#writing
The flesh above his right eye was swollen and his upper lip was painted red with blood where David had punched him.
He touched the wound and winced in pain, he suddenly remembered that the heavy punch which had busted up his lip was actually aimed at his eye.
His mum would yell at him for coming home late and with all those bruises, he knew that. But now the boys on the play field would never pick on him again.
The fifty naira was the price of honor, of a boy who kept his word.
"I bet marvelous can't go into the bush and pick the calinor flower... He's a scared baby..."
Laughter
"My dad said these bushes are crawling with ghosts! Are you scared marvelous? Hahaha... They will eat your skin while you're alive!"
The scare tactics of children. No one had ever gone into those bushes, no one but Toke the idiot, he came back from picking the ball which had been kicked high and away over the "Do not Trespass" line. And he was crying, snot running down his nose, babbling about monsters and ghosts. That was three years ago. The legend stuck.
"Are you gonna go marvelous? What? Too scared?"
Laughter.
"I bet my ten naira! You baby! The calinor flower is down by the highest tree!"
Me too! My ten naira!...me too... Me too... Me too.
Marvelous was suddenly aware that they had made a circle around him, howling from all directions. Kolade Phil, the twins: peter and Paul kema, David Okoro with his handsome face and unnatural calmness that hid his true character, and three others. David was smiling, he had collected the bet from all the others and it amounted to fifty naira.
"Are you scared?" David Okoro asked, fiddling the notes in his hand.
That question from David was all it took. And suddenly marvelous eyes were filled with
determination. He was going to make David eat his words, after today they would never stop him from playing with them again.
Then there was that still voice. The calm of reason or was it an insurmountable fear camouflaged as reason. Don't go, the voice said. Don't say what you can't do, that was his father's voice this time.
Dressed in his black Batman T-shirt and whitewashed jean shorts, with his whole body exhuding confidence, he seemed ready to take on the greatest task he had ever faced. He accepted