He rolled his eyes incredulously. 'PHONETICS!' He said. 'You are trying to speak like an oyinbo, but I can tell that you are not a been-to. You have never been to London or America before, or have you?'

I was tempted to lie, and I did.

'I have been to London before.' I said.

'Liar!' He said.

'How do you know that I haven't?' I asked hotly.

'Your cloths and your things.' He said. 'All the been-tos here all have their uniforms bought from London and also their shoes and boxes. You, your sandal is locally made, your box is common, almost everyone here have a similar type and your uniform looks like it was sown by an Obi-òma.'

I hated him more that very moment. He had seen right through my façade and this made me feel cheaper than the sandals on my feet. I had wanted at least a pair of Bata shoes but my mother had said that we could not afford it and so I had to make do with one of those sandals crafted by local shoe cobblers. It was a beautiful pair of shoes but its only disadvantage was that it was easily recognizable as a Nigerian made shoe. This factor thus made it cheap and common.

'What has my uniform and things got to do with my father being rich?' I asked slowly.

'If your father were rich then all your things would have been bought from overseas. I don't think that you are a been-to but you are an àje-butta to say the least, you know, a spoilt brat.'

'You have no rights to call me that.' I said with a touch of anger.

'My guess is that the house prefect will put you in one of the other rooms with the regular boys and not the room with the special boys.' He said ignoring my last statement.

'Special boys?' I repeated in my confusion.

'Yes. You know,' he explained. 'The been-tos stay in the same room with the house prefect and the regular boys are scattered round the other rooms.'

I wanted to be one of the special boys. In my mind I was special and not common like Jovi was and looked.

'We will be best friends.' He announced as he pranced up suddenly. 'I have to go.'

He ran off and soon disappeared as he had appeared, behind the tanker before I could say anything to him. It was still again and I was left with the sound of the bees and the flies. Now that he was gone, I found myself missing his callous company. The loneliness frightened me once again.

I didn't have to wait for long before I heard the sound of approaching feet. I was using one of my buckets as a stool and when I looked up I saw another boy approaching. He was taller than Jovi and was wearing a trouser instead of shorts. When he got to my side, I realised that he looked old. Not old like an elderly man, but old like a twelve years old boy would regard a man in his twenties. He was wearing the school uniform of white and blue and a badge with the school's crest pinned to the pocket of his shirt. On his wrist was a G-Shock metal wristwatch and I quickly noticed that the nail on his little right hand finger was very long, at least two inches long. He had traces of a moustache that was not fully formed and also some hair sprouting from his chin.

'You are the new boy.' He said without really looking at me.

He was backing me now and fiddling with the locks on the door to the room the lizard had crawled into.

'What is your name?' He asked.

'Chuka Onyema.' I replied very much aware that I had said it in a similar way a foreigner would pronounce my name. It wasn't quite deliberate; it was simply the way I spoke. It came from living in a home where vernacular and Pidgin English was banned and speaking English the queen's way was not negotiable. Jovi had called it fake 'phu-ney' but it was simply good home training.

The man-boy turned round to look at me properly for the first time. As he did so, I kept thinking he was trying to place me based on my verbal modulation; was I special or common?

'My name is Emeka Alor. House prefect, Zik House.' He said. 'You will call me Senior Emeka.'

'Senior Emeka.' I repeated his name.

He looked me over again and sniffed slightly.

'I think I should have a spare bunk in room three for you.' He said.