Better Never Than Late by Chika Unigwe

Author:Chika Unigwe [Chika Unigwe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781911115564
Publisher: CASSAVA REPUBLIC PRESS
Published: 2019-12-16T16:00:00+00:00

‘Sistas and Brodas! Today we have a very special request!’ Pastor Moses Elijah Samuel Okeke’s voice boomed through and the speaking in tongues and clapping and dancing stopped. Ijeoma was dragged out by two assistant pastors, from the Inner Sanctuary where the demon-possessed were kept until they were cleansed. She wore nothing but the white cloth Ada had bought, tied under her arms and reaching down to her knees. Her hair was mala shaven, so clean the lights bounced off it. Maybe it was the shaven head, but she looked smaller. There was a welt where Ada’s belt had cut under her eye. Kambi caught herself feeling sorry for Ijeoma. What if there had been a mistake? The girl looked harmless. She turned to Ada and before she had even said a word, Ada said, ‘See how her wild eyes are. Ask the blood of Jesus to cover you from her evil.’ Ijeoma’s eyes were indeed wild, Kambi saw now. They darted over the hushed congregation. When they landed on Kambi, Kambi shut her eyes and said a prayer, asking Jesus to cover her with His blood, to ward off any evil the girl might still be capable of.

‘Brodas and Sistas! This here is a witch!’

The congregation gasped as if they were being shown some exotic creature, even though this scene was not new to many of them, certainly not the older members of the church. Before Kambi joined, Ada had told her, the pastor had done at least three exorcisms. One was of a widowed woman whom her brother-in-law had caught walking around the house at night, mewing like a cat. The pastor had revealed that she was responsible for her husband’s death. The cirrhosis of the liver was just a symptom of the woman’s sorcery. Like Ijeoma, she had denied it, but confessed during the exorcism. The second one had been of a teenage boy with the spirit of shoplifting. His family was wealthy but no matter how much they gave him, he would still be caught stealing from supermarkets in their neighbourhood. After the exorcism, his parents had bought the pastor a brand new car. The third was a three-year-old whose father’s business began to fail the moment he was born and whose mother’s womb could not hold a baby after him. Kambi, disturbed by the thought of a toddler being accused of sorcery, asked Ada if the man’s business picked up after his son’s exorcism. Ada said that if it did not, it was because his faith in the pastor was not strong enough. Kambi might be book-smart, Ada said, but in matters of faith, she was obviously still a learner. ‘Today, we are going to cast the spirit in her and send it back to the pits of hell! We are going to reclaim this girl’s life for the one true and ever-living Father in heaven. Let me hear Hallelujah!’

‘Hallelujah! Amen!’ Kambi imagined Ijeoma after the exorcism, freed from witchcraft. She might take her back. She would send her to school, help her live a normal life.

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