For Sena - Bad Things Happen In Threes

By Oyesanmi Ifeduyi

This is a story about love. But don't get too excited, it's love that was doomed even before the first kiss.
Love was the first time you saw me, you fell in love with me in that moment. Love was when I got drunk and kissed her, I wasn't yours but still you got mad. I had broken your heart the first time. I didn't mean to.
Love was all those times you saw me but didn't speak to me. You were still mad. I was still oblivious.

First Impressions 2 - Short Fiction by Tola Odejayi

Over the next few months, Taribo and Julie continued to see each other. They had both agreed that it would be a good idea for them to start off as friends, and to see how things developed. And the more Taribo saw of Julie, the more he liked her. He sometimes met her at the hospitals that she visited in the line of her work, and he saw how the staff and patients responded with affection to her genuine interest in them. He noted how cheerful and optimistic she was, even on days when things hadn’t gone her way.

First Impressions 1 - Short Fiction by Tola Odejayi

Taribo repeatedly scanned the restaurant for Julie, hoping that she would be on time. There was nothing he hated more than people who had no concept of punctuality – that was why he had arrived a full fifteen minutes before the time that they had agreed on the phone. In between scans, he thought about the circumstances that had led to their date.

Long Distance Relationship - Short Story

By Ifeanyi Ogbo

she stopped answering my calls. at first her phone would ring nonstop while i sat on the edge of my seat listening to her caller tune, and expecting her voice to break through the melody but it never did.
the caller tune eventually got replaced by a robotic, monotonous voice telling me the number i was trying to call was not available.

some nights, i swear i could feel a weariness in the robotic voice as if it was tired of repeating "the number you are trying to call is not available" over and over again.

Runaway Bride Dumps Fiance On Wedding Day Because He's Not A Graduate

An Anambra bride has dumped the man she was supposed to marry on their wedding day because she says he's not a graduate. She literarily abandoned him at the altar. Meanwhile, it is the same uneducated groom who sponsored her through university.

Supposedly, the former couple met while she was still a jambite. He proposed marriage and she gave the condition that she would only accept if he allowed her to go to school and pay her way. She promised to marry him after she finished.

Now no one knows what other things happened, maybe she wanted him to also go to school and he did not? Whatever, I think it was very mean to take advantage of the man like that and then dump him on the wedding day. Read the full story below....

Short Story - Ja-mis. One Hell Of A Driver

By Onyinye Orabuike

I once worked with a driver whom we all know as Ja-mis. His name is spelt James but he pronounces it as Ja-mis, the funny aberration suited his overall make-up just fine and it stuck. As a marketer then, I had worked with different kinds of drivers, but this Ja-mis beat all the records.

Jamis was one hell of a driver. He had sworn to our transportation manager that interviewed him that he had five years experience as a driver in V/Island. This was in addition to two years experience as a mechanic. I had specifically requested for someone that knows V/I and Lagos Island roads very well, but it turned out James didn’t know anywhere on the island.

Short Story - Spending Christmas With The Police

By Onyinye Orazulike

Would you surety someone for court bail? I did this once and got my fingers severely burnt. I thought I was doing a good thing but the person I stood in for absconded and left me feeling empty and stupid.

The lady was arrested a few days to Christmas and I couldn't stand to imagine the kind of hell she would go through in detention. Also, only God knew how long the case would last, especially when she didn’t have anyone to help her in the police. She couldn’t even afford a lawyer to begin with, worse still she appeared so ignorant she didn’t seem to realise the kind of trouble she was in.

Short Story - One Chance Christmas

By Onyinye Orabuike

It's a couple of days into the month of December, and in church Last Sunday, the minister prayed for us for Christmas gift from heaven, and the church members chorused amen as if their lives depended on it. People are pressed to meet up with different targets they set for themselves for the year. Men who had their mind set on the dream car they want to take home for Christmas are making frantic bids to maximise sales.

Single ladies who believe that this year will not pass them by are intensifying prayers. I learnt that in some forums parents who for some reasons may not be able to travel to the village for Christmas make special plans for their daughters that are of marriageable age to travel so as to increase their chance of meeting suitors.

Short Story - The Witches of Okpolo

By Onyinye Orabuike

I once shared a room with a cousin that killed mosquitoes on the wall. I tried to tell her it wasn’t right, but she would have none of it.

The sight of the dirty blood stains all over the walls made me feel as though I was living in a hunter’s bedchamber, and there was no escape. Each time I raise this with her she would accuse of being a terribly deep sleeper which explained why I could even tolerate both the mosquito bites and their sorrowful dirge.

Short Story - The Lesson of True Love

By Onyinye Orabuike

Once there lived a strong and handsome he goat, Tabi. At his prime, Tabi met and fell in love with the young and beautiful daughter of the lion. The love that sprung between them that beautiful summer grew and blossomed, as everyone watched. Theirs was true love.

Short Story - The Day Boko Haram Killed My Brother

By Onyinye Orabuike

The day started like any other until it was not. My brother was an officer in the Nigerian Army and everyday we prayed that he would survive. He was my eldest and only brother, and had stood in for both my parents since my mother died 2 years ago. I was the youngest and never knew my father.

