Blackass: A Novel

by A. Igoni Barrett

  20:02 | How can the police at Akowonjo Station tell Dad to pay them to go and find Furo???

  20:05 | I’m just tired of everything.

  22:47 | Going to bed. Goodnight everyone.

  From early on I distrusted the persona of @pweetychic_tk. I didn’t know why at first, as she seemed sincere enough in her tweets about herself, and so I put my scepticism down to my own suspicious nature. (Just to press home that point about my suspicious nature, here’s my first tweet upon opening my account: To make money off selling us to ourselves for free, that’s the business model of social media. Given the tone of this tweet, I’ll understand if netizens find it hard to believe when in future I declare that actually I don’t disapprove of social media. But I don’t and can’t and won’t. For one thing, I’m too much aware that my disapproval wouldn’t matter a Facebook poke to the billions who have adopted Facebook and Twitter as if they were new-age versions of Christianity and Islam. And then again, as @_igoni, how can I, in honesty, oppose the very medium responsible for my existence? My efforts would be better served in renouncing Jehovah from the pulpit of a Kingdom Hall. Jesus wept and the hashtag exists, that’s gospel, so I’ll move on to the real crux: my distrust of digital personas.) I was wrong to think that my scepticism was unfounded, as the more I learnt about Furo’s story, the more certain I became that his sister’s persona had to be either contrived or schizophrenic. For here was a young lady whose full-blood brother had just gone missing, and there she was on Twitter collecting followers and trading jokes? If her digital persona was not misleading, then her real one had to be full of shit.

  @pweetychic_tk: Thursday, 21 June

  03:36 | I think I’m starting to understand this Twitter thing oh …

  09:11 | Morning Twitterfam! See the sunny weather we’re enjoying in Eko!

  09:30 | Phone app lets women rate men like restaurants http://hfpv.to/629Nv via @HuffPoVidz

  09:31 | If that app had come out b4 it might have saved me from my rubbish ex! (See last tweet.)

  09:37 | Did anyone watch yesterday’s episode of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

  10:16 | Not a single retweet or mention since morning! #bored

  10:20 | The biggest #COCK I’ve ever seen belongs to the aboki who has a kiosk near my hostel!

  10:21 | FOOL => RT ‘@RUDEbwoyDeji: This #Unilag okpeke @pweetychic_tk has just fessed up that she likes aboki cock ha ha ha!’

  10:23 | @RUDEbwoyDeji Silence is the best answer for a FOOL.

  12:36 | WOOHOO! 104 new followers! #COCK tweets rule!

  12:47 | Some people are sending me angry DMs oh. #COCK

  12:50 | Confession time! #COCK

  12:51 | For all you tweeps who RTed my #COCK tweet, I meant CHICKEN! The aboki keeps a big fat chicken as a pet. #gotcha #LWKMD

  13:47 | Hmm. Follows have stopped since #COCK became CHICKEN. #justsaying

  13:50 | O se! :-) RT ‘@lazyeyedben: #ff @pweetychic_tk, one of the realest chics on Twitter.’

  15:27 | LOL RT ‘@drbigox: NEPA promo = Pay your bills regularly and win a generator.’

  16:01 | I miss @efyouaruoh. Where are you? Mum & Dad went to the newspapers today. This is not funny any more oh. #Furo

  16:06 | I’m sad :‘(@efyouaruoh won’t reply to his mentions & FB messages. Or is he lost 4 real?

  21:54 | See me see wahala! This ugly FOOL @RudebwoyDeji is still looking 4 my trouble!

  22:19 | Some people on Twitter are stupid sha. They think they can just say anything. But that’s easy to fix. @RudebwoyDeji, you’re BLOCKED.

