I can recollect the moment of its occurrence. I was at a place of cross-roads in life the night when I stood and looked at two roads, and could not tell which would carry me to peace and which would ruin me.
That night in Ilorin the harmattan wind was chilly. I was out of school just now and I was walking home with my bag on my shoulder. My friends, Seyi and Bashir, had invited me to meet them at the football field. There was "something" to say.
I was aware of what that "something" was. They had been talking about a "quick job" for weeks. A way to make fast money. Not yahoo, they said, but something near. They called it "runs."
Before I reached them my heart was already struggling. I thought of the face of my mother. Ever since my father passed away the woman had given it all up.
She was selling vegetables in the Oja- Oba market to simply pay my school fees. I used to hear her praying every night, "Lord, do not allow my son to get into bad company".
But hunger was an eloquent voice as well. My shoes were tearing. My school fees were hanging. Already my little sister had been sent home twice due to levies. Even prayers at times sound distant when the issues of poverty speak.
The boys were waiting in the field.
"Baba Tunde!" Seyi shouted with a wide grin. "You don show. Omo, that is destiny meeting o."
I smiled and sat with them.
Bashir leaned closer. "Guy, no time. There's a little thing tonight, you see. Very soft. Just escort us. You need not make a difficulty. You go just stand as a look-out. That's all."
I swallowed hard. "Look-out for what?"
Seyi rolled his eyes. "You too dey ask questions. We are carrying some phones out of one warehouse. Nothing heavy. Na just phones. The ogas within sabi us, no worries. Money goes drop. You want at least 50k to stand there".
50,000 naira. My breath caught. That was the money I had never had in my life. Fifty thousand would pay the levy of my sister, and repair my school-shoes, and even keep our table alive for a few weeks.
However, in the same breath, there was a voice in me when I said: This is wrong.
That night, I could not sleep. I switched on my bed with the little rechargeable lamp fluttering. In the next room my mother was snoring gently along. I could imagine her face in case she ever heard that I was caught stealing. Would it break her heart?
Then another thought came. Suppose I said no, and got poor permanently? What will happen when I continue taking my strutting turns with tattered shoes when other people are purchasing new things, living? Was I not tired of suffering?
I felt that there were two voices on my shoulders. One whispering: Do it. This is your chance. Nobody will know. The other whispering: Don't. Fast money won't make your future.
By morning, I was drained. My choice had to be made.
The evening came quickly. My friends texted me: "we moved by 9pm. Don't be dull."
I left the house around 8:30. My heart was beating. I never even explained to my mother where I was going. She just asked, "Tunde", do not go out late.
I went past the church in our street. The door was open and I could hear prayers. There was something drawing me in me. I sat quietly at the back.
The head of the prayer was an old man. His language at least was like arrows to my heart: "Father, save our youths out of that way of choice which will ruin their lot. Get them to say no to easy money that causes embarrassment."
I froze. Was he talking about me?
Tears filled my eyes. Right there, I knew my answer.
I switched off my phone. I never went to the field. I walked straight home. The next day my friends called me an angry person.
"You mess up, guy!" Bashir shouted on the phone. "Na fear go kill you. You no go ever blow."
I said nothing. I just hung up.
The news came to me two days later. Seyi and Bashir were caught. Police raided the warehouse. They had cooled now in the cell.
I heard it as I sat silently in my room. My hands shook. My whole body shook. It was one decision, one decision which had saved my life. Had I been there that night I would have been in handcuffs as well.
Life is full of choices. Others are minor such as whether to consume bread or rice. Others are large, such as whether to go with friends and commit a crime or to leave. But every choice has a price.
It made me learn something that night: "poverty can be weighted, but prison is more. Hunger is agony, worse still, shame."
My mother does not know to this day how I managed to ruin her prayers. Thank God for that decision I made but every time I see her smile at me, every time I see my little sister run to me when I come home.
An option that saved me tomorrow.