The Broken Cradle by Patrick Onye - HTML preview

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Chapter one

 

In Lagos, the silence of the room was broken by a sudden clap of thunder outside. Slowly, gray clouds in the sky spread their skirts open, wider and wider, and soft rain began to fall. It started quietly and caressing the warm air erotically, licking at the sides of buildings, sucking at the soft grass, kissing all the bright corners of the morning. It was a hot rain, wanton and sensuous, sliding down slowly, slowly until the tempo began to increase and it charged to a driving, pounding storm, fierce and demanding, an orgiastic beat in a steady, savage rhythm, plunging down harder and harder, moving faster and faster until, it exploded in a burst of thunder. Suddenly, as quickly as it had started, it was over.

Obinna had been staying with a friend whose distinguishing features were a large head, which everyone believed carried a giant-sized brain for outstanding scholarship and a diminutive nose which seemed to have been stuck to his face as an afterthought. Ikenna’s head swung from side to side on a torso that was so thin proportionately, he sometimes reminded you of a tadpole. However, his legs had gradually “straightened” as he grew older, that a football or a fruited pumpkin could still pass between them when he stood to attention. There was nothing superfluous about his average height and his body that was slender without being thin. Ten rows of tattoo marks ran parallel to each other from his chest to his navel and sideways from each corner of the mouth, terminating just short of a crater-sized dimple.

Although, Obinna had promised his younger sister Adaobi when they had a chat on facebook the previous day that he would visit home this morning; the vulture-eyed thief had another business in mind.

Big boys are never dead broke, so money must be raised for fun for the weekend; thank God it’s Friday!” the nineteen year old guy thought superciliously as he got out of bed naked, except for baggy trousers. A look of complete beatitude spreads all over his face as he reached for his shirt on the floor. He left the exiguous room like a seasoned depredator with a crescendo of fast steps.

Chidi was having his bath while his laptop computer was being charged with the plan to work on it later. He was happy that, there was ‘light’. He was a bachelor and still looking forward to a bright future ahead after being unemployed for many years after graduation. However, it seemed mother luck smiled on him recently as he got a job as a computer operator and his employers gave him a laptop computer so as to enhance his skills and efficiency. He had suffered too much for survival, and this job came as a welcome relief.

Just as he was bathing, he heard a sound that came from his parlour. It sounded like something dropping on the floor.

“Who is that?” he asked, really worried and perturbed. But he got no answer.

“I said who is that?” he asked for the umpteenth time but he got no answer again. Instantly, he became suspicious that it could be a thief or a burglar because he wasn’t expecting anyone around that time and he thought he locked the door leading to the parlour. In the twinkling of an eye he remembered he was charging his laptop computer before he entered the bathroom. Then surprisingly he heard the loud bang of his door and the rushing sound of footsteps.

It immediately dawned on him that it must be a thief. At that very moment he was covered with soap from head to toe. He quickly used water to clean his eyes and grabbed the towel, then rushed out of the bathroom. In a flash, he saw that his laptop computer was missing from where he placed it. He ran towards the door leading to his parlour and saw the thief running away with the laptop cleverly tucked under his armpits. He followed him with all his might, running the great race of his life. He was a tall and lanky young man but he had all the energy to pursue this good- for-nothing, lazy thief.

As he pursued him, chasing him with all his vigour, he was shouting: ‘Ole! Ole!’ But the computer thief continued running without looking back as if his life depended completely on the laptop he was holding. The two people were panting heavily as the great race continued. As Chidi continued the chase, he didn’t realize that his towel had dropped from his waist for the past few minutes on the road, and he was also covered with soap from head to toe. People wondered at the strange drama taking place. A naked, young man running after a thief holding a laptop computer on a Friday morning! They thought it must be a movie or some kind of reality drama taking place across the road. Passers-by and residents of the streets concluded that they must be shooting a great movie or great film.

All this while Chidi was still chanting, ‘Thief! Thief! Onye Ori ! Onye Ori! Help me grab him!’ The hot chase continued unabated. His thought was focused on retrieving his computer by all means, because his survival depended on this precious machine. The thief was now running like a cheetah, the fastest animal in the world but he was never tired and remained relentless. Obinna was the name of the fair-skinned, tall, young and muscular thief. He was a smart thief. As a young boy, Obinna alias ‘complete submission’ was spoilt beyond redemption by his loving Parents, particularly his mother-Mama Adaobi. He was so overfed and over-pampered that at a stage it seemed he had become so rotten in manners that maggots were dropping from his body. Could it be because he was the only male child? His degeneration into the abyss of waywardness and rot started at a very young age in the primary school.

