It was then I knew things were hard. Infact things were worse than hard. I didn't have any scale to measure how hard things were for my family but I'm sure it's a pretty big measurement for your mother to consider selling you off to the circus.
I looked at the flyer in my hands as I was cleaning her part of the bedroom we all shared.
She walked into the room at that moment and we were locked in a staring competition, her eyes going from the piece of paper in my hand to my hand while I just looked straight at her.
"What's this?" I asked her, emotion raw in my voice.
"I can explain." She says moving closer to hold my hands
I moved backwards, out of her reach and I saw the effect my actions had on her face.
"Mama!! We have to go before someone takes our space." My younger sister Erica shouts to her from outside.
My mother glances slightly outside the door and then back at me.
"It's not what you think-" She begins but I didn't let her finish, I wasn't in the mood for her to finish.
"You're selling us. There's nothing more to think about." I stated it plainly.
"Bobo. No..." She says, using the nickname that only she can call me, her eyes were about to be flooded with tears but I wasn't moved.
"Maaaaaa..." My sister shouts again.
"You should go." I tell the woman who was in front of me, no longer my mother because I'm sure a mother wouldn't sell her kids.
"We will talk when I'm back." She says firmly, managing to hold my arm and squeeze it tightly.
Erica and mama were in a rush to go to the market to sell what we had scavenged for last night. Erica as the first daughter, had followed her, carrying the basin filled with worn shoes and slippers cleaned and sewed to almost their past virtue before dusk, some torn clothes patched and washed and other misplaced items that have been cleaned and repaired.
The other children were outside playing and some roaming the streets.
I, the eldest boy, stayed at home today to hold down the fort, as it was my turn to stay at home this week.
In a city as overpopulated as ours it's incredibly common how trailer homes like ours have been wheeled away by other homeless characters, leaving the previous owners in tears and confusion of where to camp.
I looked outside the window and noticed Rikka, the last born girl picking something from the ground to eat.
"Rikka!! Géku mba iyeeh!!" I shouted, reprimanding her.
She freezed holding whatever she was about to eat in her hand then I began walking towards her.
"How many times have I warned you people to watch her?" I shouted at my 2 other siblings, the twins, who stopped playing to see what the commotion was.
I unfolded her fist to reveal a seed of dried up groundnut, surely well past the date of consumption and probably germination.
I sighed as I carried her back with me into the trailer.
I couldn't blame the girl, who was too weak to even cry when she was shouted at, she just looked in disappointment and went in the direction where I threw the groundnut seed.
"Touka." Rikka called me as we were inside the trailer.
She pointed at her belly and put out her hands, asking for anything edible.
"I'm so sorry." I replied to her, carrying her to the drum where we stored rain water boiled for drinking.
I gave her a cup and put her to bed. At least something to hold her till night, when mother would be back.
I returned to my sitting spot to see Tori with the clown flyer.
"Give it back Tori." I say to him calmly, not wanting to sound overanxious which would cause him to go defensive and run off with it.
He looked at me stretching my arms for the flyer
His eyes scanned mine, trying to gauge just how much power over me he had just by having the flyer.
"Fine, if you want it that much just mean you'll have to rearrange and cleanup these places when you're through reading-"
He dropped the flyer and ran off before I could finish the statement.
With nothing left to do than to sit and doze, nighttime came quickly and so did our mother and eldest sister.
Seems as though they had a lot of luck today as the bowl Erica uses to load tools to the market was almost empty.
I waited behind as the children rushed to hug my mother. Her eyes drifted to mine searching for any of the anger in the morning but there was none.
It was hard to hold joy in one's body when he's bridled with hunger, it's even harder to hold anger, the only thing left in my eyes was a sad understanding of the cards life had dealt us.
"You no go believe wetin happen today." Erica said to me while we were scavenging for leaves, fruits and the occasional bush rat for our evening food.
These gossip sessions were one of the few good points of being poor. Since friends are expensive financially and emotionally, your family members are your closest friends.
