The Ticket (A Short Story By Cityofdavid) Season 1

6 years ago

The Ticket (A Short Story By Cityofdavid) Season 1

Lucky, you were confused the first time your short, unemployed legs found itself at the little bet shop across the street, the street which sees you caressing Nnena on moonless nights near an abandoned Dangote truck. The pretty attendant, who had her pretty face buried in a desktop computer, looked up and smiled at you. You smiled back and looked away. You didn't know what to say, what to do. The heavy presence of numberless boys outside the shop irritated you. You didn't want anyone to know that it was your first time at a bet shop.

You had heard several incredible stories about how young boys and old men staked football matches with a token, with 100 naira and won 10 million naira; stories about how 500 naira transmogrified into 18 million naira. You even read in the newspapers the story of a university professor who, employing complex matrix and permutations, predicted a long list of soccer events and won over 20 million naira - a sum huger than a pension earned in 35 years of toil, of speaking big grammars. Still, you felt these stories were fabricated to sell sport betting to greedy people.

However, your perception about sport betting changed when you saw a living testimony, when your "korokoro" eyes witnessed how Folabi, your neighbour's stubborn son, changed the destiny of his family forever. You still remember how the story happened:

One cold evening, while light rains knocked the earth, Baba Folabi, a chain smoker and Danfo driver at Apapa garage, called Folabi to himself and said, "My pickin take this 200 naira; buy me cigar and Schnapps make I sama am for this cold weather kia kia."

"Yes sir," Folabi smiled. He collected the money and walked away hurriedly.

Baba Folabi, resting on his rickety cane chair, waited for hours, all in vein, for his son to return.
But Folabi did not return. Baba Folabi soon lost his patience, grabbed his "koboko" and dash into the dark to look for his son. After several minutes of search, Folabi was found in a bet shop, where he had staked 25 football matches with the whole money. That night, Baba Folabi tied up his fifteen years old son, placed him inside an empty sack of garri, clung it to a ceiling fan and flogged the sack until the whole town overpowered him. Baba Folabi didn't want his son to become a gambler like him. He wanted his son to go to school like you.

On the next morning, the news broke that Folabi had won 7 million naira from the games he staked the previous night. You nearly fainted.
The following week, Baba Folabi bought three "tokunbo" buses and moved his family from the face-me-I-slap-you apartment where he had been your neighbour since you arrived Ajegunle.

"Bros, what games do you want to stake?" The lady at the bet shop asked you.

"Eh!"

"I say which game you want play?"

"Em, em play Barcelona win. Play Manchester win and play Cork City to win for me."

"Just three games?"

"Yes. How much will I win if I play with 500 naira?"

The lady entered the games into her computer system and then looked at you, "Bros, the three games are 8 odds. You will get back times 8 of your money."

"You mean 3000 naira?"

"No. I said times 8. That will be 4,000 naira if you stake 500 naira."

"Okay," you said. You paid and left, your ticket tucked in your back pocket.

Lucky, you won on your very first attempt. You won 4,000 naira. And you made up your mind to win bigger money like Folabi, like the professor, like all the heroes whose winning tales you have heard. Deep down within, you knew that gambling was bad, was unscriptural, but you didn't mind. You have been pushed to the wall, the thorny walls of unemployment. This year made it exactly four years since you graduated with first class honours, becoming the overall best student of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Benin.

You started looking for jobs before several barren women became desperate to have babies. These women have landed miracle babies and you're yet to find a job. Just any job. You have lost several jobs because you didn't have the right connection. You even lost out in the police recruitment because your name was not on the governor's list. Escaping stampede by a stroke of luck at the immigration recruitment, you made up your mind never again to apply for any government job. Your whole life has been in shambles because your country does not have unemployment benefits, does not care about the future of her youths.

You have several wonderful dreams, Lucky, dreams you wish to bring to pass when you one day win a jackpot, say ten million naira. You would travel to Canada for your masters degree, bag a first class again, obtain a scholarship for a Phd, get a job as a research fellow and then return to Nigeria, to marry Nnenna whom you always caress on moonless nights. You would then bulldozer your mother's hut in the village and build for her a twin duplex where you would always spend the holiday when in Nigeria with Nnena and the smart kids God would give you.

And now, and now, six months after your first bet and winning, you're at the verge of winning a jackpot, a whopping fifteen million naira with a 100 naira stake. You are lying down on your little bed, your Techno android phone held in firm clasp. You're browsing Livescore.com and monitoring the last game on your ticket of 32 matches. Your hands are trembling; you felt like your legs are soaked inside a bowl of hot water. Your head is heavier than ever. You're just five minutes away from victory, five minutes from becoming an overnight millionaire. You're waiting for the fulltime whistle. Your stake and last game is under 2.5, meaning there will be less than 3 goals in the match between Eyimba and Kano Pillars. And it is now 89 minutes and the scoreline is 2 - 0 in favour of Eyimba, the home team.

You hold your breadth and close your eyes. The few minutes to the full-time will be the most important moment of your life. You're just few minutes away from becoming a millionaire and fulfilling all your dreams in a country which kills dreams. You imagine yourself in a Canadian university, attending a lecture with friendly white faces dotting the walkaway. You imagine yourself in an aeroplane flying over several continents of the world. And then your phone vibrates. You open your eyes and briskly drive them towards the scoreline. Ah, Eyimba has scored a 90th minute goal to seal a 3 - 0 victory. Your heart stops momentarily and then coughs back to life.

You reach for the unfortunate ticket and chew it, your dimming eyes falling on the bottle of "Otapiapia" near your bed. You grab it and cannot decide which is better: to be dead and rotten and forgotten in the grave or to be alive and remembered as an hopeless unemployed graduate who may never become the leader of tomorrow.