March 18
08:02
As I painfully flex my jaw for what seemed to the twentieth time, I couldn’t stop thinkin’ bout my torn favorite jeans. I love the black jeans and you can tell by the number of times I rock that shit in a week. And now the jeans gon’ be out of service til I get it washed and take it to the tailor for a patch up.
There’s something else on my mind apart from the pain in my jaw and my torn jeans and that is the fact that my Pops doesn’t give alms to beggars. One day I’d asked him why, he looked at me said, “if you know how cruel these seemingly invalid people can be when religious riot breaks out in the north (Northern Nigeria is predominantly Muslim) you’d understand where am coming from”
Huh, what’s the correlation between my painful jaw, my jeans and my Pops’ give-no-alms to beggars’ principle?
Sometime (2012)
August
18:45
Out on the street, a bunch of young boys (about five of ‘em, age 15 - 19) mumbled somethin’ I couldn’t understand at me from the other side of the street. I put a lil’ bass in my voice and some steel in my eyes and stepped to the one that looked to be there leader. I told him to speak in English if he wanted to talk to me. He took a whiff of the glue in his bottle and chuckled.
“Eh eh, sorry”
“Sorry for what?” I glared at him
“Do you have jeans? Please give” he managed to string together. His friends laughed but they were impressed
I understood what he wanted and it was his lucky day ‘cause I happened to have some jeans I haven’t worn in months. I asked ‘em where they’ll be same time the next day. They told me, so I promised I’d bring ‘em something
Next day, I kept my promise.
Sunday
March 16
20:38
As they emerged from behind the flood lights of the factory and the lone tree in the distant into the open space before the train tracks, my mind went into alert mode. I pocketed my BlackBerry and Nokia phones (gotta keep those babies save) can’t afford new ones if I got jacked. Next, I changed the way I walk, I usually do that in the night when am alone and my dangernometer is blinking red. Though the danger lights weren’t blood red but they were red all the same.
Hundred meters from the two approachin’ figures, I did a quick appraisal of the situation again and told myself its pro’ly nothin’ but I kept my guards up jus’ incase shit escalated, can’t be caught slippin’, can I? I pumped out my chest and changed my laid-back strides into long ones. I had my arms and legs wide apart as I do that walk. I must have cut a funny image of a gym rat that’s been working-out all day, a walk reminiscent of Agberos (Motor Park touts) in Lagos, Nigeria.
20:40
Jus’ before we met on the second train track, the two figures branched out, flankin’ me on both sides and that was when shit got crazy. Things happened so fast yet so slow, it was like the whole incident was put on a matrix-type slow motion and I was a movie goer enjoyin’ the action from the comfort of an air-conditioned cinema.
The figure on the left swiftly flung out him arm and clipped my jaw hard whilst tryin’ to put my neck in a choke-hold, I could barely breathe but no, my shortness of breath wasn’t as a result of the attacker tightenin’ lock around my windpipe, it was from somethin’ more menacin’, his body odor was more life-threatenin’ than his hold on my neck. The smell that flooded my nostrils was of unwashed body, I could feel goose bumps come alive on my skin as adrenalin kicked in, I shoved a powerful elbow into my attacker’s ribs, I felt his grip loosened, the other guy tried to close in but his shin met the tip of my swingin’ right foot, he staggered back.
I planted a good right hook into my attacker’s side, somewhere I knew Mohammed Ali would have been proud of me if he was there to see. Mr. choke-hold let out a guttural yelp. He let go of my neck, I took two steps back and gulped down the sweetest air I’ve ever breathed but there was no time for thanksgivin’, that’ll have to wait for Sunday service. My vein was pumped full of adrenalin, I charged toward my attackers with a fistful of sharp-edged gravels from the rail track. Niggas were stunned! They expected me to take to the hills but I did the exact opposite. The tide was in my favor.
Mr. choke-hold got his Johan Blake on when he saw me chargin’ toward him but nah, there wasn’t goin’ to be no great escape ‘cause the Usain Bolt in me was already locked on top gear. I flew after the mutherfucker in a sub 10sec speed and I kept screamin’ “I will kill you”.
I was faintly aware of the sound of crunchin’ gravels under my feet as I chased him down toward the darkness beneath the bridge. I took a quick look around and saw the other fool hightailing it in the other direction.
Jus’ before we emerged from the shadows of the bridge, Mr. Choke-hold slid and was fallin’ into a hole that wasn’t jus a hole; it was a man-hole. In that instant it dawned on me that this guy had used this escape hatch before. I had to do somethin’ fast before he vanished. Just before the subterranean hatch swallowed him up, I lunged forward and jet-li’d his head hard against the edge of the hole.
20:43
The veins in my forehead were bulging; I could feel it as I headed back in the direction where the muggin’ started. Attacker number 2 was shocked to see me runnin’ toward him. He ran and almost got hit by an on comin’ from under the bridge. I chased after him and jus’ like his friend, he ducked into the man-hole.
20:53
Fifty meters away from the hole, I laid low and still on the train track, lookin’ around as I did for any movement or sign that my attackers might be dumb enough to think that it was safe to come up for air. Ten minutes later and no sign of the muggers, I made my way up the bridge to get a bird’s eye view of the area and still no sign of the two punk asses.
20:57
As I walk home, I began to shake, adrenalin was leavin’ my body. My left thumb was sore and was my left jaw.
Monday
March 18
09:22
Outro
I’ve been told so many times to be wary of the street kids (they were no kids at all, if you ask me) at night. The boys that mugged me musta been 18 or 19 years old. Folks have told me gory tales of muggings and harassment by these night marauders but I’d always say that shit won’t happen to me and if it did, I’d make sure they pay in blood.
As write this, I massaged my jaw and wonder if one of the kids I gave my clothes was one of the two muggers.
Enjoy your Monday while i nurse the pain in my jaw, patch up my fav jeans and write the next blog
No comments:
Post a Comment