I was pressed. For the first time since I entered the cell, I was pressed. I needed to enter the Engine Room. I was wondering how I could ease myself virtually in the full view of my cell mates, without being embarrassed. But this was nothing to be shy about.
It had come to that, and my cell mates had demonstrated to me repeatedly that you could actually have a delicious meal while enduring the foul innards of someone in the throes of easing himself just a few meters away, anal blasts and all.
I was grateful that it was still day time, and the cell was open. Practically every one of my cell mates were out in the field for that moment’s share of freedom. Here were sixteen men in a cell designated as special, and two of the occupants were Indians. Every one of them felt at home far more than I did for the simple reason that I was the 17th man. I was the newest entrant to the cell. I didn’t know the rules of engagement, so to speak, and I didn’t know who was who.
But let me speak, urgently, about Sunny Keke for reasons that will become obvious to one and all. We became friends before he left, and he told me his story with the humility and trust of one who wanted to establish his innocence. But that did not stop me from making my own observations. Sunny could easily fit into a side of Okonkwo’s character.
He was brash to a fault. He was as rude as Evinrude, without meaning to be so. He was lawless from the time he woke up till the time he went to bed. He carried the burden of a militant temper. He was perhaps the most intolerable inmate in my cell.
Let’s just say Sunny Keke had an attitude problem. He was loud and domineering in speech, as he was loud and irritating in his eating manners, smacking his lips with unabashed delight every time his fingers came up to his mouth. In every material particular, Keke could pass for my good friend, Mannerless Manner. He seemed to have come to the conclusion that the world was owing him an apology, and he was here to extract it from any inmate of Okaka prison who would have the nerve to empty his bucket of water.
Let me put you in the picture. When Abuja had finished with his interrogation as to what brought me into the stronghold of Okaka prison, I had told all ears expressly that I wrote a book that offended a friend of mine. The cell boss decided that the matter had a curious oddity about it that would be explored fully in the course of my stay. There was no point rushing a man to tell his story when he was right there with you in the cell.
‘In the meantime, that would be your bed,” said Abuja, pointing to the top of the double-decker upon which I slept in a six-inch space for one hundred and thirty-five rugged days. Abuja had surprised me by bringing out a brand new bedsheet, torn it in two, and told Martin to dress the bed for me. I looked particularly elderly that night, and I still don’t know why. Even so, I commanded a quiet respect that was to stay with me throughout my sojourn at Okaka, and I didn’t have to force it. I was simply myself.
Abuja set out to tell me that I should feel free to ask for whatever I wanted, and it would be done for me. There was a roster for daily chores with particular regard to cleaning the Engine Room and sweeping the cell in the morning, but I would be exempted. Every cell mate was also obliged to fetch water from time to time. If you could afford to pay for the service, someone would be glad to do it, but I shouldn’t even bother about that. There was water in the two giant drums, and water in the cell buckets. I should feel free to use any one of them, if I had to.
That is what I understood Abuja to mean that night, and I was truly grateful. He had even gone ahead to say that if I wanted a warm bath, I should just request it. He would ask one of the boys to heat up some water for me in the kettle. We will talk some more in the morning. You can go ahead and take your bath now, if you want to. Good night.
I didn’t want to take my bath. I thanked Abuja for his kindness, placed the small bag containing my clothes and toiletries in a corner of the bed, and adjusted the pillow. Martin, the inmate below my bed, placed a white plastic stool before me, and I climbed into the blue mosquito net that was to be my private sanctuary for four and a half months.
I did not go to sleep immediately. I counted the number of holes in the net, and listened to the chatter between the Indians, the sonorous gush of Hindustani in my enchanted ear, the friendly laughter overwhelming the cell. I listened to the funky interjections from the homeland cell mates for a while, trying to guess which voice belonged to who. I got tired of the game, said a short prayer before the image of the Christ hovering over me, and slept off with the confidence of one who was safe even among criminals.