  22:43 | Too much animosity on Twirrer tonight mehn … get a life you haters. #goodbye

  While searching for Furo’s story, I, too, underwent a transformation. I was more relieved than surprised by this happenstance. The seeds had always been there, embedded in the parched earth of my subconscious. I had heard their muted rattling in the remembered moments of my sleeping life; I had seen their shadowy branches overhanging the narrow road that wound into my future. As is usual with Damascus journeys, I only understood the portents after my conversion. (One such portent – or, rather, evidence of my subliminal preoccupation – can be recognised in this quote from an interview I granted a magazine a few months earlier: No human being has ever directly seen their own face. It’s impossible within nature – the most you can do is glimpse your nose and, for those with full lips, the curve of your upper lip. And so we only see ourselves through external sources, whether as images in mirrors, pixels on the screen, or words on the page, words of love from a mother, words of hate from an ex-lover.) Long before Furo’s story became my own, I was already trying to say what I see now, that we are all constructed narratives.

  @pweetychic_tk: Friday, 22 June

  09:45 | This thing is getting real. It’s now 4 whole days since my big bro #Furo got lost. See his missing ad in today’s (cont) http://tl.gd/ktdfkbt

  09:53 | I’m still disgusted at how the Christian Taliban twisted my #COCK tweet yesterday. It was just a joke – GET IT? #hypocrites

  09:54 | 4 all the #hypocrites who attacked me, I now have 1856 followers! Eat your hearts out!

  10:32 | WHAT have I done to this one AGAIN??? => @Nu9jaYoots

  10:41 | @Nu9jaYoots Who dash you #YOOT Leader? You can’t even bloody spell! #mschew

  10:52 | By their tweets we shall know them, Twitter #YOOT Leaders. With achieve-nothings like YOU no wonder PDP has a 68 y/o grandpa as Youth Leader!

  10:55 | Why am I even wasting my time? For my new followers, abeg see my next hashtag.

  10:57 | #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo #Furo

  10:59 | RT ‘@lazyeyedben: @pweetychic_tk Who is Furo?’ YOU don’t know? And to think you were my Twitter crush! You’re dumped! *stomps away*

  11:06 | :-) RT ‘@lazyeyedben: @pweetychic_tk *singing* Please don’t go, don’t gooo …’

  11:42 | I love Twirrer.

  11:42 | Facebook is sooo yesterday.

  11:43 | RT ‘@Lurv_Facts: Women are biologically attracted to a-holes because their traits resemble those needed for survival in the wild.’

  11:44 | Retweets are NOT endorsements!

  11:49 | I just lost 3 followers. WTF. Why can’t I get to 2000???

  14:49 | For those who haven’t seen this yet, here’s my big brother’s missing advert in today’s newspaper: twitpic.com/yjs75Np #Furo

  17:30 | God I LOVE this picture! twitpic.com/bzR76on via @JimmyChooLtd

  17:31 | I’ll gladly endure the pain of wearing a tight pair of shoes … if it looks good LOL.

  20:03 | I’m not pregnant. That’s a relief.

  20:40 | _|_ (-.-) _|_ to @emem_1987 & @anpasticru

  20:42 | Twitter is beginning to piss me off sha!

  20:44 | Some RATS don’t know when to choke on their evil thoughts @emem_1987 @anpasticru

  20:45 | I came here to look for my missing bro. Every other thing is dirt off my shoulder.

  20:49 | This! RT ‘@lazyeyedben: I’m digging your style @pweetychic_tk. Don’t mind the olofofos.’

  20:49 | THANKS @lazyeyedben! You’re such a cool dude!

  21:04 | Co-sign => RT ‘@Rihanna: The one person you can’t run from is YOU!!!’

  21:05 | I ♥ @Rihanna! #justsaying

  21:15 | Mum & Dad have returned. Mum is crying again. My life is so not fun right now.

  21:41 | OMG!!! Mummy wants to go to the mortuary 2moro to look for Furo!!!

