Chika's Last Call

Chika was different; he wasn’t like the rest of us. I couldn’t control the tears dripping from my eyes that Saturday morning when I dropped the call, my heart kept pounding fast like a brigadier’s drum....

  

It was my sophomore year in college and I had two close friends, they were like my mama’s sons to me.  Our course mates called us the musketeers but I and chike were referred to as the twin evil of macro economics. I was inflation and he was unemployment. We argued a lot about academic issues but we agreed on any other areas of life. Seun was always neutral when we argued. He simply says; 

“Femi and Chika” with a calm voice , grips us both on our shoulders while trying to maintain eye contact with us simultaneously “you are right, you guys are both right”. We would stare at him for a second, just hiss and that will end the whole argument. Whenever he does it, it always worked. He called that the argument terminating trick. We shared our lives together, as though making a promise never to keep secrets from each other but we soon realized that Chika became a closed book that couldn’t be open nor read from its covers. We tried making him talk more about personal issues but he was emotionally numb. There was a time he would talk and tell us things but he just became an emotional “dead-end” after several attempts to reach out. We began to grow apart over time, I and Femi were still tight but Chika became distant and we gradually became strangers over the passage of time, especially when he decided to move to a separate apartment saying he wanted more space.

In our third year, Chika’s name was all over the department. In the first semester, he had straight As in all his course, that was when we noticed that he had only had two Bs throughout his studentship and for a moment I had this awkward feeling of joy and sadness at the same time, I couldn’t explain it. I felt that was why he kept his distance so that he could study more and maintain his impeccable grades. I and Femi were probably becoming a distraction to the poor boy after all. So as time passed the issue vanished into the rhythm of the seasons and soon we were in our final year and that was when clarity came uponto the past issue that had gone dark with time. 

On that faithful Saturday morning, I was having a shower after returning from my early morning workout. My phone began to ring but I could only hear the faint sound from the loud splashing sound of the water from the shower. As soon as I was done, I quickly went to where the phone was and picked it. There were five missed calls from an unknown number. It must be pretty urgent for the person to have kept dialling my number I thought. So I called back but the number was switched off and before I could drop it, it had switched to the voice mall so I said; 

“Whoever this is, maybe you should call back when you are back on” as I dropped the call, I had a kind of  ‘Dejavu’ a sort of feeling I was familiar with. I had that feeling when my Mum passed away five years prior but I couldn’t explain why I had the feeling nor what it meant so I forgot it and cleaned up, turned up a little music to ease up the tension. After an hour and a moment after the music stopped due to a power outage, I heard the phone ring again. I was motionless for a second because as I heard it ring, my heart stated beating fast and the same aura I had an hour before came upon me. It was very strange feeling that way about my phone ringing but I still approached the table where it was with a pseudo confidence and I discovered when I picked the phone from the table that it was the same number.

 “Hello” I said as I picked up the call, stuttering a bit, still wondering what was going on with me.

“Who is this?” the voice responded. I could hear whispers from the background but I couldn’t quite pick any word from all the rumblings.

“You called me, didn’t you?” I responded.

“NO! You called this number and we saw got your voicemail, anyways that doesn’t matter... Do you know any Mr Chika Emmanuel? I think he is a student of the university, Economics department, Judging from his ID card” 

Now my heart stated to beat faster, I was forcing my head not to go in all the wrong directions but deep down my gut I knew what could have happened and I didn’t want to believe it.

“Errm, Yes, I know him, he is my classmate. What happened to him?”

“We found the body some minutes ago; I guess he was dumped here. I’m afraid, he is dead” 

As I heard that statement, my head started to spin; I had no verbal reaction, just tears, which came out fast- so rapid. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing; the phone had slipped off my hand. I lost my grip and my balance; I hit the floor in tears. I couldn’t control the tears dripping from my eyes that Saturday morning when I dropped the call, my heart kept pounding fast like a brigadier’s drum.... 

Soon I got another call, and this time, it was the police. I was invited latter that day to the station and that was when the entire picture became clear. Chika’s parent got separated around the time he stopped talking.  His mom left, abandoning him and his sister with their unemployed dad. It seemed she became frustrated being the bread winner of the house for so long. His dad wasn’t educated so he couldn’t get a real job. He eventually died while trying to do an illegal business to cater for his children. They got the money from their dad’s illegal trade and that was how he could continue school and get another apartment and somehow I guess he made up his mind no to end up like his dad but the sorrow of his loss had pierced his soul. Even though he was doing well academically, he was failing socially and emotionally; he got involved in a lot of problems. His sister latter explained how she tried to make him come back to his senses and he shut her out as well. Chika took a shot to his pelvic and one to his left arm the police never found out what really happened or who was responsible. Even though I hate the fact that he never thought that I could be there for him as a friend when he needed me the most, I still felt while he was dying and in that bush where he was dumped, he summoned the last strength in him to make that call, to say what exactly? I really can’t say. All I know is that I missed the most important call of my life, Chika’s Last call!

                                                            (THE END)