But, as I said, I was pressed. I had been in the cell for about a week, and I was too shy to use the loo. And then came the moment I dreaded. I waited for the last man to saunter out of the cell, and grabbed the next available bucket of water. My left leg was still swollen, and I would have to endure the pain of squatting over the enamel pit. I was thankful for the gush of fresh air when I limped out finally, pushing back the dilapidated half door which marked the division between the Engine Room and the sleeping space.
I was never really alone. I was assailed by voices all the time. There was really no moment of quiet, no solitary hour, except when every cell mate was truly asleep in the depth of the night. Out in the open field that day, the inmates cheered players in an on-going football match, and the voice of the pastor at the Chapel Of Mercy floated over the air with a megaphone distinction. The yard would be a bustle of activity until the bell to end the day sounded, just before the sun went down on the evening side.
I was sufficiently relieved to eat my meal early, and I was doing just that when the inmates began to shuffle back into the cell one by one. The bustle built up quickly as the warders barked commands for everyone to get back inside, even as the inmates took time to remove their clothes from the grass lawn, pack their kitchenware from the corridors, and stack the plastic chairs into the cells.
Keke was one of the last to get back from the field of play. The sweat ran off his body for all to see, and he did not waste time to pull off his long camouflage knickers and reach for his towel on the clothesline that ran from one end of the first double-decker bed to another. And then he froze.
‘Who took my water? he asked with panting belligerence, his eyes scanning every inmate with suspicion. ‘I say who took my bucket of water?
I wondered why the question was necessary when there was enough water in the drums and the cell buckets. Sunny did not wait to hear anyone make the confession. His voice was tense with anger, and he was ready for a fight with whoever dared to touch his bucket of water. Until that moment, I had no idea that the green plastic bucket I had used was exclusively for Keke, and that it was forbidden for anyone other than him to use it.
But Keke had already gone off at a provocative tangent, and was uttering unwholesome curses upon whomsoever it was that dared to touch his bucket, and the generation of that fellow.
‘I used it’, I said, pushing aside my meal, ‘and I will not have you swear upon my generation’.
It was his turn to be surprised. He probably didn’t expect the defaulter to own up so readily, and he was prepared to repeat his mindless swearing. But then, he looked at my resolute face, and relented.
‘O, elder’, he said. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was you’.
Abuja intervened just then, and pointedly told Keke that he should not be in a hurry to swear. He just might be swearing at the wrong person. He offered to fill up Keke’s bucket on my behalf.
‘I’m sorry’, Sunny repeated, still breathing heavily and doing his best to calm down. ‘I take back what I said’.
But I had lost appetite. I was already incensed. I could feel my temper rising like a boiling cauldron. Abuja did his best to pacify me, and to tell me categorically that there was a marked difference between the cell buckets and individual buckets. That was when I took a closer look at the buckets, and saw that some of them were not branded C4 in white paint.
Keke’s name was in narrow faded stripes on the side of his green plastic bucket. Three other white paint buckets carried the legend ITT in black print. They belonged to Solomon, the owner of the supermarket in a corner of the cell, and they were forbidden too.
I was still seething with a defined anger at Sunny when I climbed into my bed that night. Before I slept off, I spread a vast canvas of clement prayers on all my children, redeeming them from every curse of the enemy, and resolving that I would take the morning sermon next Sunday, after conferring with the cell pastor. I would speak on the vile excesses of the human tongue, with particular regard to Keke and his rash, irreverent ways.
And so, I went on to finish my prayers. My children shall live to declare the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. They shall prosper in good and bad times. Their souls and their destinies shall be liberated like golden ideas from the pages of an excellent book. Every time the pages flip over, their excellence shall be on show.
They shall speak and be heard without question. They shall reason with the world and be counted as wise. They shall be rich and bubbly. They shall be wealthy in body and in spirit. They shall fulfill God’s will for their lives, and the gates of hell shall never hold them bound. Free shall I be one day when I walk out of this dungeon, and free shall my children and their children’s children be all the days of their lives. This prayer is hereby confirmed in the precious name of Jesus Christ, King of kings, Lord of lords, Prince of Peace, Son of God. Amen.
