Sapa made me accept the stupid offer from JAPA – Justice and Protection for All, an NGO. For a paltry sum of 40,000 naira per month,my duties were endless; I was to be a tutor, counsellor, supervisor, assistant caregiver, and social media manager. There were half-hearted promises from the beautiful CEO and Founder of JAPA about routine transport and feeding allowance and that I should not hesitate to ask if I had any pressing financial needs. I smiled weakly and said, “Yes ma.”

You see, I was tired of the whole interview process. It was a three-stage interview for a role that I couldn’t describe in one word. A role that was falsely advertised as Communications Lead, not knowing I would be leading and overlooking series of responsibilities instead. On the day of my interview, the founder asked if I wasn’t butty and could stay in the shelter provided for the survivors of SGBV. I nodded yes. Is it not just to stay in a place? Free accommodation too?

I signed my employment letter on the spot, the paper still warm from the processing machine. She shook my hands. “Welcome to the JAPA family.”

Work resumed for me the next day at the shelter. I was to first engage the survivors in a Values & Ethics class where I gave a motivational talk on Determination. Many of the survivors were younger than 20. I shuddered, wondering which of them had been victims of assault. Trafficking? They all stared at me with glassy eyes. When I stopped speaking English and spoke in pidgin, they laughed at my futile attempts to sound like a Niger Deltan but that really loosened them up.

“Who is Pat?” I asked as I stepped out of the office allocated to me in the shelter. The chief caregiver, who was lounging under the mango tree in the compound, scoffed before laughing bitterly.

“Pat nah the one wey get marine spirit problem nah.”

“I don’t think I know her. They all introduced themselves to me, but I can’t recollect anybody mentioning they were Pat.”

“Pat! Patricia!! Paaaat!!! You no go come here now wey dem dey find you? Craze pikin,” Mummy Orobosa spat into the ground as she said this.

A chubby girl rolled out of the building. She stood a while, staring at us like we were two aliens that had just descended from space and wondering whether she trusted us enough to approach.

“You see wetin I talk? Nah me call am and she dey there still dey look us in wonder. Pat! If I stand for this place con meet you there ehn? I go use this broom wey I hol’ wallop your head till the craze wey dey there fall like cobwebs for ground.” Mummy Orobosa’s veins shot out from her neck, and the corners of her lips foamed with a whitish pool of liquid.

Pat walked toward us and stood a little bit away. Far enough so she could bolt in case Mummy Orobosa decided to make her threats real, but still close enough to show she acknowledged us.

“Hello Pat, how una dey?” I said and smiled, wishing she would light up the way the other women did when I spoke pidgin.

“Fine ma,” she said as she stared into my eyes.

“Okay, I don’t know if you are free now and you and I can have a conversation in my office?”

“Yes ma, we can, but I want to finish my food first then I will come after.”

“Oh, that’s okay. I will be waiting.”

Mummy Orobosa interrupted, “Which food you dey chop wey you no fit follow person wey wan follow you talk? Marine spirit no dey respect elder at all!” she spat again as she said this.

I reassured Mummy Orobosa that I was fine with Pat taking her time, made small talk with her, and left when it seemed appropriate enough.

It had only been a week at the shelter, but I had been roughly inducted into how life worked there. Mummy Orobosa and her gang of caregivers had a lot to say about who I should be firm with and who I should be soft with. “No too soft sha because these people nah craze people dem still be.”

They told me about all the women in the shelter. They said Efe left her husband to run here because of ordinary small beating. They said Fadia, whom they nicknamed Two-Left Legs, was a prostitute who became an addict after one of her customers killed her child. They said Eno was a runaway who was found at the park and had refused to say anything about the family she left behind. They spoke nonchalantly about the traumas of the women in the shelter with complete disregard for their well-being or whether they could be overheard. The more traumatizing the details of a survivor’s life, the sweeter it was for gisting. They yelled at the women and the girls. They cursed at them.