  22:17 | 2moro is officially the worst day of my life. #goodnight

  My handle is @_igoni and I was born into the Twitter stream in January 2009. Apart from tweeting links to my online publications as well as other articles I’d enjoyed reading, I didn’t have much to do in my short existence. Until, that is, I found @pweetychic_tk and, through her, @efyouaruoh. Furo’s Twitter page displayed as its profile photo an image of sunglasses-wearing Neo from The Matrix, and the profile name was ‘FW’, while the bio read, ‘Lagos-based job hunter,’ and so, if not for his sister’s tweets, @efyouaruoh would have
remained a cipher for ever vanished into the dead-end alleys of the Web, just another one of hundreds of millions of unverified Twitter handles with a meagre following and a preference for the pseudonymous; and, to boot, a digital persona whose final breath was drawn at 00:13 on 18 June. ‘Nepa bring light abeg,’ he tweeted, and then nothing ever again. Silence, on Twitter, is as good as death, and if life hadn’t intervened to bring us together on the day after his final tweet, I might never have found myself scrolling through the timelines of the dead, searching for the POVs of the real person in the ghosts of their digital personas.

  @pweetychic_tk: Saturday, 23 June

  11:15 | This is NOT a good morning. Dad is driving us to the #mortuary in Ikeja. We’re going to search for #Furo there!

  12:21 | I just knew the place would be UGLY twitpic.com/bzT67oM #mortuary

  12:27 | It STINKS inside!!!! twitpic.com/c4KnnIP #mortuary

  12:33 | RT ‘@Nneka_Or: omg can this be Lagos?? RT @pweetychic_tk: It STINKS inside!!!! twitpic.com/c4KnnIP #mortuary’

  12:33 | RT ‘@PrinceofmoJo: RT @infoeNGine: Lagos govt shuts down smelly #mortuary http://dlvr.it/2NLieR @pweetychic_tk’

  13:03 | THOSE ARE DEAD PEOPLE!!! twitpic.com/bzs24bP #mortuary

  13:05 | RT ‘@asiwajuayo: WTF! Naija should suffer a natural disaster! RT @pweetychic_tk: THOSE ARE DEAD PEOPLE!!! twitpic.com/bzs24bP #mortuary’

  13:05 | RT ‘enugu2coventry: This is unspeakably shameful. RT @pweetychic_tk: THOSE ARE DEAD PEOPLE!!! twitpic.com/bzs24bP #mortuary’

  13:06 | RT ‘@PrinceofmoJo: RT @punchonthenet: Rear Admiral’s missing daughter found in Lagos #mortuary http://dlvr.it/2NLtuM @pweetychic_tk’

  13:33 | When I die I want to be cremated! On the same day! twitpic.com/ZvY80pQ #mortuary

  13:48 | O_o RT ‘@gambianfaust: @pweetychic_tk My granny died & I wanted 2 keep a part of her with me. So after her cremation, I snorted the ashes.’

  13:48 | RT ‘@MarkyMona: @pweetychic_tk Thx 4 raising awareness abt this prob. See the #mortuary they kept my father in! pic.twitter.com/rU1ogDtS’

  14:07 | I just threw up a little in my mouth. Even dead people don’t deserve this. #mortuary

  14:22 | RT ‘@PrinceofmoJo: RT @HMNews: Nigeria | Floods: #Mortuary Attendants Stack Corpses on Rooftops http://dlvr.it/2NLdG @pweetychic_tk’

  14:26 | @PrinceofmoJo Stop tweeting those links at me you PERVERT!!!

  14:27 | Apologies 2 my followers 4 the error, but please don’t RT or click on @PrinceofmoJo #mortuary links. They’re porn.

  14:44 | RT ‘@asiwajuayo: Yay! @pweetychic_tk is the reason! RT @TrendsLagos: ‘mortuary’ is now trending in #Lagos: http://trendsmap.com/ng/lagos’

  15:12 | Thanks ALL!!! My phone battery’s about to die, I have to go now. #mortuary

  23:17 | OMG!!!!!! @DONJAZZY retweeted me!!!

