Chapter 2: The Price Of 275
1013 Words
September 12, 2024, 6:12am — Ngwa Market Road, Aba
The house was still shaking from last night.
Not from dancing. From silence.
Ada hadn’t slept. Every time she closed her eyes, *275* flashed behind her eyelids like a torchlight. White paper. Black ink. A number that weighed more than her.
She’d never thought she was smart. Not really.
Not like Chukwudi from JSS2 who finished Physics before Papa finished writing the question. Not like the boys at the tutorial center who raised their hands before the lesson ended. The ones whose fathers drove Camrys. The ones whose mothers didn’t sell tomatoes.
Ada was the girl who read under kerosene lamp until her eyes burned. The girl who copied notes twice because she had no textbook. The girl who prayed over JAMB past questions like they were scripture.
And somehow, she’d beaten them. All of them.
275.
Twenty-five points above cut-off. Enough for Medicine. Enough for ABSU. Enough to make Papa stand straight for the first time since he retired without gratuity.
When she showed the result that morning, the compound caught fire.
Mama dropped her basin of garri. It scattered across the red earth like broken teeth. She didn’t care. She grabbed Ada, pulled her into her chest, and sobbed. Laughing and crying at the same time, like a woman at a birth and a funeral.
“Chineke emeela!” she kept saying. “God has remembered us! God has remembered us!”
Her wrapper smelled like tomatoes and Omo and 21 years of 4am mornings. Ada breathed it in. Memorized it.
Papa didn’t cry. Retired teachers don’t. But his hands shook. Bad. The same hands that wrote formulas on blackboards for 30 years trembled as he held that A4 paper like it was the original Ten Commandments.
He touched the *275* with his thumb. Once. Twice. Like he was checking if it was real.
“My daughter,” he said. His voice was thick. Rusty. Like a door that hadn’t opened in years. “My first fruit. You did not shame me.”
Chima and Chidi became town criers.
By 10am, Madam Rose from Stall 12 brought a satchet of Milo. “For Doctor!”
By 11am, the landlord came, no longer asking for rent, asking to pray.
By 12pm, the whole street knew: _Obinna’s daughter scored 275. She go be doctor._
For one afternoon, Ada was a queen.
Children touched her wrapper for luck. Mothers told their daughters, “You see Ada? Go and read.” Papa sat on the broken plastic chair outside, back straight, answering greetings with a nod that said, _Yes. That’s my blood._
They cooked rice. Not the broken pieces Mama usually bought. Real rice. With one egg shared four ways. Ada got the yolk.
For one afternoon, *275* paid every debt.
But rice finishes. Guests leave. Night comes.
And night is honest.
After the last neighbor said “Congrats” and the last pot was scraped, the one room went quiet.
Mama sat on the mat. Her legs stretched out. The same legs that walked to the market at 4am. She stared at the floor. At the red stain where Fanta spilled. She didn’t blink.
Papa sighed. Long. From his chest. From his bones. He rubbed his face with both hands, like he could wipe the math away.
Chima pretended to sleep. Chidi actually slept, thumb in his mouth, JAMB slip clutched in his fist like a trophy.
No one said it.
But the room was screaming it.
*Acceptance Fee: ₦180,000. Deadline: November 1st.*
*Tuition: ₦250,000.*
*Hostel: ₦80,000.*
*Books. Lab coat. Stethoscope. Bone box. ₦140,000.*
*Total: ₦650,000.*
Mama’s capital: ₦32,000.
Papa’s pension: ₦18,000. Owed for 6 months.
Total: ₦32,000.
*Debt: ₦618,000.*
Ada heard it. Loud as the market.
Two days later, her Tecno phone buzzed.
*From: admissions@absu.edu.ng*
*Subject: Provisional Admission — ABSU/UG/24/004719*
_Congratulations, Miss Ada Obinna Fidelis._
_You have been offered provisional admission to study Medicine and Surgery._
_Acceptance Fee: ₦180,000._
_Report for collection of admission letter: 15th September, 2024._
_Note: Failure to pay by November 1st means automatic forfeiture of admission._
Ada read it three times.
Her heart didn’t pound. It _drummed_. War drums. Against her ribs.
She was going to university.
She ran outside. Papa was under the mango tree, marking NECO scripts for ₦20 per paper.
“Papa! ABSU! They gave me!”
He stood. Too fast. His knee cracked. He took the phone. Read it.
*Provisional.*
*₦180,000.*
*November 1st.*
His jaw worked. Like he was chewing glass.
Then he smiled. Papa’s smile. The one he used when NEPA took light during exams.
“God will provide,” he said. “He that started it will finish it.”
But that night, Ada heard him.
3am. The other side of the curtain.
Papa praying. No words. Just sounds. The kind men make when they’re bargaining with God and losing.
Mama wasn’t asleep either. She was counting. The same ₦32,000. She’d counted it 11 times since morning. Like new numbers would appear.
A tear fell. Hit the money. Mama wiped it fast. Like Ada wouldn’t see.
But Ada saw.
And she understood.
Getting *275* was hard.
Paying for *275* would kill them.
She opened her phone. The email again.
*Provisional admission.*
The word tasted like iron now. Like blood.
Because Ada didn’t know it yet, but “provisional” had another meaning.
It meant _conditional_.
It meant _not yours yet_.
It meant _someone else is watching_.
Her name wasn’t just on ABSU’s list.
It was on another list.
A list kept in a leather folder.
A list on a desk in a big house in Umuahia.
A list titled: *Scholarship Candidates 2024
And at the top of that list, underlined in red:
. ADA OBINNA FIDELIS — 275 — ABSU MEDICINE — NGWA ROAD, ABA
The man who owned the list didn’t care about JAMB.
He cared about girls who were smart.
Girls who were poor.
Girls whose fathers couldn’t pay ₦180,000.
Because girls like that said _yes_.
Always.
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