It’s past midnight. I look around before crawling out of the hole I share with the burly dimwit beside me.
“Let’s move,” I say to him.
He rolls over the shredded paper and some raw rice scattered all over and lazily chews on a dried pepper. The grind noises he makes are less irritating than the fact that I have to keep motivating him. I set out on the mission of restocking our food stash without him. Our kids would need it.
I scurry off into the kitchen on my legs as fast as my weight would allow. Oddly, I hear light footsteps, and quickly hide behind the kitchen door.
“Mommy,” the person calls quietly. It’s only the little boy in the house. I scratch my belly, imagining myself as a mom. The footsteps fade away, and I conclude that he was returning to the bedroom.
I walk into the kitchen. As usual, the sink has some leftovers from dinner. But more inviting are the breadcrumbs on the floor. It has a buttery taste. But my savouring is interrupted as I can feel something peppery in my stomach. I start darting restlessly around the kitchen. Tired of running, I close my eyes, hoping the piercing pain halted.
I open my eyes, and it is bright in the morning. I find that I’ve been tossed onto a heap of dead leaves. It’s chilling, and the morning dew has gotten the hairs on my body wet. A lizard runs over the leaves, making a loud noise in my ear. The breadcrumbs I ate were poisoned. I envy the lizards, as they only get a few stones pelted against their tough skin. Us rats never stop getting poisoned by those with whom we live.
Read – When the King Dies – A Flash Fiction by Olabode Oluwabukola, Nigeria
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