Chapter 13 BASILA

Basila couldn't sleep. She stirred from side to side on her bed lost in deep thought. She was heavily indebted to the brothel where she had been doomed to live. How was she ever going to pay up? Would she ever in her lifetime be a free responsible woman again? Is she going to live and die here? Who was going to save her from her misery?

She'd had her first and only child at the age of fifteen, with her first love who had eloped during the pregnancy. She was an only child to a single mother, who had raised her child single handedly in abject poverty.

Basila never knew her father, he had died when she was too little to understand death. Their properties were taken forcefully from her mother, for her failure to bear a male child. They were thrown out into the streets of Lagunde. The mother was now old, in her late sixties, she had had Basila very late in her marriage due to fertility problems.

The new neighborhood where they had been forced by circumstances to move to was made up of shacks, built with wood and corrugated iron sheets. Clustered little buildings of similar nature, housing different families. The Atlantic Ocean which was not so far away, and also flowed bellow them was the general toilet, the water was black in appearance.

People bathed in little coverings, built with the same material as their homes, covering the entrance with a large piece of rag.

The stench from the vicinity was always the first to say "hello" to any visitor to the area.

The residents survived by fishing, and selling their produce in a nearby market.

The area housed notorious armed robbers, who were mostly men raised in the vicinity. The residents lived like animals and only the fittest survived.

Basila hulked every sort of cheap commodity to improve livelihood for herself and her mother. They had a neighbor who was never home, but visited from time to time. She was tall, bleached and pretty. She was not really rich as the rest of the residents regarded her, if she had been, she would have lived among the rich, not in that shithole. But she was always flashy.

Whenever she returned, good aroma of different sorts of food people in the vicinity hadn't had for months permeated the air. She had a lot of male friends who visited to chatter, smoke, and eat at her place from time to time, till she disappeared again.

Of course, if she didn't allow them, they would beat her up and take it from her by force. So it was more profitable to be friendly with them, that, plus the fact that "Mama" - as they called her - liked the attention.

Mama claimed she had a booming jewelry business in Idu Market, which explained her regular absence to naive minds.

Idu was a few kilometers away from their locale, it was more profitable to stay back on week days, and return only during weekends.

Eight months after Basila had her child, her mother suggested she visited Mama when she returned again. She advised that Basila could serve Mama at her shop in the big market and be able to afford to care for them better, but especially for her child.

Basila wasn't educated, her mother couldn't afford it. She advised that Basila should see that her grand daughter gets some education. She told Basila that someday, she would be as rich as Mama, and not suffer like they have. Basila's mother wasn't actually ignorant, but the coming of her grand child meant increase in responsibilities, and she was old, with no other help.

Basila obeyed her mother and visited Mama one evening after her numerous visitors had left. Mama understood completely and agreed to take her along when she left in two days.

Basila found herself in an unholy place in Idu on arrival, Mama had taken her to a small room on the top of the five storey building they had entered, she had given her something skimpy to change into from her collection.

When Basila complained, Mama shouted at her in pidgin.

"How you think say the money dey take come? Abeg, close that toilet wey you call mouth, dress quick make we go downstairs", Basila's eyes were covered in tears, Mama gave her a hard nudge on the shoulder, "forget that one oh, unless you wan go back Ghetto dey chop grass with your mama and pikin", she added.

Basila was motivated, she obeyed Mama and followed her downstairs afterwards to the brotel's pub.

The pub was filled with people, drinking alcohol, eating peppered meat, and others dancing. Life was never the same.