The last thing I remember before I passed out was the taste of blood in my mouth and a boot pressing against my neck.

I was face down on the concrete floor, hands tied behind my back, while one of the Libyan guards shouted in a language I didn’t understand.
Then came the whip again, this time on my thigh, it cut deep.
I felt something warm run down my leg, I didn’t know if it was blood or urine.

They were trying to get me to call home again.

To beg for more money.

But I’d already called my mother the night before. I cried and begged her to sell anything, anything at all.
She said there was nothing left to sell, they had already borrowed money to send me out of Nigeria in the first place.

That was when the guard got angry.

He grabbed my hair and slammed my head against the wall.

I couldn’t cry, my throat was dry, my face was swollen and only sound I made was breathing shallow.

In the next room, Favour was screaming not from being beaten, but from something worse. I heard her begging “Please, please… I’m bleeding, I’m tired, Please.”

Then silence.

That silence was louder than her screams.

We were in a small, dark cell, no windows, no light. Just a hole in the floor for a toilet and bodies, maybe 30 of us ( Girls and boys), all smelling like sweat, blood, and hopelessness.

I closed my eyes and tried to think about home.

Two months earlier…

We met the man who promised us Italy in a salon.

He looked successful, clean car, wristwatch that probably wasn’t fake.
He said his name was Pascal, but everybody called him “London Man.” He said he had helped many girls “cross over” and now they were living in Europe with documents.

“Na just two weeks journey,” he told us. “Once you reach Libya, dem go put you for boat to Italy.”

We believed him, I don’t know if it was stupidity or desperation. Maybe both.

Favour wanted to be a nurse, I just wanted to leave Nigeria. I was tired of men touching me when I sold food, tired of my uncle’s eyes, tired of poverty.

We borrowed money, sold what we could, lied to our families.

We thought we were chasing a future.

We didn’t know we were walking into a trap.

From Benin to Kano, the journey was quiet. Nobody talked much.
From Kano, we moved to Agadez. That’s when I started getting scared.

The desert was dry, silent, endless, our truck had no cover just iron bars we held onto.
The sun burned our skin during the day. At night, the cold cut through our bones.

People started falling sick.

A girl died on the third day.

They pushed her body off the truck like she was nothing.

Favour cried. I couldn’t even cry. I was too scared that I would be next.

To be continued…
7 8

Chai!
I was reading this with precision imagination by how the story was told and it's actually scary 😅😅
10 8

...precise I mean. I'm unable to edit it
9 8

Nice 👍👍👍
7 8

👍
5 3

Waw the story is so interesting
5 3

Nice one 🌚🥲
1 2