It Begins at the End – (part one)

His head felt soggy. If he’d been a drinking man, it would’ve been easy to explain the sogginess. He blinked as consciousness began to penetrate the haze of saturation that made his head heavy. When he tried opening his eyes, the light of the day blinded him for an instance as his eyes adjusted to the brilliance. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs of unconsciousness left. It didn’t help much. He pressed his lids shut, feeling his eyes well up with tears from the pressure. As he raised his hands to wipe the tears, he tried to piece together the fragments of his last memories before this present moment.

Nothing clicked

With his eyes’ adjustments done, he took a glance of his surroundings. Momentarily taken aback, he quickly checked himself lest he startle other passengers. He was on a bus. He blinked hard. Bus? Headed to? His forehead creased as more questions tumbled, one on the other. He forced himself to think, using every will power he could summon. How did he get on a bus, who were those passengers on the bus with him and where was the terminal?

Still, nothing.

How deeply had he slept? Did he pass out so strongly as to momentarily lose his memory? Was the loss of memory permanent? He felt himself begin to panic. The uptick of his heartbeat gave him cause for concern as he tried to bring his emotions under control. He could not afford to lose that now together with his memory.

The bus picked up speed, having gained the fast lane at a T-junction. He did not notice the change in speed. Something kept evading his grasp at the back of his mind. What was it, he thought. He surreptitiously glanced around him. Some passengers were asleep, a few were eating one thing or the other while some, like the one next to him by the window, had their earphones plugged into their ears and were not too conscious of his inspection. He adjusted himself on his seat and tried to recall how he got into this bus. What led to this trip? Where was he headed? Did he have any luggage? He felt his pockets. There was only a hanky in one and a pen in the other. If he thought that was going to help jog his memory, he was utterly mistaken. Another dead end.

He resolved he wasn’t going to keep up with the suspense any longer. It wasn’t doing his heart any favours. Rather ask than die in this ignorance. He proceeded to tap the arm of the young girl by his side. She didn’t hide her irritation at being so disturbed. She reluctantly unplugged her ears and raised an eyebrow with an air of impatience. When he asked her where the bus was headed, she frowned, hissed, plugged back her ears and switched back to her own world. He shrugged. He’d have expressed similar sentiments (maybe not as extreme) if he’d been so questioned. Why would someone on a bus not know his destination? That didn’t get him any further than he was previously. And that nagging elusive thought remained elusive – flirting with his mind’s power to recall. Or the absence thereof.

Seeing as they were approaching a lively and bustling junction, he depressed the button that indicated to the driver that a passenger intended to alight. He’d take his chances with those more likely to give answers to his dilemma. If he had any luggage, it was going to be lost because having no recollection of what came before his being on the bus, it was better to lose luggage than be taken for a thief. That latter circumstance had no place for lost memories. Consequently, at the bus stop that followed, he alighted empty-handed. Alone.

He didn’t allow the fact that he didn’t recognise the area nor have cash on him cause him to worry any. Years of experience taught him to also avoid acting the part of a stranger in any public place. He was going to find one of the few characters he always sought for answers in a tight spot as his. Again, another nugget of wisdom drawn from experience. He felt some confidence return as the realisation of these two experiential instances proved he’d not lost it completely. He made another attempt to come to terms with the thought that was eluding his mental focus but failed again. What was it? Did it hold any clue to his memory-loss? Why did it seem so close yet easily elusive? He stopped walking to allow all attention to focus on grasping the spritely phantom of a thought and the closer he came to gaining a hold on it, the less fortunate he was. He sighed and opened his eyes. Just before him was a newspaper vendor of advanced age – just exactly the kind of character he could get the answers he sought from.

Pleasantries exchanged, one of the myriad of questions assailing his mind was on the tip of his tongue when his eyes registered that he couldn’t recognise any of the titles on display. There was no Punch, Guardian, Vanguard, Tribune, The Nation, Daily Independent nor The Sun. What were these? The Gazette? Enquirer? Times? Today’s News? Where did these titles come from? No, where was he? His contorted face must have given away his interior turmoil because the old man appeared worried for him. He immediately put the question to the old man, enquiring as to where on earth he was. The old man easily calmed down, made some space on his bench, and motioned on him to take a seat.

When the old man answered his last question sometime after, the effect on him was devastating. Even if his questions were answered, it left him in a worse state of quandary than before. He was told that he was presently in the Right Region. This region was one of the four regions of this country – the others being the Left Region, Uppermost Region and Lowpost Region. Obviously, this novel nomenclature led him to ask if this was not Nigeria. And that was where the real story kicked in. It chilled his blood. Literally.

...to be continued.