Short Story Galore serialization continues 5
THE HIGH SCHOOL PLAYBOY
Tunde Thomas awoke to the
familiar loud sound made by a piece of stone drummed on one of the many iron
poles supporting the jutting roof of the hostel.
The sequenced rhythm produced
permeated the stillness of dawn and shattered the complacent silence.
Tunde wasn’t frightened by the
sudden sound as he was already used to it and knew what purpose it was meant to
serve: wakeup call to the students of the dormitory for morning devotion and
portion distribution.
He was a handsome boy with a crew
cut and medium height for his age. He was in the third and last term of his
junior high school final year and was also the captain of his room.
He sat up on his bed as his room
members, both his mates and juniors, in response to the summons, shook off
sleep, rapidly got off their bunks and flew out the door - as was being done in
all the other rooms - to assemble in rows.
He didn’t budge from his sitting
position, though.
About fifty seconds after his
room had become vacated by its other occupants, Niyi Ajani, one of the hostel
supervisors, stormed in, holding a thick leather belt by its buckle in his
right hand.
Ajani looked round quickly but
couldn’t see anyone who wanted to play truant from morning chores. Then he saw
Tunde. He glared at him (Tunde grinned and winked), opened his mouth as if
about to say something, thought better of it, and hurtled back out of the room
without saying what was on his mind.
Tunde and Ajani were not on
speaking terms. They were keeping malice with each other and Tunde could
vividly remember what the cause was.
It was back in the first term of
the current school year.
The house captain, Lashy, had
just announced the names of the new supervisors and Tunde was one of them.
Feeling that the post was more of an encumbrance than a help, he later went to
Lashy and said he wasn’t interested in it.
Lashy found substance in his
point of view and informed them all that Tunde didn’t want to be an officer so
he was slotting Ajani into the now vacant post.
The very next morning after Ajani
assumed office, Tunde wanted to stab portions. Ajani challenged him and Tunde
humiliated him in front of their peers by reminding him of the circumstances
which led to him being made a supervisor.
A proud character, Ajani had felt
the episode an insult to his personality and his reaction was to swear that he
would never speak to Tunde again as long as he lived. True player that Tunde
was, he had tried to make up with him, but after a few rebuffs, had taken up a
nonchalant attitude himself.
Note: This is the first page
of The High School Playboy, the
fifth of the short stories in the Oseyiza Oogbodo book, Short Story Galore, which’s serialization began some weeks ago but
had to begin again due to some unforeseen hitches. More excerpts to follow on
this blog. It is available on Amazon and many other stores through the links
below. Other available Oogbodo books are The
Good Life, The Newell Murder.
www.amazon.com/dp/B07DJYFJ28
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07DJYFJ28
www.amazon.de/dp/B07DJYFJ28
www.amazon.fr/dp/B07DJYFJ28
www.amazon.it/dp/B07DJYFJ28
www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B07DJYFJ28
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