'Let me book your meal now before someone else does.' He said.

'Book my meal?'

'You will soon learn.' He said. 'I traded my dinner tonight because I knew I would be eating two portions this afternoon, well three portions now, if I add your rice which I just ate.'

'Why are you trading meals?'

He rolled his eyes and smiled.

'Some àje-buttas like you are choosy about what they eat. Some hate eba and would trade their eba for rice. Some hate yam porridge and would trade it for bread and tea or rice. On the other hand some people love eba and would trade their rice for eba. So two days ago I arranged to trade my dinner tonight for someone's rice this afternoon.'

'What are we having tonight?' I asked curiously.

'Eba and eguisi soup.' He said.

I squeezed my face.

'Are you eating then?' He asked.

'I don't think so.' I replied.

'Good.' He smiled. 'I will have your food then and not starve tonight. I knew today was going to be a good day.'

I remained quiet. I watched him take the last spoon of rice and put in his mouth. There was not a single grain left on his plate.

'You are a good man.' He said shortly. 'We would be best friends.'

Most certainly not, I said to myself. I noticed that people were beginning to stare toward our direction especially now that most of them had finished with their meal and I wanted him away from me. I noticed quite a number of boys looking at me dead in the eye and whispering amongst each other. This made me nervous and homesick. I wanted to be in the comfort of my home, enjoying my mother's cooking, and our decent dining table, I wanted to be in my room I shared with my two brothers and a sister and finally enjoy the company of my best friend, Ikenna.

The bell rang again to signify the end of lunch. From the top podium the seniors got up to leave but many remained to socialize. I noticed boys in groups of threes and fours chatting up girls in groups of three and fours as well. Some of the girls were extremely pretty as they gushed and fluttered their eyelids at the boys. Most of the boys reminded me of young men, real men and not boys who were in a college.

I also noticed that quite a number of seniors left their plates on the table and some juniors strutted up to retrieve their plates. I noticed some juniors picking up as much as three plates, while some took only one. Some of the plates had untouched food in them, which were covered up by the junior responsible for the plate and then whisked away.

'Those are school sons and school daughters.' Jovi said, referring to the junior boys and girls who were retrieving the plates.

'What does that mean?' I asked.

'Well, some seniors claim responsibility for you by proclaiming themselves your school parent and in return for their protection, the unfortunate junior does all sorts of errands for them.'

'Unfortunate?'

'Yes,' Jovi said. 'Unfortunate. They simply become slaves.'

My mind took that piece of information and stored it securely somewhere in my heart. I don't know why it was important to me after all he had told me to suddenly want to keep that piece of information. Maybe it was the way he had said 'slaves' and 'protection'. I couldn't read his mind but his voice had dropped while he said it and his eyes seemed to have clouded as if blocking out an unpleasant memory. I wanted to ask him, but I didn't. Asking was what friends did. I was not his friend. I was the new boy and he was a stranger. A stranger who called me names and ate my food without asking. A stranger who called a cutlass a machete. A stranger who dared me to defy my father. A stranger who had no father of his own to defy.

'Come lets go.' He said as he grabbed my arm and pulled me up. 'I will take you back to the dormitory.'

Dormitory. Hostel.

Without arguing, I followed him but I was determined that after today, I would have nothing further to do with him.

©Jude Dibia 2005