TRINITY (SEVEN)

The woman rained insults on the man and soon people gathered to watch. Apparently the man was the little girl’s father. She needed money to eat but he had refused so she walked from ‘Attukpai’ which was also within the Jamestown area to the Salaha market to take money from him.

 Her clothes were not clean and her hair was unkempt. She saw Aku eating the orange and looking at her parents fight over her. She ignored her at first but when she turned and looked at her direction, their eyes met. Then Aku looked away.

When she turned again Adoley stood in front of her. She shook out of fear and dropped the orange but Adoley caught it in time before it could fall. She didn’t say anything to her but started to eat the rest just then she heard her mother call out her name so turned and left eating hungrily into Aku’s orange.

 She watched on as Adoley walked away to take the money her mother pulled out from her father’s pocket. She went indoors as she heard her brother wailing.

Aku spent the next weekend in her grandmother’s house. She was up as early as 5:00am.The sun was barely up and the room was still dark. Aku stepped out and headed for the bathroom. She didn’t have to do anything since her grandmother got her cousins to do all the work before she got up. She sat on a stool in the compound house.

 Some of her cousins played ’Oware ’ but she didn’t want to go near them because she was the youngest and they always picked on her. She loved to read but they couldn’t afford the books that were sold. 

Her school which was around the ‘’Sempe We’ was a government school and they had been provided text books only that they were not allowed to take the books home. Her eyes caught a paper that was being blown away by the wind so she hurriedly went after it. At that moment she saw Adoley again.

 She was yelling at another girl who looked really frightened. The girl began to cry. She walked towards them. She didn’t know what she would say when she got close but that didn’t stop her. When she got there, her heart began to beat fast but she went ahead and stood in between them. 

She was only nine years and was quite small. She took in a deep breath and asked Adoley what the girl had done to her. Adoley sensed her fear and dragged her by her shirt closer. She began to shake and swallowed her saliva. Aku stammered and said

"What did she do to you….let her go now "Aku repeated trying to force back the tears.

 The girl moved back a few steps and stared at the both of them. She was surprised that somebody came to her aid. She had been in the area for seven months and had not made any friends yet. She wanted to run away but didn't want to leave the mysterious girl that came to help her out. 

Adoley was still holding onto Aku’s shirt but she also made no attempt to pull away.

Adoley was furious but there was something that she liked about the little girl. Like them, she also had no real friends because everyone knew her to be violent so feared her. She was like the local champion among the kids and mostly kept to herself.

 Her parents always quarreled so her mother moved away, leaving her with her alcoholic father. She learnt everything the hard way though she was only eleven. She picked on other kids and moved with the area boys. Adoley took whatever she wanted and sometimes fought to have it.

Aku couldn’t hold on to the tears anymore. She knew that she was in trouble.

 The tears came rolling down on her cheeks. She wiped them away with her hand and sobbed. Adoley let go of her and asked the other girl to pay her back the money by noon tomorrow and walked away briskly. Aku turned to look at the girl that she had helped. She had not seen her before so turned to leave.

 The girl runned after her and held her by the shoulders. She stopped and turned to look at her again but said nothing. The girl smiled and extended her hand out to her. Aku looked at the extended hand and looked away. The girl put the hand down but went on to introduce herself.

‘My name is Joana Obeng but my parents call me Akosua at home….I prefer to be called Adjeley’ Aku laughed when she heard her talk about wanting to be called by that name even though she was not from their tribe so she asked

‘Why would you want to be called that when you know that you are an Ashanti and not a Ga?’