Nah me dey do you?! Nah me talk seh make five men gang rape you for creek?!

Useless ashewo girl. Nah me keeh your husband?

For this one wey una do ehn? Una no go see meat chop tonight!

They abused and piled on the trauma these women were already suffering. Due to what they called my English-English nature, I was able to bring momentary sanity. No curse words. No yelling. No bullying. No gossiping.

I tried my best to maintain the poise of authority, and they had no choice but to comply. They knew I was Madam Annabelle’s right hand, and I was speaking supri-supri English. In all honesty, I knew nothing. I didn’t know what I was doing and had to keep consulting Google for help. I tried my best to follow the day-to-day activity list on what I was to do, but I got lost for words and actions when I encountered unimaginable horrors from the survivors’ case files.

This was what drew me to Pat. Pat was accused of being a witch and was abandoned by the roadside. She was found wandering and brought to the NGO by some good Samaritans. Pat was described as a recluse and prone to violent fits of anger. At just nine, Pat was described as possessing cognitive and critical thinking skills far beyond her years. In fact, Pat was the reason there was a mini library in the shelter…

She finally knocked on my office door while I was engrossed in a John Grisham novel.

“Hello, Pat.” I smiled at her again. My cheeks hurt. I had smiled too much and too hard this past week. I smiled when I was confused. I smiled when I was lost for words. I smiled after one of the survivors randomly waylaid me in the corridors and spoke about her dead sister, who still appeared to her in her dreams. I almost smiled while I was engaged in a session with Tejiri—nothing was funny about being continuously tortured by her stepmother while her father kept mute. My soul was heavy, but I smiled through it all.

“Hello, ma.” Pat stared straight into my eyes. One of the pointers I was to look out for was eye contact. Pat maintained a steady stare.

“How are you?”

“I am not fine.”

“Would you like to share why you are not fine?” I prodded. She hesitated, then took deep breaths before she began.

“I am afraid of Madam Annabelle.”

“Oh, Pat, don’t worry about her. She won’t be mad at you, I promise. I won’t let Mummy Orobosa report you to her.”

She shook her head, and I stopped talking.

“Aunty Hope, Madam Annabelle will do wicked and bad things to me when she comes back.”

Pat’s voice began to shake as she said this.

“Pat, what is it? Talk to me.”

“The other Aunty that comes here used to tell me to get out of her front with my mumu talk.”

I was confused at the direction of the conversation, but the previously composed Pat began to look visibly flustered. I took in her smooth chocolate skin and her cheeks that still retained their chubbiness despite the crass meals they had been getting fed at the shelter. Pat had doe eyes that were now misty with tears.

“Oh, Pat, why are you crying?”

I held her to myself as she quivered and began to sob.

When she was spent, she wiped her face on her gown. There was no tissue to offer her. The women resorted to using tissues because the sanitary pads had finished, and now they had exhausted the tissues too. The request for supplies still hadn’t been processed. They said they had requested them several weeks before I arrived.

Pat began narrating her story. She said Madam Annabelle used to come around to her mother’s shed to buy roasted plantain, and then she saw her sister that day and said there was an opportunity in Croatia for young girls to train in modelling and fashion design. Her mother agreed since she had ten children to feed. Pat, seeing that her sister would be leaving, clung to her and began to scream. She said refusing to let go forced Madam Annabelle to agree to allow her to follow them.

Pat said they arrived at Madam Annabelle’s house, where she was given snacks and juice. She dozed off and woke up to find her sister missing. She said Madam Annabelle told one of the workers to drive her down to the NGO and narrate that she had been found wandering the streets and had been rescued. Thereafter, she was brought to the shelter, and she had been here ever since.

“How long ago was this?” I asked.

“I was seven years old when she came, so that was two years ago.”

“Okay. Have you been going to school?”

“No, ma. The former aunty before you taught us math, English, and social studies. We do dictations sometimes too”

My heart ached. Part of JAPA’s ongoing objectives was putting out-of-school girls in the shelter into school. The education was also free since it was in partnership with the Ministry of Women Affairs.

