Episode 1: Hell Is A Place Called Home

She was sprawled on the sofa with her mouth gaping open like a fish out water with her hand dropping to the floor as if there was no life in her. Spittle trickled out of her mouth with the consistency of a waterfall gushing water. Her snores came in broken gasp like sounds like that of an exhaust engine choking on its smoke. She was lying with her chest on the sofa and her buttocks which shot into the air like a mountain heaved with every snore.
Three bottles of vodka and four bottles of beer lay scattered all over the floor, with the rug boasting of alcohol stains in some corner while other parts of the rug had scars from cigarette burns to tell another story.

Aisha stepped cautiously into the room and took in the scene. The twelve year old sighed resignedly as she tiptoed gingerly trying to avoid the splinters of glass from the broken mug which must have shattered on the floor. She began to arrange the room methodically as she hummed under her breath softly. Scenes like this were no longer surprising to her as her mother; Bukola had continued to sink deeper and deeper into the arms of alcohol and men ever since her father left them four years ago. 

She was eight then and she had come back from school that day to see her father and mother arguing in their two-room apartment. The argument became heated as the day went on and by evening time, her father began to beat her mother. He beat her senselessly till she fainted and then he left the house never to come back again. Perhaps if there had not been neighbours to quickly revive the fainted woman, she might have lost her life that evening. Although she didn’t lose her life, she lost another thing, her husband and father to her child. Bukola at first was worried when Kunle did not come back the next day and her worries intensified when after three days he was yet to return. She went to his place of work and that was when she was told that he had tendered his resignation. She was leaving the place with dejection when one of his friends had hinted to her that he was out of the country with a white woman he had fallen in love with. Bukola wept bitterly as her heart shattered into a million pieces and she was just a mile away from the doorstep of madness.

She found comfort in alcohol and at first she would go to the bars to drink just so that little Aisha wouldn’t see her drinking but more often than not, she always came home dead drunk to meet the little girl fast asleep after being fed by concerned neigbours. Her visits to the bar drew men to her and to drown her sorrows, she fell into the arms of any of them found attractive enough and they usually ended up with her at home. It was also another good way of making money to fend for her and her little daughter.

Aisha on the other hand had to grow up quickly, from a runaway father to an absentee mother; the little girl realized she was all she had to survive. She began to do menial jobs like fetching water or helping to sweep for the neigbours just so they could feed her while her mother was passed out drunk or didn’t even bother to show up at home. At twelve now, Aisha was wiser than her years and she took comfort only in her education after all she kept hearing that it is the passport from poverty.

She turned her head as she heard her mother shift on the sofa and she watched with an alarmed expression as her mother tottered on the edge of the sofa before crashing to the floor. Aisha rushed to her side to make sure she was not injured but the drunken woman took no notice of the floor as she snored on in her sleep as if she was on the most comfortable bed in the world. Aisha hissed with disgust as she went on with her arrangement and began humming to herself softly again.

It was not until the next morning that Bukola came to and the first thing that hit her was that she was having a pounding headache and her back also ached from her uncomfortable sleeping position on the floor. She rubbed her eyes with her hand and winced in pain as the action caused her head to feel like it was about to explode. Using the sofa as help, she managed to drag herself from the floor and go into the other room where Aisha lay fast asleep.

“Get up stupid girl,” she bellowed as she landed two heavy slaps on the sleeping girl’s back. Aisha woke up with a start and held her stinging back as she stared at her mother with sleep befuddled eyes.  “Are you deaf or we are now mates that you have to count my voice before you answer me?” Bukola thundered angrily. The shout was too much for her pounding head and she winced as she felt painful throb in her head. Aisha noticed the painful wince and quickly went to her mother “What is it mama? Are you alright?” Bukola pushed her away and replied weakly “Just get me panadol, I am having a terrible headache and you have stressed me so.”

Aisha looked at her mother and sighed “But we have no money in the house mama. You used all I had saved up from scrubbing Mama Adura’s kitchen and washing her husband’s car to buy alcohol last night.”

“

Shut up will you? All these nonsense talk is making my head worse. Just go to aboki Audu and tell him that I said I would pay him.”

“He has refused to give me anything on credit again, as it is we still owe him six hundred and twenty naira.”   

“Oh for Heaven’s sake, you devil’s child, will you shut that your hell mouth. I did not kill my mother so you cannot kill me you hear? You would rather leave this house like your useless father.” With that, she stormed out of the room to go curl up on the sofa as she tried to sleep with hopes that the headache would be gone when she woke up again.

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