I stood in that wall wardrobe for several hours while the search for me got very intensed. If anyone had told Iffy my younger sister that I was there, should have rebuffed it.
It started like a child's play but ended up a serious matter.
Every Saturday morning, our parents would wake up early, leaving us in bed to have enough rest while they go to our farm in the other town. They would be there for at least five hours.
On my first day at the farm, I hated going there. There were so many tsetse flies and mosquitoes that one could begin to feel sickly almost immediately when they begin to perch. Since my parents thought we shouldn't be bothered about going to the farm, I felt so happy on the inside.
A day before, while the school closed, one of my classmates, Tunji by name, gave me his football, that he would get it back from me after school hours. Somehow, the foot got lost. I searched everywhere for it, I just can't explain how it got missing. Tunji was all over me asking for his ball. He said his father would ask for it and that if I can't produce it, he would come to our house.
That statement made me sweat. I knew I was in a dip shit.
I woke up before my younger sister. My responsibility was to do the dishes and warm the food so we could have our breakfast. While I was doing all that in the kitchen, I heard a bang at our door. I quickly peeped through to the pigeonhole. There he stood, Tunji's father.
I ran, with my back foot touching the skull into my parent's room. Locked the door and entered the wardrobe, and it jammed.
When they bang on the door continued, and louder, Iffy woke from sleep, and straight to the door, she went to attend to it. With a sleepy eye, she opened the door. I could hear all the conversation between her and the man.
Good morning sir.
Mr. Albert replied:
Good morning my daughter. Are your father at home?
Iffy replied:
No sir. I woke up to meet their absence. I think they must have gone to the farm.
Without any form of disappointment in his voice, Mr. Albert replied Iffy:
Alright then. Kindly give the vegetable seeds to your father, he requested I got them for him.
I dropped a parcel of vegetable seeds with Iffy for my dad and walked away. He never mentioned anything concerning football.
Now, I am all stocked in the wardrobe. How am I supposed to escape the early morning hunger that greeted my stomach?
There was no amount of shout from inside the wardrobe in the parents' room can make Iffy hear me. I tried opening the jammed wardrobe, the more I tried the tighter it becomes. I just decided to sit and wait for my parents to come back from the back.
Meanwhile, Iffy was busy eating the delicious periwinkle soup mom prepared last night.
She would never come close to my parents room because it was prohibited for us to do so. I only summoned courage to enter because it was the only place that came to my mind.
The wait took over seven hours and yet my parents were not back. On a good day, they don't stay in the farm beyond five hours. Today that I am trapped, what could be holding them back?
Now Iffy was getting worried. She didn't know about my whereabouts. When the power came on, the ceiling fan in my parents room began to blow so sweet breeze and I slept off.
It was around 7:00 pm that I felt a cold touch on my chest that I jumped up. It was mom's cold hands. She just finished taking her bath, and upon opening the wardrobe she found me sleeping on the floor inside the wardrobe.
From how it all started at school till how I foolishly ran for fear of been beaten by Mr Oke, Tunji's father was all I related to my parents. Mom laughed and laughed and told me I would have ro sacrifice my pocket money for the coming week to buy Tunji's football.
