Ikoyi, 2019. Typical Nigerian weather in October. It’s sunny, cloudy, and rainy. Keke from Obalende to Ikoyi. I want to become a writer of books. I have come to see writers, painters, musicians, doctors, booksellers, lawyers. I have come to listen to people talk about art. Art and politics. Art as activism. Art for art’s sake. Bernadine Evaristo is a Booker Prize Winner. I see my predecessors: Chika Unigwe, Jennifer Makumbi, Helon Habila. I see  Yosola, Ijapa, Xaron, Damian, Desmond. The sky is full of possibilities.  Grey Matter and the in-betweens. The speakable and the unspeakable. Slavery, genocide, colonialism, misogyny, homophobia, migration, feminism, gender. Mona Eltahawy is saying fuck the patriarchy! My friend questions things. Why is nonbinary in-between? The confessional generation. The Long and Short of the Short Story. I make friends. We wander around the different halls. We browse the pop-up bookshop. We buy books. We get our books signed. We take pictures. We paint our faces. There’s music. My friends are dancing and I don’t know how to dance. There’s free beer in the fridge. I don’t like beer. I have a crush. He is a writer of books. He is bald and has high cheekbones. My friend buys his book. I hold the book like it’s mine. Like I have some part of him with me. Ayobami Adebayo. I want to tell her I love her book. The night is tender. The night is charged. I am hungry and not hungry. There’s smoke at night. I try to smoke a cigarette for the first time. I call the man I fell in love with in August. Hey, I say. Deja Vu. I feel the things he made me feel. Just checking on you, I say. Conversations with friends. Conversations with strangers. Toni Morrison is dead. We watch “The Pieces I Am”. I am finally going to read Toni Morrison. I am going to become a writer. I go home with my resolve. Some day, I will be a writer of books.

Bio

Jok Gwantang is a Nigerian writer and researcher with work previously published in Kenga.