Read & Vote: Regurgitation By Uwakwe Ngozi Eke

Etisalat Nigeria has been running a  flash fiction competition where writers are expected to engage the online reading community through 300 word stories. Do you love writing? maybe it's time to take it a step further by letting the world read you. Mail: press@etisalatprize.com to know when the next competition will commence.

Featuring today is Regurgitation By Uwakwe Ngozi Eke:

"I feel a close affinity to Zimuzor as her chest, against mine, heaves. We had lived out similar life-roles; repulsive, from childhood through adolescence, till now. I understand the tears that flow from her when her stories slows. It is convenient for me to wrap her in my arms and just listen because I wear her shoes. I wonder for how long she has fought herself until she breaks the

 silence, today. Those conflicting emotions, to speak or not to speak, I had gone through too until I choose not to speak believing that one day, I would die then I and all my steaming hurt would be buried in a grave called archive.

Until Zimuzor. 31st August, 2012.

Lagos hadn’t seen rain in a couple of weeks until today. Suddenly, black clouds gather like a malign blanket and everybody scrambles, scampering for shelter. It does not drizzle first; heavy rain drops just fall, grateful for their release from claustrophobia.

She is not mad, I can tell, maybe lost. Time seems to have stopped somewhere in her world. She let the rains drench her. Deafening thunder, sparks of lightening, more rains. She does not notice.

I abandon my cocoon. “Sister, sister!” The rains slap hard against my face.

“Sister,” She stops. “Is everything alright?”

“My father has had sex with me till I ran away.” The rains wash off tears before they reach her cheeks. Her eyes, red, betray a bleeding heart. “I just want to die.” She sniffs.

Then, it returns to me, like regurgitation – the horrors within the dark walls, the thrusts, the grunts, the scum, the threats…the sworn silence. I cuddle her as she narrates monologues of the life I have lived, closing vacuums where she chokes and when the rains sieve some words away".

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