Six months down the line, and goodness, what a terrible person I had become!

That stony heart inside me had found a safe place to flourish in the company of Castro and Emma, and out of it flowed so much hatred and wickedness. That seed of bitterness that was planted a while back had exponentially grown into a tree. And the fruit it bore… well, the Bible says that every good tree brings forth good fruit, but the corrupt tree brings forth evil fruit, so, that speaks for itself.

But yeah, I had become a horrible, horrible person.

After that first day when we went to steal the iPhones, we went on a serious roll of stealing stuff, mainly from that side of town we called ‘Heaven Kitiwa’. Yeah, we were seriously brazen with our acts, snatching whatever expensive thing we could get from people. And the proceeds we got from selling off the stolen goods were wasted on the most useless of things. Just food, drinks and drugs. I wasn’t into the drugs, but I loved the food and alcohol.

And I was absolutely loving it. I loved every moment of it. It felt like the perfect way to utilize all the spite stored up in my heart. It didn’t matter that it was no fault of any victim of ours that my origins were that crazy. Once they were bearing the brunt of my anger, that was all that mattered.

***

“Mawuli! What is wrong with you? How can you be hanging out with those boys? Don’t you know they are nothing but trouble? Huh? Do you want to disgrace me? Do you want to bring shame upon me?”

It was nothing short of ugly when my mother discovered my involvement with Castro and Emma. She was not happy at all that I had defied her orders and taken them as friends. The fact that it had gone under her nose for almost six months also didn’t help matters. That obviously meant we had been moving for quite a while.

The signs were there, though, which is how she found out. For one, their cheekiness and rough nature – traits I had come to discover from them as time went on – was rubbing off on me, so now I found it rather easy to talk back to my mother whenever she had a problem with me. Back then, you couldn’t pay me to even attempt such a thing. But with those boys in my life, this depraved nature had suddenly been unlocked, and slowly but surely, it was showing forth.

I had become dismissive and pretty rude, not really bothered about stepping on the toes of those around me. My grand-uncle and the other adults around weren’t amused at all, and were now regularly complaining.

Also, I was coming home with some healthy amounts of money every now and then. Obviously the proceeds from the operations we undertook. I didn’t let them see, but somehow, they could tell I was on some money roll.

It was one morning when my mother went in to clean my room that she found some monies under my pillow, with a note attached to it from Castro.

Yeah, I was busted. It was in my room that she was ripping into me with a passion.

“And you are taking money from them! Big money! Heh? Young boys like these, where do you think they got the money from? Is it not robberies? Herh, Mawuli, I will not allow you to disgrace me ooo!”

At that point, like I said, I was really in touch with my disrespectful side, so I wasn’t going to let her shout me down. Not when these guys she complained of were giving me good money to enjoy and I was on a prolonged high on the adrenaline and the thrill of going crazy and letting my rage out. With each expedition we went on, stealing people’s phones and valuables, even going as far as beating some of our victims, there was this pleasure I derived from it, and I wasn’t going to let it end any time soon.

“Please, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I spat back at her. “This is just some money that I-I needed to borrow from him and I-I-“

“Borrow from him for the where? Massa, don’t come and tell me silly lies! Do you think I was born with no brains? If there’s anyone you’ll borrow money from, is it that bad boy? Listen, you must return this money right now! God forbid that a robber’s money will sit in my house. Come on, hurry up, take it! Go and give it back to those rascals, and listen, don’t ever go back to those boys!”

“Please ooo, I’m not taking anything to them,” I shot back, glaring at her. “It’s my money. I won’t give anything back to them.”

She looked stunned, her mouth agape as she stared at me for a few moments.

“Ei, Mawuli, what has happened to you? Where from this… ei, wait. Herh, Mawuli, is this… is this what those boys have done to you? Ei, Mawuli, my son! My son ooo, my son! This is not you! This is not you! THIS IS NOT YOUUUU!”

Before I knew it, she had grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and was vigorously shaking me, as if the madness that had taken hold of my brain could easily be shaken out by that. It was like she now understood why I had become the way I had, and was absolutely aghast at this revelation. Not shocking, to be honest. After all, that was every parent’s worst fear in the hood: for their child to any dealing of any kind with those two.

At that point, though, I was gone. Long gone.

Hanging out with those two boys, coupled with the bitterness that had quickly grown into a full-blown contempt for all things, had really blown a fuse in my brain. Now I was this dark-hearted young man with no regard for that which I had been taught to uphold.

I shoved her off and snarled at her, “Don’t touch me like that again, or you won’t like what will follow.”

The shock intensified on her face. “Ei, Mawuli, is it me you’re talking to like that?”

“Am I talking to the air?”

Chale. The mere memory of that retort makes me cringe with disgust. Such a dishonourable way to speak to your mother!