  When I’d learned enough about Furo’s story to be sure I was committed to following it to the end, I tweeted @pweetychic_tk. In remarkable time she had become a Twitter celeb, gathering seven times as many followers in a week as I had in four years, so I wasn’t certain she would respond to a Twitter lightweight like me. (Question: How did she get so many followers so fast? Answer: Check out the first page of the Google search for ‘get Twitter followers fast’. In other words, she did the work.) With this in mind – ‘this’ being my dread of getting rebuffed in public – I pondered on the approach most likely to succeed, at the same time studying her timeline for any clues that might help with my decision, which I indeed reached upon seeing a serendipitous tweet of hers. From meeting her brother I knew about our shared ethnicity, and so, to indicate to her that we had a connection deeper than Twitter esprit de corps, I greeted her in Kalabari before offering to buy her ice cream. Calculation always trumps sincerity on social media. Yet I must admit that when she not only replied my tweet but also accepted my offer, I was buffaloed.

  @pweetychic_tk: Sunday, 24 June

  07:33 | Good morning folks! Thanks for all the RTs & mentions yesterday!! #mortuary

  07:33 | And happy Sunday to ALL my new followers! Have you seen my hashtag #Furo yet?

  07:35 | So @DONJAZZY RTed me yesterday & my phone hasn’t stopped buzzing. #Thank you

  08:45 | I’m off to church. Yes oh, I believe in all that bible stuff; o)

  09:41 | I’m seriously craving ice cream. It’s all this hellfire talk I’m sure!

  09:57 | Pastor finish soon oh so my Daddy can buy me ice cream LOL!

  09:59 | TWITTER FIGHT ALERT!!!

  09:59 | RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: I’m Ethiopian and I’m SO offended by @afrikais1country’

  10:01 | O_o RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @afrikais1country Ethiopians are a proud people. We’re not like the rest of you African booty scratchers. #HornPride’

  10:04 | RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @VJ_Singhing If @afrikais1country wants to mock that way of thinking it should be called AFRICA-IS-A-CONTINENT.’

  10:06 | RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @VJ_Singhing YOU shouldn’t even be on this topic of Africans! You look like you eat curry in Mumbai.’

  10:08 | TWEEPS!!! See #HornPride for the latest. I’ll only retweet the best insults ha ha!

  10:10 | #HornPride RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @naijapalaver Nigeria was colonised just like the rest of Africa. Ethiopia was NOT.’

  10:13 | #HornPride RT ‘@_igoni: @kweenofsheebah Seems you need reminding that tiny Eritrea kicked your butt. @pweetychic_tk’

  10:15 | #HornPride RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @_igoni Don’t tell me about butt-kicking when your people were dragged to the US to pick cotton & get whipped!’

  10:15 | See my last retweet! @kweenofsheebah is subbing NIGERIANS!!! #HornPride

  10:35 | NOooo! RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: @pweetychic_tk Stop hashing my tweets you repulsive Nigerian troll!’ #HornPride

  11:01 | Church is finally over!!!

  11:05 | Have you seen @kweenofsheebah bio? @afrikais 1country #HornPride

  11:06 | @kweenofsheebah YOU live in CANADA & yet you talk shit about AFRICA???

  11:31 | #HornPride RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: Shut up all you poor Africans. Go fix your starving 3rd world countries. That should keep y’all busy.’

  11:50 | My fingers hurt from all the RTing, but this has got to be the best fight ever! And a BIG hello to all my new followers!!! #HornPride

  11:51 | :-) #HornPride RT ‘@kweenofsheebah: All you Nigerian scammers tweeting threats at me, I’ve nothing to say to you.’

  12:11 | YAY! RT ‘@lazyeyedben: #HornPride is trending! 2 days in a row @pweetychic_tk has put Lagos on the map! I love that gal!!’

  12:43 | No more tweets from @kweenofsheebah in the last 20 minutes. She’s run off to lick her wounds. Good riddance to bad rubbish!

  13:00 | Time for ice cream!!!

  13:11 | Aargh! Mum is still waiting to see Pastor! I’m stuck here with Dad until she’s done. No ice cream! *sheds angry tears*

  13:13 | Ooh yes please! RT ‘@_igoni: Tobra, @pweetychic_tk. I’ll buy you ice cream. Least I can do after you provided my Sunday entertainment.’

  13:14 | @_igoni I’m at the Winners Chapel on Akowojo Road in Egbeda.

