•Bashir

I had to pretend the network was unstable to avoid exhausting my credit balance as it was only #50 I had left.

It was already raining so it was only believeable that it was the weather that was the cause of our 'man-made' problems.

Today was rather odd. After five years of irreverential friendship, I and soldierboy suddenly became best friends. He promised to give me a job as his personal assistant and get me out of the peripheral part of town that I live in.

I've known him since my university days. We were in different departments but his sister brought us together. One of my course mates was trying to take advantage of her behind the engineering building so I saved her and since then we'd been friends.

Normally, I had to be the one to make the calls and do the visiting since he was doing better than me financially. I tried to get close to him so we could become business partners in the future but he just turned a blind eye.

Two weeks ago, I even called him to ask for some money but he didn't answer my call. Since last week though, he has taken a slight interest in a friendship with me. He was even the person that sent me a part of the #150,000 I ended up spending on Basma.

I'm confused and delighted at the sudden changes in my life. My dreams could come true. Maybe Bash.Empires was meant to happen, eventually.

"Abeg Fareed pass the bowl make I soak my garri." I said to one of my flatmates.

"Aaah you no go take us go chop for restaurant?" He asked, confused.

All four of the inhabitants of this flat solely depend on me to feed. The only thing they provide is part of our rent.

I went ahead to fetch a few spoons of the garri into the ceramic bowl. I stretched for a sachet of pure water and ripped the left top corner with my teeth before pouring it's contents into the bowl.

Repeatedly, I did it, Fareed took a bowl from the kitchen and joined as well since he was  also just coming back from somewhere, then poured out the debris left on top before I poured a little more water, sugar and lastly, some nuts.

"Which restaurant? I don't have money. I took one girl to eat at a restaurant."

They didn't know that I had used the last #1000 I had to buy a bushel of garri, half a bushel of sugar, a few cups of nuts and a pure water bag that'll take us a few days, just before they get paid their salaries and I, the money my sister promised to send a few days from now.

He laughed, "You'll never change ko? Sha how far our rent na?"

"You no dey hear?! I no get money. Na beg I go beg landlord make him give use two weeks." I threw a spoonful of the garri into my mouth.

"Abeg tell the man that it's four weeks we need."

"You dey craze." I chuckled, "To even get two weeks was hard. Don't make him take his words back."

We ate in silence for the rest of the time till Kamal, Al-Hassan and Salman bursted in laughing, bringing an end to our blissful solitude. They were the noisiest of the group.

Kamal worked in the finance department of a private company that sold furniture. He had two wives in the village who didn't know he wasn't only in Abuja to look for money to take care of them but also to scout for other women he'd bring to the flat everytime. It'd have been worse if we didn't stop him.

Al-Hassan is the party god; he named his self that by the way.  He was a secretary in a secondary school. A very hard-working man but could be a monster during the weekend. It was as if he had a Hyde of his own that only appeared during the weekends. He would usually end up sleeping at a club and coming back early in the morning the next day or stay at his friends house till Sunday afternoon.

Salman wasn't like the others. He was the shadiest. He talked too much but kept so much to himself that I suspected he was into dubious activities. He never speaks about his job and doesn't ask about ours but he provides his share of the rent at the expected time. Sometimes I feel like he's an armed robber because he would come back at late hours of the night and rush into the room and when we asked about his whereabouts he'd say he was coming back from work which was weird because it was around 12:00am but no one questioned him though we were always skeptical of him.

As for Fareed, he's the closest to me. I could say it was because we had similarities in our choices of work and the company we kept. He had a wider range of connections to people of higher class in the societies hierarchy but if you asked him he'd say he only knew struggling hustlers like us. He was a stingy miser that only shared with me once in a while and that was probably because I would usually help him whenever he was plunging in debt, sometimes.

The funniest part of this whole story is that despite how long we've stayed together couped up in that house, we still didn't know anything about each other. It was like living with strangers because none spoke of their daily activities, only dabbling into work stories for a while before disappearing somewhere with friends that come to pick them up in their cars since none of them had cars except me.

Salman invited us to a wedding today but I and Fareed declined. So him, Al-Hassan and Kamal went for it while I went to play golf with Fareed and soldierboy.

His calls had even started becoming irritating because he never told me what he was getting out of helping me. Yes, it was a novelty for me but if it was to cause me impending doom I wasn't interested.

My phone vibrated in my pocket and I just knew it was him even before I dipped my hands in my pocket.

As I held the phone in my hand, I suddenly wished it was this one that rang instead of the Nokia.

"Salam my friend! How are you?"

It hasn't even been two hours since we left his house so why was he calling?

"I'm fine, Alhamdulillah. How do you do?"

"I'm good. I just wanted to invite you for dinner tommorow." He paused, "That's if you're free, ofcourse."

I got up and left the living room to go outside because the noisy men had suddenly quietened their conversation to listen in on mine.

"I'm sorry. I can't make it tomorrow. Can we do it on another day?" I coughed.

"It's fine. I just wanted you to meet Inteesar. She came back from Prague with my parents yesterday. She came to stay with me for two weeks today and she was asking about you." He sounded a bit hurt.

Inteesar is his twin sister whom I haven't seen in ages. I never heard of her since I left the university. That moment in my life was the worst altercation I had to accept in my life because I left in my final year.

I didn't want to seem like a beggar so I rejected the offer. Mostly, because I had seen him more that five times between last week and this week.

Inteesar will just have to wait a little bit longer to see me.

"Please send my regards to her. I'll visit on Saturday since I do not have anything to do then."

"That's in two days. Perfect! See you then."