She was livid. Her hand immediately went flying towards my cheek.

I swerved that slap just in time, and pushed her away roughly. “You figure sey I dey joke, eh?” I barked at her as she stumbled backward. “Try that again and see if I won’t do something crazy!”

Now it was horror. Sheer horror on her face as she looked at me. I, on the other hand, had the coldest, meanest, evilest stare on my face.

“Jesus Christ! Mawuli! Mawuli! Mawuli eeee!”

My mother’s shrieks hit the back of my ears as I stormed out of the room and out of the house completely.

I went to the boys’ end and stuck around for the rest of the day. We didn’t do anything profitable throughout the day; just listening to dark, godless music that promotes evil and hanging around, talking about the most useless of things. It wasn’t until 11:45 pm that I left their den to return home.

I went, only to find out that the gate had been locked.

Can you imagine I had to audacity to bang on the gate multiple times, yelling at the inhabitants to open up immediately? Hmmm. As we would say in pidgin, I really tear chain at that point.

My grand-uncle and one gentleman occupying one of the other two rooms came out to meet me at the gate. As you can imagine, they were extremely mad. I mean, the audacity of this teenager to bang on the gate incessantly and demand to be let in after spending the entire day out of the house.

My grand-uncle ripped into me like crazy, letting me know he had been informed I was spending time with those boys, and he was extremely disappointed that I had allowed myself to be swayed so negatively by young men I had been warned about. He was absolutely livid that I was now resorting to getting physical with my mother, and reminded me how she was living solely to ensure I was catered for.

I couldn’t have been the least bothered at that point. “Chale, chale, chale, I want to go and sleep. I’m tired.”

That was my response to this man in his late seventies as I tried to shove past him and go to my room.

Of course, he and the other gentleman would not let me through. My rudeness was not going to be rewarded with a smooth path to my bed.

“Herh, Mawuli, where do you think you’re going?”

“Herh, Mawuli, what is wrong with you? Ah, young man, you can’t be behaving like this!”

“Please! Please! I don’t have time for your long lectures! I want to go and sleep!”

I wasn’t ready to submit to these older men. I was ready to barge right through them and go to bed. I really didn’t care.

They resisted me fiercely, though, and my disrespectful self went back and forth with them, literally causing a racket and waking so many neighbours up. It wasn’t long before I flipped the middle finger at them and walked away.

That, ladies and gentlemen, was the last time I slept in that house. For the next three years, I joined Castro and Emma at their den.

Yes, you read that right. I walked away from the house, joined the boys in their hideout, and never returned to the house. Even after they called me and told me to come back, I cussed them out and told them they could ‘chew their house if they wanted to’. As far as I was concerned, I would not go back.

Of course, they tried their best to track me down and smoke me out of the den in which I was in. all their attempts were unsuccessful, however, and I remained elusive, remaining with Castro and Emma as we continued to wreak havoc on the communities around us.

It’s amazing whenever I think about it. Three good years.

Three good years.

They went by so quickly. And I did nothing productive with my life in that period. I stopped going to school altogether, spent my days turning into a hard smoker and drinker, and a callous thief at that. Very callous.

By the time we reached the age of eighteen, we had graduated to higher levels of thievery, our favourite being the method of pretending to be good Samaritans willing to give a person a lift, only to rob them afterward. One of us would drive the car, move the person to a secluded place where the other two would be waiting, and then strip the person of all he or she had. Sometimes we’d even beat them to a bloody pulp.

Well, one day, I was the one behind the wheel. I was driving around the streets, looking out for one gullible person to lure into the trap. Then at the traffic light junction, I chanced upon this young guy wearing a purple shirt and jeans, who was waving about for a car. He looked pretty desperate, so that was my cue. I honked at him and gestured to him that I’d give him a lift.

He was so happy, gushing about being grateful and how I’d saved him from getting into major trouble at home and all that. All I was thinking about was getting to our usual grounds and dishing out our usual punishment on him.

Five minutes later, we were at the secluded, untarred road where we usually carried out our dastardly deeds. On cue, Castro and Emma popped out of the bushes nearby, carrying blocks of wood as they yelled at the guy to get out of the car and lie on the floor.

They quickly proceeded to strip him of all the valuables he had on him, while I watched on. Snickering as they took his phone and watch, I was loving every minute of it. It never got old to me, seeing these people helpless and at our mercy. The rush of power it gave me!

Then, suddenly, I heard cocked guns.

“Freeze!”

“Put your hands in the air now!”

The three of us looked behind, and there stood a good number of police officers, armed to the teeth, pointing their guns at us and roaring out instructions.

It was at that point that we knew… our three-year reign of terror had come to an end.

We were busted.

Hmmm, he really became a bad boy, didn’t he? Well, he and his guys got caught, and rightly so…