2

Amina

Papa had emphasized sweaters—not just any kind of sweater but furry sweaters and a bunch of other winter clothes. I had thought I was ready to face the weather here, but that was not the case.

On the first day I went to class, I was struck in the gut with the cold. I had to take a public bus and hike the remainder of the journey. Papa begged me not to go to school until he sent me money for a car, but I was free now. I was having none of his protection here. By the time I got to class, my gums ached and my teeth threatened to collapse from excessive chattering. The classes were already ongoing when I walked in. I hurriedly sat beside a boy in a thick blue plaid shirt. He threw a curt smile my way and focused on the lecturer as though I were never there. His eyes made it really difficult for me to listen to what was going on—they were a soft blue, the color of morning, and he smelled sweetly like vanilla. My brain was processing a lot of things in very little time. In my entire life since I was six, this was my first time being around people, yet everyone acted like it was normal for me to be here, like there wasn’t anything else I should have been doing at that moment. I was bothered by the fact that I might spend a whole year here and still not have a single friend! What are the basics? Did I have to walk up to them, smile, and shake hands, or did I just wait to speak to the first person who sounded the slippers slightest bit friendly to me? For God’s sake, what did people in Russia like? I was overthinking a whole bunch of things; I almost fainted from a panic attack.

After a series of lectures, it was time to head home, and my head ached with the thought of hiking to the bus station. I sat on a bench, dreading my demise and regretting that I had not listened to my all-knowing father. As I sat with my head in my hands, a voice glided to me from behind:

"Do you need a ride? It was the guy from the first lecture; I could swear he was an angel. His hair was blonde and curly, with a part of it falling into his eyes, so he had to brush it off occasionally. The Lord must have known how much I needed a savior and sent me one of his angels to help me off the edge of falling apart on a foreign continent.

"Yes, yes, I do! I cried. "I live down at Pokovkra Street," I said, hoping I had not pronounced it wrong. I recited it at breakfast so I would not bite my tongue when the occasion arose.

"That’s nice; I am going that way too. My name’s Ivan. The blue-eyed boy said to me that his smile was so welcoming that I let myself relax in my seat.

"My name’s Amina, but you can call me Jewel. My father would be disappointed that I had given out so easily his nickname for me to a total stranger, but whatever, anything goes.

Ivan and I chatted as he drove, and I didn’t even notice we had been driving for almost an hour without getting to our destination. It was warm in his car, and his aura was warm too. I felt like sitting in his car all day. But as he kept driving, the temperature in the car dropped, and a silent cold filled the air. Ivan’s face was no longer that warm visage that kept me comfortable beyond reason. It was frigid; he ground his teeth, and his eyes seemed to darken with mystery.

"Ivan?" I called. "Ivan, where are we going? I asked, and fear began to creep into my throat and down to my abdomen.

"Ivan?" I called again, and I looked at his eyes this time, trying to decipher the clouds of codes written in them.

"Shut up." Ivan spat, and I knew I was in danger. I knew absolutely nobody in this place, and I was certain that if I called Papa, he would send somebody to my rescue. I was just not certain that Papa would not panic and fly me back to Lagos the next day, so I decided against calling him. Ivan swerved onto a dirt road where a black minivan was parked. Two hefty, blonde, bearded men, one with his eyes half closed by a scar, alighted the van and walked towards us. They had pistols tucked into their trousers and knives in the gray holsters dangling from their belt holders.

"Ivan, you brought the girl?" asked the man with a scar overlapping his eyelids.

"Konstantin." Ivan said, and he nodded in affirmation.

Even in the debilitating cold, sweat trickled down my spine. On my first day of freedom, I was kidnapped. While they discussed, I pulled out my cellphone from my pocket and tried to remember the emergency number—was it 211 or 234? No. +234 was the Nigerian country code. It was 112, and I could hear Papa’s voice echoing through my consciousness: "112, If you’re in trouble and cannot reach me, dial 112."

As I punched in the numbers and dialed, I felt a different coldness at the side of my head; it was the coldness of metal.

"Drop the damned phone, Jewel. Ivan warned me; he took my cellphone and tucked it into his back pocket.

"Better keep my name out of your mouth! I snapped at him—I could not stand to hear my name on his set lips.

"I don’t care; now get out of my car. Ivan averred. The two hefty, blonde, bearded men helped me out of the car and bound my hands and mouth with duct tape. I was tossed into the back of the minivan and watched Ivan speed away. Before I could note down his plate numbers, a black bag was drawn over my head. My butt still hurt from the exhausting ride, but what was more prevalent in me was the fear that these men would do terrible things to me. I had heard stories of wives and daughters of gang leaders being beaten up, raped, killed, or all of these at once. So much for being around people. Deep down, a part of me wanted to crawl back into the stiff hands of my father and inhale the smoke of his strawberry-flavored Oris. I wanted to go back and clean his golden frog ashtray every morning.