It started making sense, whenever Madam Annabelle came to announce that they were transferring some of the survivors to another facility to address their core needs which are either mental rehabilitation or physical therapy. That was always the end.

Madam Annabelle would throw galas and fundraisers that never trickled down to the girls she was raising hundreds of millions for. At the past gala, a video of her dancing for joy after the state governor’s wife announced a fat donation of 50 million naira went viral.

BELOVED NGO FOUNDER DANCES WITH GLEE AT FUNDRAISER

JAPA, A HOST OF OTHER NGOs RECEIVE GRANTS FROM AMERICAN CHARITY ORGANIZATION

It was hard to reconcile Madam Annabelle with the horrors gnawing at my chest. I walked around the shelter woodenly. Snippets of conversations from the women in the yard filtered across.

I started randomly bringing Pat up in conversations during meetings anytime there was a discussion about adoption. There were times the ministry pushed for the younger girls and teenage girls to be rehabilitated into society by providing them with a warm home and ensuring frequent inspections were made.

Pat impressed me with her mastery of vocabulary. ‘’I read the newspapers my mother use to wrap the bolé.’’

Pat often sits by herself in the dormitory with one of my novels. Her current read was the third she had borrowed that week; she seemed to consume books as ravenously as termites consume wood. I also routinely bring her my sister’s old clothes whenever I went home for the weekend.

Pat was a joy!

One such weekend, I went home, and on my way back, Madam Annabelle’s SUV was exiting the shelter. I walked briskly towards Madam Annabelle’s car, wondering why she had shown up unannounced.

As the windows rolled down, I saw Madam Annabelle’s beautiful face smiling warmly at me.

Pat sat beside her, a quiet, expressionless figure.

“Ma, I didn’t know you were coming today.”

“Yes, darling, I know, but I am glad you caught me just in time. Hope all is well? May the Lord bless you,” she said in her high-pitched voice.

“Ma, Pat is leaving?”

“Oh!” She glanced at Pat as if she had forgotten she was in the car. “Yes, Pat is coming. It’s all for her good. You know, a bright young girl like her. And I can see how passionately you pushed for her. This is all thanks to you, darling. May God bless you for your efforts.”

Madam Annabelle began to drone on about how Nigeria needed more selfless, passionate ladies like me, but I couldn’t hear a word. Everything she was saying didn’t matter.

Pat.

I couldn’t look into her eyes. She stared straight ahead, clutching Sycamore Row in her hands.

“Okay, bye, darling!”

I stood frozen in front of the shelter for a long time until I heard the voice of Mummy Orobosa.

“My chest dey do me one kain for that pikin wey dey go. I no fit explain am.”

I wasn’t listening anymore. My whole being came undone. I fell to the floor and let out a yell. I screamed in anguish for Pat. For her sister. For the girls who had come before her. I mourned. Women never known. Women forgotten. Women dismissed.

The day I resigned, Peter followed me around the office, bewildered. “Why would you resign now?” he asked. “We’re about to receive an ActionAid grant. Our salaries could quadruple!” He also made vague references to rumours about me following Madam to Abuja for an SGBV conference.

How could I tell Peter? How could I explain that beneath Madam Annabelle’s warmth lurked a monster too evil to contain? How could I tell him that she had called me that night, her voice dripping with syrupy menace?

“Abi you want to go on the internet?’’ She cackled like she couldn’t imagine anything more comical. “My darling, you can go wherever you like, but I don’t work alone. And I like you too much to see something unimaginable happen to you or your family. May the Lord be with you, dear.”

Her words haunt me. Her faces on posters seem to be daring me to go ahead and talk.

My resignation letter was just a formality. I had already resigned the moment I saw Pat in that car.

Pat will forever be etched in my memory. I can only hope that someday…perhaps by some twist of fate…

Pat is gone.