We spoke in a crude language that made talking faster and easier, fewer syllables and less energy to pronounce, at least that was our thought process.
Our mother had heard us conversing like this before and laughed joining us in the conversation.
She explained that what we were speaking wasn't any new language made by us but part of our blood.
The African Pidgin a language spoken with speed and power. Easy to misunderstand yet easy to master too.
Where answers and questions vary due to their intonations.
She claimed we must have learnt it due to us being able to speak before we left her husband in the African Camp.
The explanation ended there as a series of bad memories concerning our fathers departure made her stare at the wall intently and start crying.
We on the other hand were overjoyed that we had something connecting us to our roots despite being in a foreign land, thus we made it a must that all our gossip would be spoken in Pidgin. First for confidentiality, second to gain mastery of the language.
Wetin happen? I asked Erica, making sure the intonation on 'happen' was higher than her intonation on 'today' as I was the one asking.
"Omo, one guy just enter our shop con start to dey look the goods oooh" Erica explained, her mastery over it sharpened after a lot of conversations with our Mother and other Africans in the market.
"Ehen?" I replied urging her to go on
"Before we know wetin dey happen, the man asked how much for everything." She said, her eyes wide in excitement.
"Ahhh. Na big fish oooh." I said smiling too, imagining the scene in my head.
"Omooor, na Mister Talk and Do. Ihn no even try price. As we tell am 3,000 draco, na so ihn bring out wallet start to dey count money ooo." She explained further
"Eweeeh. Una don go catch Bop Daddy." I replied laughing at the stroke of good luck.
"No be small." She said as we continued chatting, our job of scavenging had been forgotten now.
"Erica and Bobo!!!" Our mother shouted our names, urging us to run to the house with our baskets.
Under the light of the candle lantern we splitted the edibles from non edibles. Then splitted the non-edibles to what can be sold to what should be disposed of.
We then made supper, and ate.
Before the moon had even reached the middle of the sky everyone was asleep.
Either too tired to stay up or too hungry.
"Bobo." My mother called my name
"You don sleep?" She asked in pidgin, knowing that only two of us could understand as Erica was already snoring happily and loudly in the corner.
"I never sleep" I replied to her.
"Come outside, make we gist small." She beckoned to me.
Outside, under the moonlight we sat down and just stared at the stars.
"You're my eldest child, my eldest son, in tradition you're my second husband." She began.
"A shoulder for me to lean on when my husband isn't around. Someone to look after the children when their father isn't around. You're the second head of the family." She said solemnly.
"I've trained you well. You have your surname's pride and your father's strength. Although that pride may not be worth much looking at our current state of living." I kept quiet, listening to her every word.
"I've already lost one head of the family, Bobo. I can't afford you to be angry at me now." She said, staring at me intently.
"Put your leg on the soil. What do you feel?" She asked me to join her barefoot on the grass.
"It's cold." I said.
"Indeed it is. The seasons are coming, scavenging is getting harder, fruits are rotting and falling." She explains.
"Winter is coming and when it comes I fear we won't be able to cope." She explained.
"Why? We've survived other winters, why's this one more different?" I asked her.
"You all are maturing, Erica is in her 14th year. Her blood would soon start flowing, thus she'll need more food. I see Rikka picking things from the ground out of hunger, it breaks my heart to have to stop her and explain to her why she cannot eat whatever she's picked." My mind flashed back to what happened earlier this afternoon.
"Even though you're already 16, you need more food for your body that is growing like a gorilla's," she says laughing." I couldn't bring myself to laugh with her.
"I understand." I said slowly.
"She stopped laughing and looked at me. Are you sure?" She asked, her eyes leaking already with emotion.
"How much are they going to pay?" I asked.
"A hundred thousand Draco. Enough to get us a small house and keep us well fed till next year Autumn."
I nodded in understanding, it was a huge amount of money.
"Are you sure you're okay with it?" She asked. "It feels to me like I'm selling my children."
