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| ...I became afraid. No! Terrified to bath in the bathroom even when it was vacant, even in his absence I feared him... |
Chapter One
Dear dairy, the nightmares began when I woke up one morning. I was fifteen
years old at the time; I headed for the compound’s public toilet as was my
routine most mornings. Immediately I opened the toilet door I noticed the floor
was wet and I could smell urine, which signified am not the first to visit, the
single toilet was shared among at least twenty three neighbours of all age
brackets, it’s a miracle the ceramic toilet bowl retained some level of
whiteness. I had always loved the toilet floor dry. It somehow aids me in doing
some level of thinking, although I always go into the toilet with my own
plastic mobile potty.
The toilet was the only place I am ever alone apart from my mind,
it is where I am isolated from the world around me, it’s where I could be
anyone, travel where I wished, live out my comic books and indulge my
imaginations to explore other worlds. In a small compound of eight rooms assigned
to eight families each doors staring at your neighbours’. The compound
synonymous to a warehouse that accommodates a mass production of little
children, young adults and teenagers, it is laughable to even toy with the idea
of desiring to be alone.
I squat over the plastic potty to do the business of the day,
suspending my buttocks mid-air above it and clutching my two feet with my two
hands for balance. I stared on the wet concrete floor, I shifted
my gaze to the toilet walls splashed with water by someone who obviously was
tired of being on queue to use the bathroom and had converted the toilet to a temporal
bathroom. I tilted my head upward to the rusty roofing sheet above me; it was full
of unnatural eyes through which sun rays infiltrated the toilet. Finally I cast
my eyes at my body. I picked a picture so unfamiliar it startled me the first.
For the first time, I could see strands of hairs.
Not that there was anything special or amusing seeing hairs
piercing through my skin except where it was now located. It was around my male
genital. How did it get there? How long it went unnoticed? I could not tell.
I peered down again with some level of seriousness, then I smiled-
maybe because it means I would be
treated as an adult soon or maybe seeing it there has its own kind of feeling. I
was proud. Finally, my hair growing hormones had woken up from slumber to
accord me some royal honour of maturity.
I paused my smile and abscond my thoughts. It looked like neatly
mowed grassland down there, I thought to myself. The hairs were barely peeping
over my skin.
It was not like I was going to tell anyone about it, or
deliberately walk around nude to exercise some bragging rights but it was an
identity, an initiation into the league of adults. I pulled at the
strands of hair with mixed reactions of slight pain and tickle.
That morning ushered me into a train all teenagers had to board, a
train that transport not just your body but gives your soul a free ride of new feelings
and cravings as you are being driven into adulthood.
Cravings you dare not ask your parent how to satisfy and feelings
you are too ashamed to tell anyone you feel. Dear dairy, I take you through my
journey. How the hunger for sex became more essential for a fifteen year old
male than his three square meals.
I kept this secret to myself pretty much but with fascination.
Most afternoons I would visit the toilet or bathroom depending on their vacancy.
There was no “Gold Rush” for the toilet and bathroom in the afternoons so I would
go there and take the time to stare at my pubic hairs and pray it becomes bushy
soon. It was a centre of attraction for me. Every twenty minutes or so am back
there just to see if my hormones have not played a cruel trick on me by
withdrawing my pubic hairs, like I could go bald down there overnight. Those
were the exciting moments of teen I could remember and actually smile about.
At fifteen I was still bathing in open space at the back of our
ever busy compound. Yes, till I was close to seventeen. Why? I had a phobia
which I got acquainted with when my dad scolded me for using the bathroom one
morning; I was fourteen at the time.
I made a dash for the bathroom before someone much older than me. I
was next in line to make use of the bathroom but loving dairy, in the world I
lived back then, the older person gets all the privileges ahead of those
younger, so try not to wrap your mind around it, it doesn’t bother me anymore.
But on that morning I was desperate. I was almost running late for school where
the teachers’ canes await my buttocks.
My dad called me back out of the bathroom, “What are you searching
for in the bathroom?” With the bucket of water in my hands I replied, “To take
my bath.” “Are you unaware that older people are waiting to use the bathroom?”
“I am sir, but I allowed two elderly people use the bathroom ahead
of me, now I am almost late for…” “Shut up! Are you the type of person to have
his bath in the bathroom? What are you trying to hide?” He pointed in between
my legs.
“Henceforth take your bath in the open space where dishes are
washed, I don’t want to ever see you use the bathroom again. Is that clear?”
With all sense of my dignity striped away and yet, a deep feeling of reverence
for my dad, and tear filled eyes I said, “Yes sir!”
Tears filled with puzzling thoughts that my own daddy did not
realise I was growing up. I carried the bucket of water to the open space of
the backyard and had my bath. Sighs… That was the beginning of the other
beginnings.
Since my dad’s rebuke, I became afraid. No! Terrified to bath in
the bathroom even when it was vacant, even in his absence I feared him. Dear
dairy, where I come from fear is synonymous to respect.
I bathed amidst children aged six, seven and below. I bathed with
everyone around the busy backyard peering at my body, I felt their eyes tickle
every part of me and in the depth of my soul I could hear the whispers of their
dark fantasies.
Sometimes some of the loud married women stare at my private part;
they take a long look at it to let me know it is intentional. At times they teased
me about the size of my male organ. One of them in particular took to this
habit, with keen interest she watched me bathe anytime I had an erection.
The day she noticed I had pubic hairs, the twenty something
neighbours got to know, she was loud about it, pointing at my private part, she
must have stared really hard to notice the just growing hairs from the distance
she stood. I had to kneel in between the plastic bucket of water. I was so
ashamed and couldn’t utter a word.
However, I never apportioned her any blame. My dad thrashed my self-worth
why should she save it, my dad offered my body for public exhibition, the women
and children who stared were audience honouring his invitation.
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