The clouds gather without warning, like debt collectors, their shadows
spreading across the skyline, thick and unyielding. It rains every day
here, but not the gentle drizzle that lulls children to sleep. No, it pours
like a landlord’s knock, rattling windows, soaking dreams.
I clock in, clock out, my shirt damp with sweat, my hands calloused from
gripping the fragile edge of hope. Payday arrives, crisp like new naira
notes, promising something close to relief. But in this city, the rain is
always waiting—another fuel hike, a new tariff, a naira that slips further
away, like a lover you can never hold onto. The money leaves as quickly
as it comes, sluiced away by the relentless downpour.
Every day, I watch my paycheck drown in the flood—NEPA bill swollen
like the riverbanks after a heavy storm, school fees that rise like Lagos
tides, and a market where prices inflate faster than the clouds over a rest-
less horizon.
I want to save, to build a dam around my earnings, but the rain is too
clever—it finds the cracks, slips through, trickles into corners I’d forgot-
ten. It washes away my plans like old calendars left out in the storm. I pay
and pay, but still, I owe—life debts that pile like unpaid rent.
Yet, somehow, I am still here. I am still standing under this downpour,
drenched to the bone with perseverance. In my city, we learn to dance
with our heads down, our feet splashing through the puddles, our laugh-
ter mingling with the thunder.
