Blunt by the Cemetery | by Oluwadeaduramilade | Flash Fiction

“Why wouldn’t the stupid tap stop making that noise? Why don’t Nigerians like to fix things that need fixing?”

***

The quiet bothered Kemi, but she didn’t want to complain. The others said she complained too much. She was the party pooper. The Debbie downer. So she couldn’t complain.

She didn’t want to be in the cemetery beside school. If only because, around her, the surrounding streetlights built shadows here, there, frightening her. But the gang wouldn’t listen to her because she was frightened by everything.

There was an irritating dripping sound coming from a tap somewhere near the entrance to the cemetery. Why wouldn’t the stupid tap stop making that noise? Why don’t Nigerians like to fix things that need fixing? Mosquitoes buzzed around her ears. “Ugh.” This was a bad idea. The gang had been drinking and smoking at the Lagoon front, then John had the bright idea that it’ll be more fun if they went to the cemetery. How the fuck did they think that going to the cemetery to smoke and drink would be more fun? This was how Hollywood horror movies started.
She stepped on something, heard a crack, and gasped. The others stopped and looked back at her. For a moment, she thought she had stepped on a bone. It was just a twig. She motioned for them to keep moving. John, who was in front, asked her to come forward and they continued to make their way to the back of the cemetery, with her in the middle.

She felt uneasy. Something was watching. Or was it just the creepy feeling of being in a fucking cemetery at 12 o’clock in the morning. This was stupid. They finally got to the back and sat beneath a tree by the wall in a semicircle. She couldn’t hear the dripping anymore. They were far away from the stupid tap.
They were joking and laughing and she started to relax when she noticed that the branch above her moved. She looked at the blunt in her hand, then looked up again. “Relax. It could have been the wind,” she thought. But the air was still. Too still. There was no other sound asides the gang’s. It was too quiet for Lagos, for the streets near UniLag on a Saturday night.

“Guys. Let’s leave,” she said. “It’s too quiet here.”. They laughed and told her to have some more weed. She got up and stepped on her blunt. She’d leave them there. They could stay and play their silly games. She was leaving.

That was her last thought before she felt something curl around her neck.

**************

Post image by Bob Shrader via Flickr.

About the Author:

Oluwadeaduramilade is a Psychology student at the University of Lagos. People say you can’t love inanimate objects – you can only like them – but the only thing that rivals her love of books is her love of ice cream. Lade likes to think of herself as a polymath. When she grows up, she wants to be a psychologist, a writer and a teacher amongst many other things.