping outsi---"
I hadn't finished when she unlocked the door and moved quietly aside.
Right from that day, living in the hostel became fun. We protested against bad meals at the dining hall also and won. Sport time and activity night became something we looked forward too. It wasn't easy for the seniors but eventually they became nicer and we extended our hands of love to them. We were eventually one.
Amidst all this however, Dara became quite distant from me. I tried to make her talk several times but she wouldn't. There were times she even snapped at me. On Sundays were visiting days and mostly an holiday for us in the hostel. Our parents bring homemade meal and we took turns eating each others meals for the rest of the day. Asides from food, our provisions were restocked, well not for me though so I mostly depended on my friends for that.
Dara was taken home one of that Sunday leaving me wondering. I later got to know that she had started menstruating and her mum insisted she took her home to educate her before bringing her back. I was hurt and determined to menstruate which I tried at and kept looking at my urine all through that term with nothing to show for it.
There was more room for unity since the incident occurred and snr Ogechi had become nicer since then. Not only that, we could enter other rooms freely and even sleep there now without the fear of being chased away. Snr Tosin, out of frustration and pride, had herself withdrawn from the school.
There were adventurous times in the school also. Like the time guys came into the school. Most of our seniors were bathing outside naked, they screamed and ran inside. The boys were rough and local. They began whistling and calling on us to come out.
"Should we scream for the matron?" Princess asked scared pitiless.
"No, she's not around. We are on our own today" I looked out again through our windows and some of the boys were already attempting to go closer to the bathrooms. We all began screaming when they started hitting the closed gates sending screeching sounds through the air.
"We can't keep looking at this,very soon they will come for us" Fathia said and began pacing.
"How about we attack?" I blurted out
"Attack? Attack boys? How?" Suliat began raising her voice.
"Calm down" I touched her "Do you want them coming in here then?"
She sighed " of course not, but how do we do it?"
"Gaari cake!" My eyes lit up as I snapped my fingers continuously.
"What?" The whole room said looking at me as if I was going crazy.
I laughed "Let's make Gaari cake, lots of it and begin turning them into lumps so we can throw at them"
They all stared at me continuously.
"No I'm serious. Or..." I looked at Joan, another girl in my room. "Do you still have your boiling ring?"
She nodded
"Good, or we can make hot eba lumps and throw it at them"
"That sounds nice"
"Let me plug the water"
"I have gaari"
"Let's still make the gaari cake so we can celebrate afterwards"
Everyone began to get to work. Some brought out milk, tea, butter for the mixture of the gaari cake while others made the EBA and some began rolling it into rough balls.
I smiled "I'll be right back. Let me inform other rooms too of our plans. The more the merrier".
I climbed the locker shelf and called the attention of Green house room close to ours through the space demarcating our rooms. When I got their attention, I told them of our plans
"...... When I yell go, we should all come out at once. And tell Purple house also till the news gets to everyone"
"Okay, that's brilliant"
The room senior began giving orders also and everyone got to work. The boys had gone to look for hammers and started clawing at the bathroom padlock. The girls inside kept screaming. Some had also began walking towards the hostel with different instruments. I knew it was now or never.
I yelled "Go!!" Every girl had a bowl of hot EBA in hand and rushed outside I picked mine up also and joined them. We began throwing the balls at the guys. They didn't expect it and began screaming as the EBA balls touched their body.
"Get out of here!!!"
"Leave us alone!!!"
They began to retreat and we also followed them till they scaled the fence back to where they came from. Some had even began begging as the pain was too much for them. When they had gone we all began to dance and celebrate. We decided then to report our matron to the school authorities.
We all shared our gaari cake and continued celebrating but we couldn't sleep that night. The fear of their return kept us awake throughout the night and also the raid of the rats which became worse.
Yes, the rats. There were enormous rats at our hostels which began to eat our skins while we were asleep. We got to know they were the ones after a girl screamed while going to urinate at night because she saw rat feasting on snr Ogechi's toes. Snr Ogechi had the most mark in the room from these rat bites. This was because mist of us had run out of provisions at that time and the rats were hungry. They had even taken to eating Fathia's small Nokia phone's buttons which we had laughed at.
That night the sounds of the rats moving through our ceilings became worse and we all had to cuddle on one bunk in the room and began praying. it was one long scary night. I had seen such a bite before on my finger which I thought was just a wound. Apparently the rats blow air on the skin while eating it. It was mostly the palm and our feet's they ate.
Dara couldn't take it anymore and reported every event that went down at the hostel to her mum. Her mum pleaded with mama who decided to withdraw us from the school. The news met me at the wrong time. Two seniors had been asking me to be their school daughters in the junior section and I was feeling very proud at that time. They would come with different gifts and food for me and I was basically pampered. The thoughts of me leaving all this and my friends back to my step mum was disheartening.
For the second time just like I did when I arrived, I cried myself off to sleep.
"Its going to be fine" Suliat consoled me
"We are going to miss you" Princess said
"Yes, really" Fathia also nodded and confirmed.
"We can call each other though" Fathia said already writing her number down for me
That lightened my mood a bit.
"I will" I promised.
That promise however didn't come true as I didn't have a phone at my step mums place. I became distant and lonely again. Although I was happy to see my brothers again.
One night my step mum called us all to the living room.
"Mama and i have decided. You all will be going back to your parents place. I am also travelling with my children. So start to pack your things. Your parents have been informed."
As if an heavy weight had been lifted from my chest I dashed in and began packing every little stuff I had. When I was done. I knelt down and prayed again thanking God for finally answering my prayers. That night was the longest Saturday night I had ever encountered as I stayed awake all night looking at the time.
It was with joy and gladness in my heart that I jumped into my mums hands that Sunday. Though my real mum still couldn't take me in, I was more than glad to be home at last.
My first night in the house was the best ever as my mum celebrated my return home with chicken, Fried rice and drinks.
"Welcome home Dara!!!" The cheers rang in my heart and I responded with a big smile.
It all still was a dream and unbelievable when I had to sleep every night. My mum woke me up every night until I stopped bed wetting. Eventually I got used to it and started going myself until one night. I had an unbearable pain in my tummy. I wanted to wake my mum but decided against it as I turned and tossed all night. I decided to hold in the pain until morning when the pain subsided.
I felt an urge to use the toilet. I ran to it and was surprised to see a very huge lump of something red on my pant. I was so scared and ran out screaming and calling my mum.
"Mummy, mummy, I have injured inside me!!"
My mum leaped up from bed when she heard that and saw me stretching my panties at her.
"Mummy blood" I said again almost crying.
She looked at me and laughed. "Congratulations you have started menstruating"
I widened my eyes making her laugh more. She got up and gave me a sanitary pad from her drawers, took me into the bathroom and began explaining the essence of womanhood to me.
I came back out smiling. My dad (her husband) came in at that time and saw me beaming.
"What's it?" He raised his brows.
I looked around me, happy and contented, I am home, I have stopped bed wetting and now im menstruating. God really does answer prayers. I looked at my dad and answered happily
"I have become a woman..."