On this unforgettable day, also a hairstyle day for Bena, there was no sound of federal fighter jets in the sky; The sun over Akokwa village had just set, allowing my family members to gather around the open backyard behind our house.
When I was a kid, I wouldn’t know that those times were still wartime. The adults did not explain the inconsistencies, why, in the midst of hunger and anguish, families continued with their daily lives, just as hatred coexists with love.
Using a wooden comb, Grandma Elizabeth isolated moles, or strands of hair, on my sister’s scalp, tying the base of each selected crop with black thread. Then he chewed on the unused floss with his strong teeth, stained from chewing tobacco. A gentle breeze stirred the leaves of the orange tree in the middle of the patio under which we sat.
Udoka, my brother, came in with his flock of sheep while I watched the yams roast under a dwarf metal tripod. “Done for today,” she said, going straight to the kitchen and bending down to lift the lids of several bowls in search of food. “Chmchm,” he sighed.
Reacting to two sallow faces, my mother said, “Soon, the little round yams will be ready soon.” On the flat-topped wooden stool where we sat, our backs leaned like conjoined twins and we took turns yawning.
A few inches from Bena’s feet, under the orange tree where Grandma was combing her hair, six two-week-old chicks gathered with their mother as she transferred all the remains she found to their beaks.
To the left of the orange tree and an arm’s length from the backyard fence was an above-ground water tank made of bricks. Squeezing between the tank and the fence was a papaya tree. Standing next to him and frowning was Papa Idoeh. At the top of the tree was my other sister, Ezinne; he was inches away from plucking a green papaya. The narrow-stemmed tree swayed sideways with his weight.
“Girls don’t climb trees,” Dad would yell at him. I turned to look up. An oily palm that belonged to Aunt Eunice struck me in the face and I blinked.
Idoeh took the opportunity to be disciplined to watch over her sleeping twin daughters, the youngest of my ten sisters.
In the village of that time, adults gave no reason to discipline children. Find out, they would say. In hindsight, the slap was an omen, the beginning of an impending horror.
A sudden sound that was now familiar to all adults and some children had exploded. The sound rose and fell like the ghost of a man who used to hit children on the head with his knuckles.
There they were, hovering in the sky over our house: fighter jets, sent by Gowon, the then head of state of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
‘Don’t run, freeze where you are!’ yelled my grandmother. The move meant a human target and the dropping of a bomb.
On the ground, we transform into statues like termite mounds. At the top of the tree, Ezinne froze.
The killer planes descended to roof level, spun and circled the entire house like rabid kites, their wings jingling louder than an aluminum toolbox.
Bloodshot eyes watched various standing figures until, convinced they were lifeless, the pilots launched their planes into the clouds, leaving only echoes of terror.
The enemy jets disappeared forever, we defrosted and quickly returned to normal normality; frozen to death one minute, only to come back to full life the next.
Under the papaya tree, Ezinne found a decapitated knife with which he cut the fruit into four parts. His fingers swept numerous slick black seeds from inside the pods, handing one part to me and the other to Udoka.
With a new energy, Udoka got up to face a loving ram who was making a move on one of his sheep.
Taking off from under Bena’s feet, where Grandma was fixing her hair, the hen and her chicks ran to converge around Ezinne and the black fruit seeds on the sandy ground. Not knowing where the next meal would come from, they pecked furiously.
Returning to the backyard with his left hand cupping his ear for better reception, Idoeh began to say to no one in particular, ‘Listen, listen, everyone listen.’
Since the war began, his hearing acuity had improved to match that of an owl, picking up sounds that no one else could perceive. It was an adaptation that many men developed to get off to a good start on enemy planes, as well as to listen to the footsteps of soldiers when they came to enforce conscription in the Biafran army.
Now his ears were picking up a new sound. The noise increased in intensity, first resembling the sounds of angry mosquitoes, then those of hungry house flies, and finally enraged bees.
Enemy jets! scream. Those killer pilots aren’t stupid. They knew we were human. The townspeople are unlucky twice in one day.
Crossing the backyard and jerking open the backyard door, we crossed yucca, yam and corn farms towards Ohiamgbede, the dense Mgbede forest.