  13:49 | Just got off the phone with my new Twitterpal @_igoni … #crazyexcited

  13:57 | @_igoni arrives! twitpic.com/bzBvv3h

  15:43 | Eating ice cream with @_igoni at The Palms in Lekki! twitpic.com/bzFu2dl

  20:03 | Today’s stupid rain couldn’t spoil all the fun I had with @_igoni! Now heading home in one of those new metro cabs! #enjoyment

  20:14 | 4,743 RTs & 86 favs of my first-ever tweet about #Furo (You guys ROCK!!!)

  21:37 | Mum needs to chillax! I can’t go out again because Furo got lost???

  22:31 | I’m thinking about the long talk @_igoni and I had about #Furo today.

  22:35 | @_igoni And imiete for the @ColdStone ice cream!!!

  23:22 | :o))) RT ‘@_igoni: @pweetychic_tk The pleasure was mine. See you again soon.’

  23:45 | Ooooh just 2 followers short of 7,000!!!

  23:46 | *staggers across bedroom* *flops
on bed* *hugs teddy bear* #happy #goodnight

  Five days after I found her on Twitter, I got a chance to meet @pweetychic_tk. I was conflicted about that move – should the artist probe too deeply into the mundane lives of their characters – but grabbed the chance anyway. We met by arrangement at the gate of her church in Egbeda on an overcast Sunday afternoon after the close of service and, at her suggestion, I took her to The Palms in Lekki for ice cream. Her name was Tekena. (When she asked what she should call me, @_igoni or just plain Igoni, I joked, ‘Call me Morpheus.’)

  BLACKASS

  ‘I scarcely dared to look to see what it was I was.’

  —Elizabeth Bishop, In the Waiting Room

  On Thursday, 21 June, Syreeta gave Furo an old phone that she no longer used, and after she loaded it with airtime, she made a call to someone she knew at the passport office in Ikoyi. A new passport would cost nine thousand naira and take three months to process, but through her contact it would take three days and cost seventeen thousand. Furo didn’t have the money, and he said so in a voice shocked into loudness after hearing Syreeta say into the phone, ‘We’ll come tomorrow,’ but she shushed him with a finger pressed to her lips, then muffled the phone against her chest and whispered to him, ‘At least see the man first, get the application form.’ Furo shut up in agreement, and on Friday morning she drove him to the passport office, parked the car by the gate, and handed him an unsealed envelope. ‘That’s twenty thousand,’ she said, and when his outpourings of gratitude had dragged on too long, she interrupted, ‘Go on. The man is waiting.’

  The arrangement was for Furo to wait by the flagpole at the passport office entrance until Syreeta’s contact came to fetch him. Easy instructions to follow: so easy that Furo dreaded the difficulties that must arise. It seemed to him imprudent, provoking – a clear-cut case of trouble dey sleep, yanga go wake am – to walk into the lair of immigration officials and stand under the Nigerian flag. But the previous day, after the set-up phone call, when he disclosed his misgivings to Syreeta, she had laughed them off. Her confidence only served to bolster his doubts, which grew even bigger after he got down from the car and watched her drive off to her appointment at the beauty salon. But he had no time to dwell on his superstitions, as his appearance had caused a tidal wave of excitement in the horde of informal agents, the hustlers, young men and the odd woman who rushed about offering help to everyone who approached. When this crowd fell on him with their frenzied cawing, their begging stares and smarmy smirks, he hurried forwards with his hands guarding his pockets and his lowered head shaking no until he entered the gate of the passport office, through which none of the hustlers ventured. After he halted beside the flagpole, he placed the call. ‘It’s Syreeta’s friend. I’m here, under the flag,’ he said into the phone, and the man grunted in acknowledgement, then ended the call. Furo glanced around, searching for a face that matched that voice. The man’s number was stored in the phone as Passport Man. Furo had asked Syreeta for his real name, but she didn’t know it and neither did her friend who had recommended his services to her. For safety from sting operations and disgruntled customers, Furo supposed. Another reason to worry.