Nikki’s POV
We wrote exams at home and the Maths teacher, Mr. Blay, invigilated. We did not really mind; it wasn’t like we were going to cheat or anything. We had learnt a lot because we didn’t want to disgrace our dad.
Spoiler alert, we didn’t.
My father was so happy we went to the beach during the weekend. Mum didn’t come of course, so we had a lovely time. We swam until our hair was stiff with the salt water and every other part of our body had sand in places we did not know sand could occupy. We sat on the cloth that used to be on the dinner table under a tree. My brother and I drank Pepsi and my dad slowly made a brewery in his stomach. We all had kebab and coupled with the sunny day that dried us pretty quickly, the day was definitely bright.
“Daddy?” despite the fact that I had been speaking for about two months now, my dad was always surprised every time I opened my mouth, with or without talking.
“Yeah Nikki?” he had also began calling me Nikki and Mike Mikey.
“Mikey and I have been talking,” ‘Mikey rolled his eyes “we’re ready to go back to school” This came as a shock to my dad, because he choked on his Kebab and had to finish the rest of the beer in 2 gulps to push it down. Mike and I began to laugh uncontrollably as tears rolled down our dad’s eyes, whether it was from raw emotions from his children going to school or from the effects of spicy food and the carbonated beverage, we did not know.
“Want another beer, dad?” Mike asked still laughing
“You children are going to make me into an alcoholic” dad said with a laugh, digging through his slightly damp pockets “get me a coke and get some for yourselves as well” I don’t think we have to tell you how fast we run to the store at the beach.
As we were buying the coke, some man beside the counter called us. He was drinking a beer with a higher alcoholic content than my dad was drinking, I could tell from how he squinted his eyes whenever he took a swing. I don’t think that qualified as beer anymore, it was spirit. We knew not to go near strangers, so we stood where we were and just looked at him.
“Eyy, you guys look alike papa!” the man said the moment he saw our faces properly. I could smell his breath from where I stood and I knew he had too much to drink.
“Yes, we’re twins” Mike said politely.
“Oh wow! My wife always wanted twins” Mike and I looked at each other and back at the man. He nodded towards me “Your body is showing too much” I wore a spaghetti top and shorts that covered half of my thighs. As compared to the western movie beach scenes, I was overly dressed. I noticed how this man was undressing me with his eyes and felt uncomfortable immediately.
“And my body isn’t?” Mike said. He was wearing just shorts so was the man.
“But you are a boy! It doesn’t matter”
“Instead of telling my sister to dress better, maybe you shouldn’t be a pervert who tell 13-year-olds how to dress”
The man got up shaking in anger as he said a few words that I am not allowed to even think of in fante. We quickly walked away and the reactions we got were mixed; the bartender told the man to sit his lazy ass down before he threw him out and gave us a wink while the other elderly people in the bar gave us dirty looks.
“Thanks Mike” I said as we got out of there, pulling down my shorts to make it more acceptable. Mike hit my hand.
“People are always going to talk but the difference is how you take it. There is nothing wrong with how you dress, people just have control issues”
That is the wisest thing anyone has ever said to me and I carried these words with me my whole life.
Few weeks later, we got to go to school. My mother had been trying to get me to go to church for a long while and because I refused, she decided that she would not help us get ready for the school year. Joke’s on her, because we did not want her to help either, including dad so she went to stay with her sister in Accra for a few days. Every day, I wondered whether they would get a divorce and Mike would laugh so loud. Shopping with dad was amazing; we got the things we actually needed for school instead of what he thought we needed for school which was a first. We had new uniforms and everything because ‘this is your last year of JHS you need to finish in style’.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
My dad took pictures of us the first day of school in almost 6 months but I had to admit, we looked good. We each had faded haircuts, newly ironed uniforms looking all crisp and neat, and white socks and shoes that was sure to make us get best dressed award, if we kept this up the entire school year. I definitely won’t, but Mike would.
