Cheleku is a child everyone despises. She was raised in the outskirt of Ikenga, beside an old tin factory where a girl (who some say had male genitalia) was stripped naked by enemy soldiers and raped during the Biafra war. I know this story because everybody knows it. But what we do not know is who the girl was, whether she received a proper Igbo burial after the war, and most of all, whether she is Cheleku.
Cheleku neither smiles nor laughs. She does not talk unless you talk to her, and even then she does so with obvious spite. However, she likes to sing. She is obsessed with Catholic Latin hymns. The first time she ever talked about this was during Moral Instruction, when our class teacher kept asking her to say something. I will die for Agnus Dei. Six words and that was it.
Over the next few years, I’d come to learn so much about Cheleku, this child everyone despised. We were senior students at St. Teresa All-Girls Boarding School Onitsha, and she was my bunkmate. I remember the fear that gripped me when I learned that she was to be my bunkmate. I phoned my mother right away. I remember begging her, then threatening to drop out, and then begging again.
When Cheleku arrived at the hostel she was nothing like the stories we were told. She was beautiful, with an oval face shaped like the tender, succulent opiora mango we used to eat when we were small. She did not look scary. Just distant, as if she was somewhere else, somewhere only she could enter and stay. I did not observe any breast on her. I mean, it’s not like I glanced around her chest with the intention of finding a breast, but we were girls at the peak of our adolescence and our breasts, if they were there, just had a way of sticking out from under our dress.
“Good afternoon.” I was the first to speak.
“Are you the girl?” she asked, dropping her Ecolac traveling bag beside the metal bunk.
“Sorry, what?”. My voice was shaky and paper-thin.
“I asked if you are the girl – the girl they said I should live with?” She said they like there was some external force that determined what she should do or not do.
“I am your bunk-mate, and my name is Elizabeth.”
She would spend the entire evening unpacking, this girl that did not even have the civility to tell me her name or acknowledge mine: Tissue paper. Two loaves of slice bread. A white torchlight. A catholic rosary (the type used for saying the Thank you Jesus prayer). Bottles of olive oil. An Angel Michael’s perfume. A Paschal candle. Extra rolls of tissue paper. Something that looked like a container of drugs, on and on.
Because I occupied the upper part of the bunk, I could see everything she was doing below. I knew, for instance, that unless she was truly possessed, she had no reason to come to school loaded with olive oils and candles. Even my best friend, Mathilda, holy as she is, has never done that.
And why does she not have even a single menstrual pad? I must tell the girls what I have discovered.
***
It is Saturday. The students are in their respective classes for afternoon prep. Everywhere is quiet, so quiet you could hear the soft cooing of the small black bird perched on the Nigerian flag in the tennis lawn. Beside the lawn there is a signboard that says Do not trespass; only wild animals trespass. Whoever wrote that must have thought that, somehow, it would deter students from strolling across the lawn instead of using the walkway. But they were wrong. This is twenty-first century and every student is wild.
Cheleku is walking, absent-mindedly, through the moist green lawn. Her white gown glistens in the afternoon sun. Under the sun, her skin color appears less brown and more golden-yellow. It is already terrifying to be her bunkmate, but looking at her now, looking at this palette of a girl, I’m terrified even more.
“I want to tell you something,” I say, stopping myself mid-air from pulling at Mathilda’s shirt. She does not like when people touch her.
“What is it, Eliza?”
“I’m afraid of Cheleku. The girl is mysterious.”
By now, both Mathilda and my neighbors have arranged their chairs closer to my desk, the way girls do, their ears wide ajar like a vault.
“Nne gwa anyi something. Give us gist.”
“Do you know that Cheleku does not have any breasts?” I ask, lowering my voice to their hearing only. “True to God! Her breasts are flat like small small slippers. And she brought along some weird holy things.”
By now, I could see the visible irritation on Mathilda’s face. More than anger, she seemed aware.
“When you mentioned holy things, did you mean stuffs like incense and candles or just the Bible? Is there holy water? Elizabeth, tell me everything you saw.”
But I could not give her any more detail. I’d already seen the silhouette at the door, and I knew whose it was. She stood there, motionless, just watching us with a blank face as we tried to act normal. As if she knew we were talking about her. As if she knew everything about our lives.
***
It’s already past lights out. Everyone in the dormitory is on their bed sleeping, everyone except Cheleku and myself. I don’t think I have insomnia. It’s fear that is keeping me awake. After what happened earlier today in class, Cheleku has been more distant than ever. The only time she entered the hostel was a few minutes ago when she came to light up her Paschal candle and spray Angel Michael’s perfume round our bunk. She did it in a haste, ignoring my questioning eyes. Then turned towards the door and walked out. She always moved with a carefulness, like she knew things we are yet to imagine.
It is my first time seeing her this restless. I noticed that she was absent throughout night class, and it scares me. However there was an upside to it: I finally had enough time to tell Mathilda about the all the holy stuffs Cheleku brought. I told her everything. I do not understand why she stormed out of the class later that night, or why she looked at me the way she did, but I suspect it had something to do with the story. I was sha not bothered. You know Mathilda – she hears from God and that alone can make a person mad.
Outside, the night is pitch-black and hollow. The darkness, thick as a carpet, spreads out evenly on all corners of the hostel compound. I could hear the rustling of leaves as they brushed against the wind. The black bird, the one that cooed in the afternoon, is still there. It coos still.
Inside the hostel, Cheleku’s lit candle forms a pale light. The perfume, although somewhat sweet smelling, fills the entire room, causing slight irritation in my nostrils. Everywhere is quiet. The only human sounds I could hear are the soft snoring of some hostel mates and the throbbing of my own heart as it beat anxiously against my chest. Although terrified, I am starting to feel drowsy.
There is a shadow by the door. I could perceive it, but I am too drowsy to look any closer. At first it appears like the shadow wants to launch at me, the way it keeps trying to get in through the door. But then I notice something else: it cannot go in. Something is preventing it. From my bed, I could hear the shadow’s growl; its frustration as it scratches on the floor over and over, only to attempt again and meet the same block. There is someone singing outside as well; asking the shadow to turn back and leave. Her voice is familiar, too familiar. I try to look but my eyes are weak, and I am afraid. So, I shut them and listen instead. Yes – I can hear the song now the way I hear voices in my dreams, except this time, the dream is real. It’s a Latin hymn– Angus Dei, and the voice belongs to Cheleku. But why am I hearing Mathilda’s voice as well? Why does it appear like she’s the one on the floor, scratching. Growling.
Chiwenite Onyekwelu is a Nigerian writer. His works have appeared in Rattle, Cincinnati Review, Adroit Journal, Isele, Hudson Review, Terrain.org, Ubwali Literary Magazine, Chestnut Review, and elsewhere. He recently won the After the End Poetry Contest organized at Oxford University and was shortlisted for the 2024 Bridport Prize. He won the 2023 Hudson Review Inaugural Frederick Morgan Poetry Prize and was a finalist for the Alpine Fellowship Prize. Chiwenite has a Bachelor of Pharmacy (B. Pharm) from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Nigeria.