"Goodbye."

I honestly wasn't looking forward to this meeting for now I know why he has been trying to strengthen our friendship. I knew Inteesar always had feelings for me but I didn't know she would harbour them till this point. It's been four years since they all graduated. I expected her to forget me after that day but she kept visiting me during holidays and sending my parents gifts, which I'm grateful for.

I worry that I'll never be able to reciprocate her love but to remain on her brothers good side, I'll try to maintain relations with her.

"You've been gone for so long. What's up?" Salman asked.

All of them were hypocrites so I knew his question was more cynical than empathetic.

"It's nothing. My boss called to confirm if I'd sent out all the necessary emails to our potential buyers."

I lied to them that I worked in an oil and gas company. Only Fareed knew a few things about me since he was the closest to everyone. He was like a leech to all the housemates but to an extent, I saw him as a friend. Not that I don't seem him betraying me in the future, but we've gone too far to remain acquaintances. We've conducted business activities together so that's saying something.

I fear he'll betray me one day because of how he speaks ill of the other men in the house. He was the mole that spilled all the secrets to me. If only they knew...

The day a fight would break out in the house I know some people would end up in the hospital, especially Fareed because he was the lankiest of them all.

"Oh ok. I saw the garri you bought. Fareed said it was for us. Thank you."

He was the most polite of us all.

"It's nothing. I'm expecting something soon so we'll have a change of menu."

He nods and turns to go inside and join the rest whom I think have all fallen asleep.

I was the only one that slept in the room because I paid the most money for the rent. Salman was a fast sleeper so he was already snoring by the time I came in.

I turned the key of the door behind me and walked to the kitchen to get a cup of water before going to my room to call my second girlfriend, Kamila.

The bag of pure water was no where to be found when I got into the kitchen so I left to the living room to check if it was there. I was pissed when I saw almost all was gone. I had gotten it for us to manage for about three to four days. I lifted it and took it to my room with me.

I took one sachet and finished the entire water that was inside in less than a second. A sachet was never enough but I had to be a bit frugal to survive these hard times. I thought of taking another sachet but decided against it once I thought of the disadvantages and the current need I had to quickly visit the toilet.

Going outside was a bit risky at this hour but I really needed to go so I took a torchlight and went through the kitchen to get to the backyard.

The silence of the night made everything all too scary for me. I was a man who still feared the unseen. This ungodly hour was known for unwanted meetings with supernatural beings that ended up killing you most times.

I quickly ran to the toilet that was only shielded by wooden planks on all sides. I  closed the door and crouched low enough to be able to relieve myself. The entire place smelt so terrible that I felt dizzy. I wanted to throw up all I'd eaten for dinner.

A knock from the door startles me and I throw my torchlight into the pile of feces that I met there.

"Bash are you in there?"

When was the last time someone called me Bash? That was my mother's favourite nickname to call me and my fathers' too whenever we sat down to smoke by the veranda of our house every Friday night.

Whoever was calling my name was definitely not human! My parents had died four years ago and I don't recall ever hearing about the dead contacting the living. Ever.

"Subhanallah!" I'd said under my breath and immediately started to recite the Ayyatul kursiyy as my heart began to race.

My housemates had never called me that. They had all agreed to call me dopeboy because I always had money to lavish with them.

Another knock sends the metallic door vibrating and the lights of the flashlight go off.

I fight the urge to scream and get slapped by something or someone I'm not ready to meet. I felt a large, warm but soft substance fill my trousers. It was then I knew I'd shit my pants.

In my life, I've never prayed to Allah to save me like today. Tears started falling down slowly and I hugged myself to know that I wasn't alone.

Literally, I wasn't, but I meant Allah was with me.

Another round of Ayyatul kursiyy took over, being spewed continuously till I felt like the lungs in my chest were no more.

"Bash."

Silence.

I pretend I'm not there, hoping the person would go away.

"I know you're in there."

Silence.

The person tried to pull the door ajar but I held the hook that served as the handle as fast as I could.

After a while, the door isn't being pulled again so I'm left to think of ways to get to my room as fast as I can once I open the door.

Honestly, this should be reenacted as an episode on 1000 ways to die.

"It's your mother!"

My chest started beating after the last statement. The voice of the woman was indeed that of my mothers'.

It seemed it was another person's voice at the beginning but I couldn't be mistaken. I heard about three different voices. It could've also been three different people but I had no clue and I wasn't interested in finding out what was definitely going to make me run mad.

I thought I was going to die tonight. The garri I'd eaten suddenly poured out in torrent till I couldn't feel anything in my stomach. My head hurt and the knocking continued till I blocked my ears with my hands.

The last thing I heard was "I'll be back." And the knocking stopped.

I pulled up my trousers and pushed the door in a haste to return back to my room. In the midst of the running, my trousers fell low, above my ankles and I tripped on the muddy floor, aligning my face with the ground.

I didn't bother ridding my face of the dirt. All I did was pull up my trousers and run to the kitchen as fast as I could and slammed the kitchen door shut.

They were all deep sleepers so none of them was affected by the sound of the slammed door. I rushed to the room and locked the door with the key.

I knelt by the mattress and cried for myself, my dead parents and for knowing the person said she was coming back again.

Soon, the stench of my stained trousers attacked my nose and I quickly took it off and cleaned myself up with some wipes and folded everything in a corner of the room to wash it tomorrow.

I didn't sleep, neither did I stay awake. I don't know what I did but I knew I'd spent the entire time looking upwards at the ceiling.

Darkness could've enveloped me and I wouldn't know
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~Aisha Safiyanu🥀