It was only when we saw the school building that I felt the cold grip of fear. I hadn’t seen my school mates in months and the kids from church came to this school as well. I wonder if rumors have been spread about me. I wonder if the few friends we had were still our friends. I lost my childhood best friend and others because they too popular to hang out with the weird twins who read books while the rest of the student populace snuck in electronic gadgets and played sports and hang out with the older kids. We ended up with the other weird people who, unlike western culture, were not the smart kids. In Ghana, the smart kids were the popular kids. The unpopular kids were the other kids who couldn’t sing or play sports or got good grades or brought gadgets to school and threw parties. Mike touched my knee and his voice in my head said,
It’s gonna be fine.
Dad gave us a lovely pep talk and then he drove away leaving us in the mercy of the wolves.
It actually ended up to not be so bad after all. Everyone thought that we were sick so they just waved at us and walked their merry way. The teachers who saw us asked how we were and congratulated us on the exam; apparently we had done so well that there were awards waiting for us. During the annual Speech and Prize Giving day, there was a standing ovation given to us by all those who attended the festivities. The headmaster also incorporated the importance of hard work and used us as example for people who did not let sickness come in the way of our education. We grimaced, thinking about how it must’ve made the other students feel. Anger, envy and spite for sure. The only thing we did not utterly obliterate was Physical Education and Religious and Moral Education.
Says a lot about the education system, doesn’t it?
I laughed so loud the kids looked at us like we were crazy, which in their defense we sort of were. Since it was the first day of school and dad had brought us to school a whole 30 minutes early before assembly, we got to choose our desks. It was a twin window seat that had a perfect view of the park and was three rows from the front seat. Mike’s seat was against the wall; we settled that dispute with 5 rounds of rock paper scissors. We had an entire 10 minutes to go to the library and smell the books. The student library workers were not pleased. We even chose the books we would borrow and read and took note of the new arrivals. We couldn’t wait to indulge our brains with knowledge but we had to remind ourselves of BECE (Basic Education Certificate Examination) which we would write very soon. Mike agreed to make a timetable for our study time.
This was going to be an amazing school year.
All too soon it was assembly time. At assembly, I stood at the back of the girl’s line while Mike stood a bit at the very front. Our lines were adjacent and it helped that I could see Mike.
Everything was going well, we said the morning recitals, the morning prayer was offered by the school chaplain and then I wondered if they would ever tolerate an atheist chaplain. I smiled a bit at my joke and Mike looked back just to let me see that he had ‘heard’ me and laughed a bit too loud but wasn’t caught because he immediately closed his eyes and no one knew who was the giggling offender.
The headmaster gave a long boring speech about discipline and academic excellence and the list of offenses that would warrant expulsion. If I hadn’t slept well last night, I would’ve slept right on my feet. Mike and I began playing ‘I spy’ and I missed the headmaster talking about an exchange student from Benin for a possible relationship between us and the school over there. The headmaster invited him up the stage and the clapping interrupted our game. We clapped along for good measure. I could see the girls raising their skirts higher and covering it up with their vests to give the illusion that their skirts were shorter. Why were their eyes for this boy? They might not even see him after this year. I was at the back so I could not see him as he left the lines however, he came from the lines adjacent Mike so Mike obviously saw him first. I was so busy straining my eyes and standing on my toes to look at the boy. The noise from the clapping and the shouting was so loud that I missed Mike panicking in my head. The new boy shook the headmaster’s hand and as soon as he turned to face us, I couldn’t move.
He gave everyone a shy smile that filled my stomach with lead. I saw him sweep his eyes over the crowd and then locked his eyes with mine and then smiled again. The last time I saw him, his hair was put into cornrows, but today it was cropped short into typical Ghanaian school boy fashion. He looked innocent enough, but I knew what he was capable of.
My hands moved to my throat and I let out a low moan. In a moment, Mike was beside me and holding me up. I didn’t realize that I couldn’t breathe, I didn’t even realize that the whole school was staring at me. I only saw him and as I fell on the school concrete, I could see his image burned behind my eyelids when I embraced the black.
It was the boy with obsidian eyes.