First, my sister called and told me our brother's latest assignment that put him face to face with the terrorists and something was wrong. I couldn't believe it and dialled my brother's line immediately.

Fiction - Please Come Home To Me

By Nnamdi Okose

It hadn’t started raining everyday…

It hadn’t started raining everyday when you left or I did not notice. There was little I noticed when you were in the room. I liked pretending, eye glasses pinned low on tip of nose, flipping through Mancur Olsen’s book on stagflation. But my mind was always far from economics or anything else whenever you were there.

You never saw me peeking at the stretch marks etched across your buttocks like the scratch marks of a cat. As you bounded across the room wearing nothing but different coulours of that leopard spotted panties I liked so much but didn’t tell you; I wondered if you knew how seamlessly the stretch marks complimented those leopard spots…

I guess I never told you a lot. Like all the things I liked about you. The way you rubbed your eyes furiously when they itched. The way your smile grew so wide it was difficult not to smile with you.

The Miraculous Deliverance Of Oga Jona - A Short Story By Chimamanda Adichie

As soon as he opened his eyes, he felt it. A strange peace, a calm clarity. He stretched.  Even his limbs were stronger and surer. He looked at his phone. Thirty-seven new text messages – and all while he was asleep. With one click, he deleted them. The empty screen buoyed him. Then he got up to bathe, determined to fold the day into the exact shape that he wanted.

Those Levick people had to go. No more foreign PR firms. They should have made that article in the American newspaper sound like him, they should have known better. They had to go. And he would not pay their balance; they had not fulfilled the purpose of the contract after all.

He pressed the intercom. Man Friday came in, face set in a placidly praise-singing smile. “Good morning, Your Excellency!”

Fiction - The Caged Bird Sings By Inyamu #BringBackOurGirls

It’s the end of another day, and we’re stuck in the gloominess of power cuts. The night air is chilly, a huge relief from the scorching heat of the afternoon sun.

There are candles burning, as some of the girls study, while others talk about absolutely nothing... conversations about fashion, to the comic appearance of one of the teachers to Kannywood movies. Me? I’m just sitting here, wanting more out of life as Miriam weaves my hair. Dreaming of the day when I’ll burst out of this life I am cocooned in. The life of a small village, where fear and caution has been the order of the day lately… if ever I will.

Short Story - The Fable of the Flawed Kwalari by Tola Abraham

“It is time to hear a story, we will listen, we will learn.”

The five of us gather round Mama Ibadan, singing the chorus she taught us the last time she visited, urging her to tell us a story. Mama Ibadan is father’s mother; she lives in Ibadan so we call her Mama Ibadan.
She sits up on the stool that is placed against the open kitchen door and she tucks her wrappers firmly between her legs,

​The Pentecostal Butt-Dance By Femi Segun

What, you wonder, am I on about now? Easy. I am speaking out on behalf of the tortured majority. You know, the young male Pentecostals who have sworn to abstention until marriage and are trying their best to “Hold Bodi” despite hormonal stimulus and in the face of the barrage of sexual messages from Channel O, Home Videos, X-Rated Magazines and the skimpily dressed female “Penterascals” that populate many of today’s Pentecostal Churches.

A Flight Diversion - A Short Story By Chimamanda Adichie

I was woken by the pilot’s voice. In the drowsy hum of the airplane, his words crackled, and I thought I heard something about preparing to land. Could I have slept so long? I looked at the time. It was only three hours into the Lagos-to-Atlanta flight. The flight attendants were hurrying back and forth. The pilot was still speaking. “We have an emergency onboard, and we have had to divert the flight to Dakar.” I could feel the plane descending. It seemed too fast. A sweeping hollowness. My fog of sleep cleared instantly. Something was wrong, the pilot was too cryptic, the flight attendants too blank-faced, snatching up cups, urging seats straight. I thought: If I die, I hope it’s quick and I don’t know.

Molasses - A Short Story by Unoma Nwankwor

Twenty nine year old Adesuwa Eremu adjusted her eyes to the sunlight that invaded the room. This was the dawning of a new day, today she’d announce her engagement to sixty five year old Chief Xavier. She was never going to have an ordinary day again.  She turned over drawing the duvet over her head. She wished she could disappear. As a matter of fact, she had many wishes. Most essential among them, was that she had shut her mouth. She couldn’t believe the widowed millionaire was holding her to a wager she made six months ago.

Fugue - Short Story by Thelma Nwogbo

She woke up with a start. Where was she? How long had she been this way? She didn't know.
No one could tell her. It was dark outside. Where was Mark?

He should be home by now. They had fellowship that evening, she was to lead the choir, Mark was to do the Bible readings. Where was Mark?

Short Story - Forgotten Love By Thelma Nwogbo

I retired to the bedroom, tired of waiting up for Derin. The room was lavish and very spacious, but it was the bed that did things to my mind and body. Especially as all the sheets were silk and the pillows were filled with what felt like feathers. No wonder the minute I got into it I always fell asleep. Except Derin was there with me of course.