In those days, he would only go to school if he so wished and would come home with stolen pencils and biros, sometimes with pilfered money, and his parents would never question or scold him for such acts. Somehow, he managed to scale through the hurdle in primary school and was promoted to the final class through the help of his Mum who bribed his class teachers and the headmaster so that he could go to the next level, which was secondary school. To be precise, he was an absolute dullard in school. However, while he could be dull in school work; he was an expert in thieving and lies. If he tells you good morning, make sure you take a proper look at your wrist-watch; it could be late in the night, or a blazing afternoon.

When he entered secondary school, all societal ills rolled into him. By the time he managed to get to the final class, he was a perfect reincarnation of a ‘Naija bad guy’. He would not go to school, but loaf around with his friends and peers of the same character and mindset. While he was much younger in primary school, he indulged in smoking cigarettes secretly, but now in the secondary school, he had the wild and weird habit of smoking marijuana with frenzied passion. Some of his friends used to prepare tea with the illegal weed and he and others would sip it with relish. He was once caught with his awkward friends smoking marijuana at a ‘joint’ very near the school premises. The proprietor threatened to expel him. He called his Mum to intervene. Mama Adaobi was on hand to bail him out of the problem. She had a very soft and tender passion for him and would always cover him up when he did wrong or committed punishable atrocities. He gradually started drinking shepe, ogogoro and paraga-locally concocted hot drinks that would make one go wild and high.

That is Obinna for you. It got to a point that the school authorities could not tolerate or stomach his wayward and utterly debased way of life. He was instantly expelled from school. This in particular was the genesis of his descent into the dark, unwholesome abyss of crime. His first attempt into full time crime was as a pickpocket. He would go to bus stops and position himself at strategic places. Whenever a bus came to a standstill, he would struggle with other passengers and in the process dip his hands into their pockets and filch out money. At times, he made thousands from such unholy ventures. On such days, he would spend lavishly on his girlfriends. He would even buy things for his parents but Papa Adaobi wouldn’t lay a finger on such gifts however they didn’t bother to investigate the true source of this income.

‘Thank you, my lovely son,’ his mother would say. ‘I know one day, I’ll depend on you for survival. You make me proud and I am bold to say that there’s also life and success other than though solely educational pursuits. I’m proud of you my son; you’re now a big boy.’ She would pat him on the head like a local hunter would pat the head of a loyal and dutiful dog.

“Oh, Mummy,’ he would reply, ‘you can always count on me. Don’t mind whatever our neighbours or anybody says. Money will never be our problem, but how to spend it.’ At about sixteen, he had started dating young ladies. He began to soar in the world of crime. The money he could filch as a pickpocket was not enough to meet his extravagant lifestyle. He turned into a burglar at seventeen. Life as a burglar was equally exciting to him and very eventful. On any particular day, if he went on a burglary mission and was successful, he would earn hundreds of thousands of naira. He had four young men who teamed up with him in the evil business. Back from burgling, he would bring plenty of money home and his mother would share in his loot, not asking where he got the money he was spending so lavishly. Now, he is on the run!

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Somehow, as Obinna was about crossing the road after twenty minutes of a hot chase to the other side, a speeding motorist (Okada) knocked the bloody thief down. He fell down instantly in pains, but the laptop was still under his armpit, despite the crash. He was lucky not to have suffered a broken leg. In a jiffy, Chidi was around to claim his laptop back and dealt him eight powerful punches in quick succession.

“Got you at last, you nitwit and numskull!” screamed Chidi, “may God punish you with all his vengeance, you mother fucker!”

He instantly collected his laptop and grabbed the thief from his trouser, around his belt. He continued hitting him with annoyance.

“You’ll rot in hell, you son-of -a-bitch!” he charged madly at him. When Obinna saw a huge crowd coming, he got his feet to work as rapidly as lightning. He didn’t want to be burnt to death. A huge crowd had gathered at the scene of the incident. It was at this moment that people realized it wasn’t a movie but a case of plain larceny. The next minute, two policemen appeared on the scene.

“Why are you naked, Mister Man?” One of the officers asked Chidi after a long pause. It was then he realized that he had been naked all this while. He was so surprised. He took a long breath before narrating all that had happened. Instantly a young man with a tear-tugging imagery of a starving Lagosian with blown-out belly, skull with almost no subcutaneous fat harbouring pale, sunken eyes in sockets that betrayed his suffering offered a jacket to Chidi. Oscillating amid impassioned outrage and constrained love, Chidi provided a toothy smile and reached out his hand to the good Samaritan, the touch was as light as a feather. He however thanked him as he muttered:

‘Although, I ran naked on the road to retrieve it, it was an embarrassment that paid off at the end of the day because my employer would have sacked me for negligence of duty and as for that young thief, he will breathe his last soon, if he doesn’t change.’