Orúkọ rere sàn ju wúrà àti fàdákà lọ.

A good name is better than gold and silver

By the time he had walked into the open market, the sun had already gone down. He wanted to continue his search but he knew he needed a place to sleep. He heard his stomach softly grumble but did his best to ignore it. As he walked past the woman who was selling fruits as she packed in her stall for the day and he waved at her, she caught his eye and beckoned him to come.

Odion looked to his left and right before he crossed the street to her. As he reached her, he bent down to grab one of the wooden chairs she was packing.

She said something in Yoruba and Odion caught only a few words. He gestured that he couldn't understand and she smiled as she switched languages and spoke in English.

"My son," she said in a kind voice, "thank you very much for your help. But why are you out this late? Do you have a place to stay?"

"Well, no, not really. But ma, you don't have to worry, I'll find—"

"Don't worry, my child. You helped me and I will help you. After all, if my children were still here, I'd want someone to do the same for them. Pick up that bench and come with me to where I live, you can stay for the night."

Odion wanted to protest but what choice did he have? He knew he needed food and shelter and this surely beat having to sleep under a bridge or tree where he could get robbed or even worse. So he picked it up and followed her.

Along the way, he learned a lot about the woman or 'Mama,' as she told him to call her. She was a single mother with two children who were now in the University of Lagos. They should've finished by now but with the continuous strikes that riddled the school, it was almost a miracle to finish at the required course time. Her fruit selling business was how she was paying them through school. She also had to make money through other means so she washed clothes too for a living. Odion was scarce about the details of his life, though. To her, he was just an orphan travelling through Lagos, looking for something worthwhile to do.

By the time they reached her shack near the seaside, his arms were already burning from exhaustion. She greeted a few of her neighbours before leading him inside. It wasn't much to look at, there was a bed at the corner of the room and some wooden stools in the middle with a misshapen circular table, all lit by a flickering lightbulb on the ceiling. There was also a wooden clock hung on the wall and beneath it was a torn paper calendar. He smelt a nice odour from somewhere inside and his stomach grumbled in response. He didn't even know how hungry he was.

Mama looked at him and smiled, 'don't worry ehn, there's some rice I made earlier in the pot and I think there's still some meat. I'll get some for you, you must be hungry."

Odion wanted to protest but his mouth seemed to have been silence by his stomach, so he just nodded in agreement as he sat down on one of the stools. He looked around and realised that even though there wasn't much, there was still everything. He felt it as he sat, it may not have been much of a house but it was surely a home. There was a small table by his side and on it was a picture of a younger woman holding a baby swathed in clothes and she held a young child with her other hand. The woman's face beamed and she looked so happy, it almost made Odion uncomfortable looking at the picture. Like he was intruding on something private.

Her prescence was heralded by the amazing aroma of freshly prepared Jollof rice. He dropped the picture back where he saw it as she came with two plates of food. But the image still lingered on his mind. Nowadays, happiness had become something of a distant illusion but an unwelcome thought crept into his mind: was it really that distant? Maybe after all this, he could have a happy life and find some solace in all the things that happened. He knew it was too good to be true and yet he entertained the thought, let it take shape in his mind as he shut it in the dark recesses in his mind. He remembered how in an English class a long time ago, his teacher had introduced the saying to them, 'if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.' At first, like everyone else, he was dumbfounded but now he found it funny how some things never made sense until they happened to you.

"I know you must be hungry, so eat up," she said in a kind voice as she sat down on one of the stools, handing Odion a plate. He looked at her and realised that she was probably in her early fifties but work and toil had made her look much older than her age.

"So," she said, breaking the silence. "What is a young man like you doing on the streets, you looked like you were searching for something, did you find it?"

Odion shuffled uneasily on his seat, he wasn't used to people taking an interest in him. His last years on the street had taught him to be secretive. But this woman had offered him her home, what harm could an old woman do to him after all?

"Well, yes and no. I found it but it only led to more questions." He replied.

"Come," she said, placing her spoon back in her plate as she set it down. "Where are you from, sef? Because the way you speak ehn, you sound like an 'ajebutter'"

This was a term Odion wasn't new to. He had been called it too many times to count. It was a term that denoted a Nigerian who didn't really act 'Nigerian.' To Odion, though, it always felt like he was being accused of some kind of betrayal, being able to speak proper English and eat in a certain way. He smiled and brushed the comment aside like he always did. What else could he do?

"Do you..." Odion said, as he gestured around him.

She gave an elderly smile as she said, "live alone? Yes, I do. Like I told you, my children have all gone to school. They come back for holidays, sha."

She saw Odion's plate was empty and she stood up to clear it, ignoring his protests that he could do it himself. "My roof, my rules," she said as she went to the back through the door.

She came back with a thin blanket and a wrapper. "you can sleep on the bed, I'll use these and sleep on the floor." To this, Odion made sure that her wishes weren't granted. It'd be a cold day in hell before he allowed himself to inconvenience someone who was giving him help. After some arguing, she finally agreed to let Odion sleep on the floor. He didn't have a watch but he assumed that it was already midnight by the darkness outside. He lay down on the floor and his joints ached, had it really just been only a day?

As the old woman spread herself on the bed, she fell fast asleep. Odion's heart melted, she worked so hard. He hoped her children appreciated her as much as he was beginning to. He was looking at the ceiling, thinking of life and the journey ahead. How was e going to do this? He didn't even feel different. He was still the sixteen-year-old druggie that used to hang out under bridges with gangs. Who was he to save Nigeria or even the world?

These thoughts paraded around his head to the point where he even doubted he was going to sleep. But sleep, like death always came in the end. He allowed himself to be whisked off in the darkness as he got the best sleep he had had in a long, long time.