Go and wait for me

- Shut up and sit down!

Sira was thrown into the wall where the rest of her school yard companions already stood silently weeping, sobbing on their bear skinny legs, leaving a salt trail on their ebony skin.

- This goes for all of you! If you don't shut up, I’ll kick some sense into your stupid skull.

A faded voice cried:

- I want my mammy.

-Shut up! 

The blow went directed to the nearest girl, not the one that spoke the words. The girl bumped her head against the wall and everything went blank.

- There is no more mammy! I am your mammy now! Officer Oguguomakwa. And you don't want me to come back here. 

The man took his leather belt from his waist, fold in two, and yanked it in a snap. The girls shivered and stood further back, hiding their face and protecting their heads, from a blow that never came. Instead the iron door shut in a massive bang.

A few minutes pass until the first girl broke the silent lamentation. 

- Tobili! Tobili! Are you ok? Wake up!

She crawled next to the unconscious girl, held her head in her lap and her floral white dressed started to get stain in red blood. Akiaekeme took the cloth belt from her waist and used it, gently to clean the deep wound on her sister forehead. 

-Tobili! Come on! Wake up! 

Tobili was non responsive, and Akiaekeme slob over her.

The tears felt like warm rain, waking up to a far away voice. 

- Keme...- The girl mumble - My head hurts.

Tobili wake up to a dark room. She took a while until she notice the mouldy scent on the air.

Akiaekeme held her sister, embracing her, like their mother did after they ran out to play near the edge of the forest. They knew the dangers of the wildlife there, but they also knew the beauty and it was like the land called out to them. After sometime they got lost and called for their mother, and called, and called again. They cried for her mother, until the night set, and cried themselves to sleep. Only in the next day they heard a distance call of a familiar voice. Their mother, several men and hounds were sweeping the edge of the forest, and the girls run bare foot towards the voice on the first rays of light. They met with an embraced, and no scold were necessary.Now Tobili felt that she ran towards the distance voice as well, but she ran towards the darkness, and her sisters arms were her only consolation.

Several days passed. The girls shared the cell, the sleeping space and two buckets: one for water, another for body necessities. Every day it was night. A continual darkness that were interrupted by a blinding flash of an artificial light when herb porridge was served. The girls stood silent and dirty. Their dresses stained in blood, faeces and grease. Every now and then the soldier hand held one girl chin admiring it. They soon learn to let him. 

One night (or day) there was no fluorescent light. Instead a spotlight held on Oguguomakwa hand, point out to two others, almost child soldiers, the girl they should take. Sira was muffled, and dragged in dread. The others hardly realised what happen. 

Days came, and went, and so did the girls, one by one. Olaedo was order to fully undressed before she was taken. So was Enedjeta. Similoluwa was taken in a body bag. She died of grief. Sudah, Sashantae and Ekhoeiyayi were beaten out and eventually Akiaekeme was taken out of her sisters arms, her dirty brown rag of a belt on Tobili’s hands as the only reminder of a previous life. Enaye, took her sister place, sat her head upon her lap as she sang a sad melody to slip her into sleep.