By the time Mfon joined the book club, they had already stopped reading books.
She stood outside the cafe entrance on a humid Thursday evening, holding a copy of Purple Hibiscus with a small yellow paper peeking out from the middle. Her hands were sweaty, not just from the heat but because she had been nervous all day. She had practiced what she was going to say, picked out a favorite quote from the book, and even spent part of the night googling how to sound smart in a book club.
The only issue was, the book club was no longer about books.
Inside, four women sat around a table with drinks they barely touched, and one guy was showing something funny on his phone. They were laughing loud enough that people in the next booth turned to look. Mfon walked in slowly, unsure of what to expect, her book clutched close to her chest.
“Oh, new member?” said one of the ladies, wearing a shiny brown jacket.
“I thought this was the Uyo Readers Circle,” Mfon said with a small smile.
“It is, well it used to be,” the guy with the phone replied. “Now we mostly talk about stuff trending online. Books were nice but we kind of moved on.”
Mfon gave a tight smile. The kind you wear when you trip over your own foot and pretend it did not happen.
Still, she pulled out a chair and joined them.
She kept coming back every week. Sometimes with a book, sometimes without. They never asked her about what she was reading. Instead, they debated over Nigerian celebrities, ranted about school strikes and shared their thoughts on friendship, politics and even jollof rice. They laughed, roasted each other, shared memes and spent ten minutes arguing about whether iPhones are worth it.
Mfon mostly listened. She laughed a little too. Over time, she noticed they were not shallow like she had first assumed. They just had their own language. They were expressive and fast. They cut each other off with jokes and responded to serious topics with slang and inside references she was still trying to catch up with.
One evening, after a discussion that somehow started with Chimamanda but ended with skit makers, the girl in the shiny jacket leaned toward Mfon.
“You are always writing in that tiny notebook,” she said. “Are you a writer?”
“I guess,” Mfon answered. “I write poems sometimes. And a few stories.”
“Read something for us now,” she said without blinking.
The others leaned forward.
Mfon hesitated, then slowly opened her notebook. Her fingers trembled slightly as she flipped to a page she had written the night before. Her voice was quiet at first, but she read with honesty. The piece was about silence in a noisy world. About feeling invisible even in familiar places. About learning to speak slowly in a room full of fast talkers.
When she finished, nobody said anything for a few seconds. Then someone clapped.
“Wetin be this,” the guy with the phone said, shaking his head. “That was deep.”
“You are talented babe,” the lady in the jacket said. “No jokes. That hit me hard.”
The next week, another person brought a notebook. Then someone else did. Even the guy who never really talked read a story about the time he failed his WAEC and did not tell anyone. They still laughed but the laughter became softer. Some days the table was quiet for long stretches as someone read a paragraph that touched something raw.
Books started showing up again. Not in large piles but one or two tucked under elbows or beside coffee cups. The energy changed. Nobody said they were going back to reading. It just happened.
Mfon did not lead a revolution or give a motivational speech. She just showed up with a little notebook and shared something real.
And that was enough.
She may not have been early. She may not have joined when the club was at its best. But she arrived with something honest. And sometimes, that is what matters most.