PROJECT PEN [SEASON III]

JUDGES REVIEW (BATCH THREE)

Hi Cribbers, it's the third batch of the Judges Review and I know we're excited 🌝.

In this stage we have the following contestants:

010 SETH
011 THE SCRIBE
013 BOWL OF FIRE
014 LILY BIRD

LET'S BEGIN!

010 SETH

“If you know you cannot run fast, come to this side.” Adinne the leader of our group says and only I step out.

We are all underneath the mango tree  where we have our weekly meeting, Adinne is sitting on a low branch while we stand around her.

“This girl, upon you have long legs you cannot run.” Charly, the fattest girl in the whole street, says and everyone laughs.

Their laughter burns my ear and I bite my tongue to stop myself from crying, Charly always has something bad to say about me, one day I'll feed that girl sand.

“See this fatty bum bum talking, Enem shift back before she swallows you.” Adinne says and everyone laughs even more.

This is why I like Adinne. She always has a more insultive thing to say to someone who insults another person. I smile at her.

We are 6 girls in total: Achi and Arum, the two short ugly twins, are from the street next to ours, but they come to our street to play because we all go to the same school.

Uche, the very quiet one that always smells like ogiri isi.

Charly, the fatty bum bum whose mummy owns the mama-put down the street and Adinne whose father is a military soldier or is it a policeman, I don't know, the main thing is that everybody fears them.

“Ofele oya come out here and say what happened to you.” Adinne commands and Ofele, uche’s 6-year old sister who has been standing here along steps in between us.

She smells worse than Uche so I have to move back a little, so I can breathe.

“Aboy pushed me down.” She says and bursts out crying. The twins make a sound, the type people make when they are surprised.

“That stupid boy!” Achi, the older of the twins, says, twisting her face to be more ugly than it usually is.

“Nonsense.”Arum says, repeating the only English word she knows.

“It's because he entered jss1, he's now feeling like a big boy.” Charly says, and Adinne tells all of them to keep quiet.

“Is that all?” Adinne asks Ofele.

“No. Chugo and Emmanuel also hit me ball on my head and told me that I'm smelling.” she says and starts crying again.

“Maybe that's not what happened, you know this girl likes lying.” Uche says, talking for the first time.

“Ewu! abi it's because you like Aboy that's why you’re saying this thing” Achi shouts, pouring small spit on Uche’s face.

“Nonsense.” Arum agrees.

Ofele is still crying and Charly is telling her sorry, Uche calls the twins monkeys, and they start coming close to beat her. I try to separate them, but they push me aside, and I land on Charly who threatens to beat me.

Soon we are all shouting and passersby are looking at us.

Adinne hops down from the branch she's sitting on, and we all pause, even Charly who has fought two boys at once is no match for Adinne. Just last week, she made Obiajulu walk home naked because he kicked his ball inside the sand rice we were cooking.

Adinne can do things that people our age can't even think of doing.

She doesn't shout at us like she normally does when we start fighting each other, she just pulls Ofele to her side and cleans her face, telling her sorry. She looks up at Uche.

"Are you for us or against us?” She asks her, and we all turn waiting for her reply.

“I'm for you people.” she replies.

“Good.” She turns to Charly. “Do you still have that pepper-water balloon we made on Wednesday?” she asks and Charly nods. “Bring them.”

“Achi, do you know where the boys are playing ball today?”

“Yes, at Jackie's house.” Achi answers.

“Ok.” She's facing all of us, “Ofele, go home, the rest of you should also go home, wear what will allow you to run very fast and come back.”

“Yes boss!” We say together and she looks at me.

“Enem, you’re going to learn how to run today.”

*********************************

Within a few minutes we all assemble back, wearing leggings and rubber slippers, Charly is carrying a bucket filled with balloons that have pepper water inside them.

We are going to show them pepper.

Jackie’s house is the biggest house in the street. My mother said Adinne’s mother said his father used to do 419 but I haven't told anybody because I'm not sure.

As we arrive at the gate of his house, we can hear them shouting goal from inside. I wait for Adinne to suggest how we will sneak in, but instead she starts knocking on the gate, we all look at one another confused.

“Are we not going to follow from the hole in the wall at the back of the house?” I say,
speaking for everyone.

“No." she continues knocking “Only those that want to do evil things sneak in from behind.” She replies with a smile on her face, the type she has when she's about to do something crazy.

“Who be that!” The gate man yells opening the gate, looking angry. His anger quickly goes away when he sees Adinne.

“We brought something for the boys.” she says and starts walking in before he allows her to, he doesn't say anything. As I said before, everyone is afraid of them.

The boys are all playing ball in the middle of the compound, and they stop playing as soon as they see us, we stop at the side but Adinne keeps going forward until she grabs their ball.

“Look at these children, o.” Emmanuel says and the boys laugh, “Come on, give us our ball!” He shouts and starts walking towards Adinne. For a second, I get scared, but Adinne stands her ground.