The African Prince.

Episode 1 They say you can’t choose where you are born. If I could, I would have chosen anywhere but here. My name is Somto, and this is the story of a boy who was born with nothing. No father. No family except for one stubborn woman I call Mama. Mama says I came into this world crying so loud that the midwife said, “This one go shake the world o.” But the world has been shaking me ever since. I grew up in Lagos, and Lagos is not kind to boys like me. Boys who live in one room with leaking roofs. Boys who eat once a day if they are lucky. Boys whose only toy was a stick they found in the gutter. From the day I can remember, it has always been just me and Mama. She used to sell vegetables by the roadside, sweating under the sun from morning till night, just so we could have garri before we sleep. Every day she would smile at me and say, “Somto, e no go always be like this. One day, God go remember us.” But Lagos doesn’t wait for God. Lagos throws you into the mud and steps on you while you are still learning how to stand. I remember the first time they threw us out. I was only eight. The landlord came with a cane, shouting that Mama had not paid rent. He dragged our few clothes out, flung them into the street, and locked the door. That night we slept in front of the locked room, the mosquitoes singing louder than our stomachs. Since that day, being thrown out has become normal. Room to room, street to street. Sometimes we squat with church members, sometimes with strangers, sometimes under the bridge when there is no other way. At eighteen, my body is taller, but life has beaten me small, small. I am used to hunger now. I am used to the smell of wet concrete when rain beats us outside. I am used to people looking at me like I don’t belong anywhere. But Mama never gives up. She keeps talking about my father. She says, “Somto, you don’t know who you are. You don’t know the blood you carry. Your papa was not an ordinary man.” I used to think she only says that so I won’t lose hope. A bedtime story to make poverty look temporary. But recently, something in her eyes has changed. There are nights when she looks at me like she wants to tell me everything, but fear ties her tongue. And then came that morning. The sun was not even out yet when there was a loud bang on the door. “Pack out! Pack out!!” The landlord’s voice again. Another rent we could not pay. Mama tried to beg. “Please, give us two more weeks. Abeg, na boy pikin I get.” He did not listen. By the time the shouting ended, all we owned was in a small nylon bag. We stood on the street again. Mama held my hand. Her palm was shaking. “Somto,” she whispered, “no matter what happens, remember who you are.” I wanted to ask her who I am, but I was too angry to speak. As we walked away with nowhere to go, I looked back at the house, at the locked door, at the neighbours watching us like we were dirt. Something burned inside me that day. I didn’t know it yet, but that eviction was the beginning of everything. Somewhere far away, in a palace I had never seen, a throne that belonged to my blood was waiting. And the world that had ignored me for eighteen years was about to come looking. Because I am not just Somto, the poor Lagos boy. I am the African Prince. And this is how it all began.