CHAPTER TWENTY: THE UNWANTED PARADE
1389 Words
Ron kicked an empty bottle cap down the street like it had personally offended him. Behind him trudged Mami, her lace wrapper flapping around her legs like a defeated flag. Jerry followed, muttering into his armpit and carrying a bag that once held onions but now held nothing but crushed dreams. Bringing up the rear was Minos—half-zombie, half-horror show, full-on public menace.
If misery had a parade, this was it. And the crowd was not cheering.
“Why are we walking again?” Mami groaned, dabbing her forehead with an old tissue that had lost all dignity.
“Because the hospital security kicked us out like we were expired rice,” Ron muttered.
“No, they kicked him out,” Jerry said, jerking his thumb at Minos. “We just got caught in the blast radius.”
Minos blinked slowly, like a lizard that didn’t understand shame. His eyes, glowing faintly yellow, made every passerby veer sharply to the other side of the road. A pair of schoolchildren screamed, pointed, and ran like they’d seen a live ghost in school uniform.
“Oh, come on!” Mami shouted. “He’s not that ugly. Just a bit... textured.”
“Textured?” Jerry barked. “The guy looks like expired bread dough!”
Minos growled softly. The smell that followed made a dog whimper and retreat into a gutter.
“Can we just find somewhere to rest before I faint dramatically in front of traffic?” Mami asked.
They reached a buka and peered inside. It was lively, with jollof rice steaming and customers eating happily. For the first time all day, hope shimmered.
Mami adjusted her scarf and strutted in.
“Hello o!” she said with a practiced smile. “Can we sit—”
The waitress took one look at Minos behind the door, screamed, and hurled a plastic chair. It missed and shattered a flowerpot.
“That’s that zombie guy! From the news! He’s the one that bit the goat!”
“He didn’t bite any goat!” Ron yelled.
“OUT!” came the shout from the kitchen. “BEFORE WE CALL ENVIRONMENTAL!”
They fled as if chased by bees, Jerry holding up his hands like a hostage and Minos trotting after them, licking his lips for no good reason.
Back on the street, Mami clutched her chest. “I’m getting heart palpitations. I’m too fine for this disgrace.”
Ron turned to her. “This is what happens when you adopt strange zombie-adjacent creatures from coastal towns.”
Minos let out a long sigh, like a broken tire.
A keke driver rolled past, slowed down to stare, then zoomed off while shouting, “Cover am! Na biohazard!”
They slumped down under a mango tree. For a moment, they just breathed.
Until Minos sneezed.
It wasn’t an ordinary sneeze. It was the kind of full-body blast that sent dust flying, made birds scatter, and rattled a danfo’s window across the road.
“Seriously?” Jerry coughed. “Do we need to register him as a natural disaster?”
“I think he cracked my eardrum,” Mami whimpered.
They stood up, brushing dust from their bodies, and continued on. By now, people were trailing behind them, some filming on their phones.
“Can you guys stop staring?!” Ron barked at a teenager.
“But he’s trending!” the boy shouted. “He’s Zombie Number Seventeen on TwikTok!”
“He’s a person—well, technically!” Mami defended.
“No, no. That’s a walking cautionary tale,” Jerry said.
They came upon a tiny corner shop where an old man sat sipping malt and nodding to Fuji music. Mami smiled sweetly. “Uncle, please, can we sit here for a while? Just ten minutes.”
The man squinted at them, then at Minos. “Na wetin be this one?”
“He’s... doing a street play,” Ron offered. “Drama student. Method acting.”
“He’s method acting as what? Leprosy?”
“No no,” Jerry added quickly, “he’s rehearsing for a role in a medical thriller. Oscar buzz.”
The man grunted. “This country sha.”
They sat gratefully on crates beside the shop. For about two whole minutes, life was calm.
Then Minos spotted a butterfly, reached for it gently... and tried to swallow it whole.
“STOP THAT!” Ron slapped his hand away. “It’s not food! That’s someone’s spirit animal or something!”
Minos hissed and sneezed again. This time, the vibration knocked over the old man’s malt.
The man stood up slowly and reached under his table. He brought out a giant broom.
“LEAVE.”
“We’re leaving, sir!” Mami said, grabbing her purse.
“Before I sweep him like sand!”
They took off again.
“You know what we need?” Jerry said, panting. “A disguise. Sunglasses. Cloak. Moustache. Something!”
“Can you disguise a guy whose skin peels when he blinks?” Ron snapped.
Just then, someone across the road pointed and yelled, “Na him! That’s the guy from that emergency news report. He bit someone’s generator!”
“That never happened!” Ron shouted back. “He only licked it!”
They hurried into a nearby shopping plaza, hoping to disappear. A security guard stepped out, took one look at Minos, and shook his head. “Not today.”
“But we just want to rest—”
“Go and rest at your ancestral village.”
Jerry grumbled. “I should have joined my cousin’s tailoring shop instead of this nonsense.”
“Wait, I know what to do!” Mami gasped. “Let’s pretend we’re doing charity. Yes! Zombie Outreach!”
“Where we give what to people? Fear?” Ron asked.
“Better than being aimless like this!” Mami shot back.
They ended up outside a small, dilapidated salon. Mami marched in confidently. “We’re here for a community project. Free haircut for the... cosmetically challenged.”
The salon owner looked at Minos and blinked slowly. “You want to cut his hair?”
“Just shape-up and maybe a little conditioner—”
The woman pressed an emergency button under the counter. A loud siren blasted outside the salon. An automatic voice announced: “Unknown individual with facial distortions detected. Authorities notified.”
“WHY WOULD A SALON HAVE THAT BUTTON?!” Jerry yelled as they bolted.
“Security reasons!” she screamed after them. “We had a cat thief last week!”
They ran until they collapsed behind a closed suya stand.
They sat there, panting. Dirty. Humiliated. Surrounded by the smell of burnt meat and rejection.
“I hate this city,” Ron muttered.
“I hate these shoes,” Mami said, throwing one aside.
“I hate my life,” Jerry whispered.
Minos sat quietly, chewing on a plastic spoon he’d found somewhere.
“Do you even understand what you’re putting us through?” Ron asked him. “Because I feel like you’re just here for the drama.”
Minos blinked once. A pigeon landed beside him. He gently reached over and handed it a stick of suya he had somehow stolen.
The pigeon looked confused but accepted it.
Ron buried his head in his hands. “I give up. I’m related to a zombie pigeon whisperer.”
Jerry nodded solemnly. “I say we sell him to science.”
“No!” Mami shouted. “He’s family now!”
“He’s an infection risk!” Jerry retorted.
“He’s Ron’s friend!” Mami argued.
“Friendship ended the day I got chased by five okada riders screaming ‘epidemic!’” Ron hissed.
Suddenly, a loud honk blasted behind them. A city sanitation truck pulled up. A woman leaned out the window.
“Hey! You people with the creature! You’re violating three health codes and a public scent regulation!”
“We’re just sitting!” Mami shouted back.
“Not with that! That’s a walking violation!”
Ron sighed. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere with fewer screams.”
And with that, the Unwanted Parade stood up once again and continued their slow, comical migration across a city that had clearly decided it wanted nothing to do with them.
- Writer
