Life of Jiji

All Rights Reserved

2020 Tena Ifiemi

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ТHΞЯΞ ШΛS ЛФБФÐЏ łЛ the room when I entered but from the looks of the already made bed in the corner and the unpacked box beside it, I could tell that I wasn't the only person that had arrived. I quickly became nervous because I did not know what to expect of my roommates. Meeting new people has always been a pain to me. There were four beds in the room, each of them with a reading table beside it. I liked it, it's so much less clustered than the rooms in my former school. We could have from 8-10 girls in a room!

I picked one bed and threw my backpack on it before sitting on the bed myself. I began to unpack, arranging my clothes in different heaps on my bed before I stood up to go and check out the wardrobes. I picked one and accessed the interior based on my belongings, telling myself where I would put this and that.

"Hello!" Somebody called from somewhere behind me and I could swear, my heart practically stopped and then started again beating painfully in my chest. Why the hell does everything scare me so much?!

I turned to check who the intruder was and it was one of the twins.

"Hi." I greeted back.

"Did I scare you? I'm sorry. I can see that you're new, I saw you with Ayoola. Lol, I hope she hasn't started bullying you already. What's your name?" The girl rambled and I wondered where I was supposed to start replying from and she talks really, really fast. Like, how?

"You actually did scare me but never mind. And yeah, my name is Ejiro."

"I'm Niniola. Nini for short." I smiled when she said this and wondered if I should have told her that I was called Jiji for short.

"I like your name. It's really nice." I say, not really knowing what to say and then my heart began to race again in fear that I had made things awkward.

"Thanks. Do you know who our other roommate is?"

"No, she wasn't here when I came in."

"It looks like Ayomide's box sha." She said and I did not know if she was talking to me or not. Then she went straight to the girl's wardrobe and opened it. I cringed. Was she supposed to do that? Or the people here just have no regard for privacy.

"Yup, it's Ayo. That's her cream...and her nightie and..." She giggled. "The g-string, yup, It's definitely Ayo."

"Definitely Ayo that did what?" I froze at the voice of a third presence in the room. One that was definitely Ayomide. Nini shut the wardrobe and turned to look at the girl, I finally turned too.

"I knew it!" Nini said, grinning.

"Nini!" Ayo screamed while running to hug Niniola.

So she's not angry about the invasion of privacy? Well, I guess I'll have to get used to this huh?

"Ayo, see our new classmate."

"Woah, sorry I didn't notice you at first. What's your name?"

"Ejiro" I replied.

"Ayy, Warri girl!" She hailed and I laughed. Ayo, looked like someone that was very hyper and I liked her already. Like Nini, she was also dark skinned but a few shades lighter.

"I'm Ayo... Ayomide, call me which ever you like."

"Ayo is such a nice name." I said.

"Ejiro!" Nini exclaimed bursting into a fit of giggles. "Are you going to tell everybody you meet that you like their name?" She said still laughing and I could feel my whole face and neck heat up.

"Nini, leave her jor. Thank you Ejiro, don't mind that yeye girl." Ayo said and Nini scoffed.

"See who is calling me yeye." Nini laughed and Ayo ignored her, turning to me.

"It's nice to meet you Ejiro." Ayo said, suddenly enveloping me in a hug.

It was so abrupt that I tensed, hugging people has always been difficult for me but Ayo seemed like someone who liked to hug a lot. That's not going to go so well with me. Thankfully she didn't hug me for so long and when she released me I let out all the air I had been holding in.

"You look like I was sucking the life out of you. You don't like hugs, do you?" She frowned.

"It was that noticeable?" I cringed at how transparent I was.

Ayo nodded. "Don't worry, you're not the only one. Amarachi also hates hugs...she's one of our classmates."

"Oh." Was all I could say.

Our last roommate ended up not coming the whole day and when it was time for dinner, Nini and Ayo had already assisted me in arranging all my stuff into my wardrobe. I was quite nervous for dinner, I was going to be seeing other students.

And boys...

I don't really talk to boys my age since I've always gone to a girls' only boarding school and even during holidays, I never really go out.

"Ejiro oh! Let's go na. Are you not hungry? Cause me, I'm starving. I've eaten only tea and bread today." Nini disturbed with her rapid way of speaking.

"Sorry please, Madam Niniola." I joked and she rolled her eyes.

"You people should come please let's be going." Ayo said, now standing outside the room.

"Come out for dinner!" A voice which sounded like it belonged to an older woman shouted repeatedly and I looked around for the source of the voice.

"That's Mrs. Lizzy. She's one of the hostel parents...or porters; whichever you want to call them. She likes to shout a lot." It was Ayo that spoke.

"I've not even seen her yet."

"You'll see her later, she's not much of a sight anyway." Ayo said and I gaped at her.

"You're mean!" I laughed.

"Being nice doesn't take anybody anywhere dear. You need to learn that."

I wanted to tell her that I did not need to learn that because I did not believe it but I decided against it. If there's anything I've learnt is that everyone has a mind of their own and are allowed to have their own thoughts. Something might have happened to make them think that way and an argument might be pointless.

"Hey Ayo! Hey sis! Hey you!" I heard a strangely familiar voice yell and we all turned back at the same time Nini's identical twin wrapped her arms around Ayo and Nini's shoulders.

"Dami! Oh my God, it feels like I'm seeing Nini all over again for the second time today."

"Yeah, we kinda have that effect on people." Dami winked. Oh Lord, its going to be hard telling which is which.

"Dami see our new classmate." Nini said and Dami turned to me.

"H-hi." I whispered my voice breaking shortly.

"Hey, what's your name?"

"Ejiro."

"I'm Damilola. What do you think of this school so far?"

"Isn't it too early to tell?" I asked laughing nervously.

"Mmmmnn well, I guess." Then she turned to Ayo and Nini and whispered, but loud enough that I could hear.

"She's going to take all the boys' attention from us!" I heard her say and furrowed my eyebrows.

"Dami! Stop it... you're making her feel uncomfortable."

"Ah ahn, Is she not supposed to know that she's pretty?" Dami said and I blushed furiously.

"You see!" Ayo gestured towards me and I blushed even more. Nobody has exactly called me pretty and hearing it from a girl made me feel very weird. I zoned out from the rest of their conversation until we got to the cafeteria.

But seriously Jiji, did you really think that Ayo, Nini and Dami were the only girls in Year 11. My subconscious mocked me.

When we got to the cafeteria I felt like I didn't exist anymore. Everybody knew each other and I really couldn't fit into any of their discussions because they were mostly talking about things that they all knew about, probably because it was something that happened in class last session or about the last graduation...things like that. Sure, Nini introduced me to all the girls but the attention only lasted for a few minutes and then everyone went back to their conversations. I'm not a fan of attention...in fact, I hate it! But right now I feel very left out and that's no one's fault at all. I get it, its a new school. New people. They don't really know me and I don't know them. But with time, I guess.

Dragging my focus back to the spaghetti and stew they served us for dinner, I continued to eat.

"Jiji."

Reya... Only Reya would call me Jiji, right? I dropped my fork and turned to look at her.

"Yeah?"

"Please come..." I raised a brow but she just gave me an impatient look, so I stood. For some reason, the entire table had gone quiet. I left the table and followed Reya but not before I heard Nini or Dami say,

"Don't tell me she's Ovieya's sister!"

Huh?