THAT RIDE HOME

I shouted. I really did. Out of the seven passengers squeezed into that korope, my voice was the loudest. But as they say, life happens.

I had been standing at the bus stop for about twenty minutes. Trekking was not an option. After a whole day of jumping from one meeting to another, moving files up and down without rest, attending to clients with different level of anger issue, my body had had enough. My legs were weak, my head was heavy, and my stomach was already complaining.

Buses kept speeding past, but none was going my way. At the point, standing became stressful, and waiting became tiring.

Five minutes.

Ten minutes.

Fifteen minutes.

Nothing.

Just when I was close to giving up, a bus pulled up. The driver was shouting my destination: “Obadina! Five hundred!”

On a normal day, I would have argued. I would have priced it. But that day, the strength to debate over ₦100 was gone. I entered the bus without saying a word.

The first thing I noticed was the strong smell of petrol. It filled my nose immediately. For a moment, I wondered if the other passengers could smell it too. Nobody said anything.

As we moved, a driver sped past us and shouted, “Werey! Iya eee!”

Our driver answered back without missing a beat, “Werey ni iya eee!”

I didn’t know what the issue was, but shortly after, our driver said, almost casually, “Make una no vex, the person wey suppose fix the headlight travel.”

I didn’t think much of it.

Not until it happened again.

Another car passed us, horns blaring, insults flying. That was when it hit me—the bus had no headlights.

My chest tightened.

We were already on the bridge. No streetlights. Just darkness. Even inside the bus, there was no light. The driver could only see when another vehicle had its headlights on.

At that point, the petrol smell didn’t matter anymore. All I could think about was how blind we were on that road.

Then, from somewhere ahead, we heard shouting:

“Move! Move! Brake don fail!”

We couldn’t see who was shouting. We couldn’t see what was coming. The road ahead was pitch black.

Fear spread quickly. People started murmuring, then talking— everyone was talking at the same time. We told the driver to slow down, to park, to stop—anything.

He replied, “Una too dey fear.”

That was when everyone started shouting.

I shouted too.

Louder than everyone else.

Suddenly, faint lights appeared—wild, unstable, coming fast. A container. Out of control. Its brake had failed.

Our driver had no headlights.

No clear view.

No time.

I remember holding my breath. I remember gripping the seat in front of me. I remember thinking, so this is how it happens—just like this.

The bus swerved.

Someone screamed.

Everything went quiet.