Curses And Blessings

“God go punish you…”

The words dripped with meaning, the lips that had uttered them were quivering, angry and totally sure about what had been said.

I looked away from the aged woman who was still staring at me. I was sure I had never met her. She had a face that could not be erased from one’s memory – wide eyes that were close together, and large nostrils that flared as she spoke. Maybe when she smiled, she was a sight to behold, but right now, as she glared at me, she looked like the wicked witch from the west.

“God go punish you….” She repeated.

I turned to walk away from the stall where she sold salt, I turned my back to her, but I could still feel her eyes piercing my bag like riddling bullets.

I heard whispers as I walked away, and people looked at me with sideward glances. Their eyes were like saws, and with them, they ripped away a part of me.

“What is my crime?” I wondered.

“Olopa…”

“God punish me? I don’t even know the woman…”

I was a new police  recruit, stationed in the heart of Oshodi market, sporting my uniform for the first day, still not understanding why I should be a recipient of a stranger’s curse.

“You don’t have to know her,” my older cousinSolomon told me, then pointing to my uniform. “She knows this.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Do you walk with your eyes closed?” Solomon’s eyes shot at me, pain reflecting in them. “Didn’t you know this would be your plight before you asked and demanded for this uniform?”

Not quite. The images that had formed in my head before I signed up for the police force were of crime fighting and corruption busting. I was aware of what had been going on, but I had made up my mind to be different.

“We are not all here for the same reason…”

Solomon looked at me, ”Oh… you’re trying to justify yourself, good boy abi?”

“I’m here because someone has to put an end to all this nonsense…”

“And you think you’re the one to do it?” Solomon taunted. “you’re  nothing but a little boy with fairy tales floating in your head – you know nothing about the problems a police man in Nigeria has to face…”

I turned away, resolute to do something, but even the people I wanted to help looked at me with suspicion, and every move I made was misinterpreted to mean something else.

“So, you will not collect money at the highway, and when the night men come with their sophisticated arms, you will open your chest and let it  be punctured with the arrows of death?”

I said nothing, but my intent was clear.

He held my arm and pressed it hard. I winced.

”It is flesh and blood,” he began. “this life is only one…”

“It is about what we do with it that counts,” I started.

“Is it better to live for fifty years and bear the insults and curses, than to die at the prime of your beginning, just for one heroic act?”

We arrived at the check-point, and Solomon mounted our stands. He pulled out a cigarette from his pocket and lit it. He hardly ever smoked this early into the job, but his fingers quivered, I could tell I had gotten to him.

“You know, I was like you when I started,” Solomon exhaled a circular puff of smoke, “I thought I could change the system…” in his eyes were the before-years, glinting.

Like many other police men, the system had changed him.

“I’ve been a police man for five years now…” Solomon began. “I have a wife to take care of and three children… do you know how much my salary is?” he went on. “Do you know how much I hate this job? How much I hate this uniform?”

“Then why did you enlist in the force?”

“Same reason you did – no one else wanted me… this was the only option.”

His words brought the bitter reality home. I had been rejected by everyone – I had known I was not cut out for studies – I was a more hands-on person. Perfect GCE grades had eluded me time without number, and I had built an empire in the GCE office. I wrote that exam five times – and all five times, I had not done well, I had failed. With no other option, my cousin Solomon had encouraged my mother and I, his passionate speech about life as a police man had bought me over. He told of stories of the good of the police force, and with his words, I had packed my things and set off happily with him.

“So, you extort the very people you ought to protect, and you disappear when the real criminals show up?”

“You haven’t seen criminal – it’s not all the useless training you get at the camp,” Solomon began, he waved his gun. “these things we have are nothing but mere toys compared to what those guys have…”

I had heard about the sophisticated guns, AK42 and the likes of them that were consistently used to terrorize innocent citizen and continued to kill police men in mass numbers.

“I have no apologies – I have to eat, my friend,” Solomon began. “you are young, you don’t understand what it is like to fend for a clan…”

Solomon discarded his cigarette, he adjusted his trousers, and he spat in a far out corner. The day was getting dark, work had begun for Solomon.

“Twenty naira for buses,” Solomon  began. “Just stretch out your hand – they  know what to do…”

The first bus approached, bumpy, with marks of age, the conductor stood upright, dangling dangerously from its dark interior. Solomon flagged the bus down.

“Officer, good evening o!”

The hearty greeting from the driver elicited a smile from Solomon.

“Ah, Christmas don dey come o…” Solomon began

The driver made eyes with the conductor and the conductor, a young boy, no older than I, had a resolute look on his eye. He handed the money to the driver, and the driver gave it to me. He held unto the green note a little longer than necessary.

I heard the hiss from the back seats, the grumbling, I paid deaf ears to them all. The driver’s smile faded as quickly as it came. This was like a construction of a nollywood scene, the actors were just doing their job, not satisfied with it, but without any alternatives. The drivers had to comply with us, or face the drastic consequences of being arrested, and we on the other hand, had to forcefully collect, or face the drastic reality when our wives demanded for money for their upkeep.

This was not life, we were no different from the people that stood at the expressway, dressed poorly, and holding unto a cup, asking for alms. We were beggars with guns, at best, that was what we were.

I looked at Solomon, a product of the system, and like he said, no one could fight the system. Who would save us? Who would deliver us from this plague?

 I wondered if I could learn to live with the accusing looks from the people we were meant to serve,  I wondered if the people we made this sacrifice for would appreciate us – would our wives, our mothers, and children know just how far we had to go to put food on the table?

We were there for a while, when a car abruptly turned and sped quickly towards us.

Solomon tried to flag it down, the car stopped.

“Armed robbers… they are on the way,” the driver shouted. “Abeg, save the people…”

Solomon swung into action. He shoved a pile of dirt on the checkpoint, and the fire we had lit fizzled to the ground. He began to remove the plank that had been used to set up the barricade.

“What are you doing?” I asked him. “People’s lives are in danger. Why are we going this way?”

“Do you want to die?” he asked me. His face was lined with terror and he took my hand in his and dragged me in the opposite direction. “Come this way, my friend…”

The tension was mounting, and he began to run. I followed him closely behind. We heard the sound of a car coming and we ran even faster. The road was clear, there were no cars in sight, and except for our pattering feet and heavy breathing, nothing else could be heard.

We were like clear targets for all to see –we had to get off the road, or we were for sure, dead men.

Solomon ducked by the side of the road and I followed obediently. Darkness was on our side, and we hid in the shadows as a car came bounding across the road.

I knew it was them, I didn’t even have to look behind to see, I could tell from the way their engines moved, the speed with which they drove. Solomon and I hid and watched them from a distance as they sped away.

I was low with shame, I resolved that day, that I would never run. Nothing would make me run.

Now I could see why the woman had said ‘God punish me’, it made perfect sense. I had become one of them, wearing the uniform as a sport, only to run at the slightest provocation. I resolved I was going to be a different kind of police man, I was not going to join the status quo, I was going to make a difference. At that moment, I waged an unofficial war with the system. I was going to break the system, or die trying.