"There's no problem, I just have one condition." I said calmly
"What's that?" She asked, tears in her eyes.
"I'm the one that'll be going." I said determinedly.
"As the head of the family, I have to be the one to do it."
She cried openly now.
"You have one other thing from your father, his bravery."
So that's how in the last week of autumn I signed the contract and was put in a carriage ready to be shipped to the circus. My mom and I told everyone that it was a business trip and I'll be back as soon as I can but I knew from Erica's eyes that she knew. She bade me a teary farewell later on.
On the carriage, I looked back at the trailer that was my home for sixteen years.
"I go miss that place die." I said outwardly in pidgin.
"Na your house be that?" Another person in the carriage asked me. I turned to see a beautiful girl that looked like my age mate.
"Na ihn. E small ba?" I asked, laughing.
" E no too bad, I been dey stay with one of my aunties weh dey force me to live inside one cardboard box because say space no dey her house." She explained.
I stopped laughing immediately and looked at her seriously.
She began laughing as she noticed my change in mood.
"No worry, the cardboard box been dey big Sha, at least I been get space for the rats, so I was a landlord sef." She said jokingly.
I was amazed at how someone could joke about such a thing.
She seemed to have a specific odor around her that brought some truth to her cardboard house claims.
Other members of the carriage gave her space because of the odour but drew closer. We were all smelling anyway.
She looked at me as I sat closer to her and smiled, and my stomach gave me a feeling that was different than the normal hunger bites.
As I was with her, suddenly the circus didn't seem like such a bad idea.
This story was inspired by both a dream and a poem by @kemmyb .
It's somewhat a wake-up to reality as we're about to enter this new year. Although some people are certainly enjoying and living in bliss in this festive period, there are plenty that are living from hand to mouth, most don't get anything in their hands at all.
Regardless this isn't a story to bring one down, as the ending suggests it's a story of hope.
Maybe the circus is exactly what Bobo and his family needs to get out of the dumps, maybe you are the circus to a certain Bobo in your life, maybe you're looking and waiting for your circus.
Regardless of what section you're in, it's best to look forward with bravery, faith and hope.
That's what plenty of us needs this new year ✨.
English Version of the Conversations Spoken In Pidgin
Bobo and Erica
- You no go believe wetin happen today.
- Wetin happen?
- Omo, one guy just enter our shop con start to dey look the goods oooh.
- Ehen?
- Before we know wetin dey happen, the man asked how much for everything.
- Ahhh. Na big fish oooh.
- Omooor, na Mister Talk and Do. Ihn no even try price. As we tell am 3,000 draco, na so ihn bring out wallet start to dey count money ooo.
- Eweeeh. Una don go catch Bop Daddy.
** ENGLISH**
- You won't believe what happened today.
- What happened?
- Somebody just entered our shop and start looking at the goods.
- And?
- Before we knew what was happening, he asked for the price of everything in the shop.
- Ahh, he's a big person ooo
- Yes oooh, he's wasn't doing a prank or anything ooo, as we told him the price which was 3,000 draco, he brought out his wallet and started counting the money.
- You people caught a big fish ooo
Bobo and Mama
Pigin Version
- You don sleep?
- I never sleep.
-Come outside, make we gist small.
English Version
- Are you asleep?
- I'm not asleep.
- Come outside, let's talk a bit.
Bobo and the girl in the carriage.
- I go miss that place die.
- Na your house be that?"
- Na ihn. E small ba?
- E no too bad, I been dey stay with one of my aunties weh dey force me to live inside one cardboard box because say space no dey her house.
- No worry, the cardboard box been dey big Sha, at least I been get space for the rats, so I was a landlord sef.
English Version.
- I'll miss this place very well.
- Is that your house?
- Yes. It's small right?
- It's not that bad, I used to stay in a cardboard box because my aunt claimed there was no space in her house for me.
- Don't worry, the box was quite big, so there was space. I even had some rats in, so I was a landlord.
- Header Image was gotten from here and edited using Canva.
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