The first night I slept inside a mortuary with the mortuary attendant, I pretended to be asleep while the mortuary attendant quietly picked up a cutlass beside his mattress. Not long, someone started knocking from outside.

But that was a few hours ago.

Now, I was running away from the mortuary for my dear life.

As I marched through that bushy road, my body was dåmn cold. I couldn’t help but wrap my hands over my body.

Not too long, I started hearing footsteps… approaching footsteps from my behind.

Who could that be?

My heart skipped immediately; it slammed very hard against my chest.

At that point, I began to hope it wasn’t the person on my mind, because if it was, I would be as good as d3ad.

I fastened my pace, but only to start hearing the sound at my front.

Confusion slapped me on the face as I reached a sudden halt.

The footsteps were approaching towards me from the front.

I didn’t know what to do, I wanted to turn back and run, but to what end? To what end exactly?

How long was I gonna linger in that valley of fear and dread?

I stood still, my legs and hands were shivering, my eyes lurking around, anticipating what would happen next.

By the time the approaching footsteps got closer, I discovered they were two persons; a pregnant woman in labour and a middle aged man I presumed to be her husband.

When they got closer to me, I heard the woman’s painful moanings, and the part where the man said “don’t worry, Nkem… we will get to the health centre very soon.”

The moment they walked past me, I took a deep breath and continued moving.

By the time I brought out my phone to check the time, I was already a few centimetres away from my house.

“Thank you, Jesus.” I said in a whisper, as I placed my fist on our parlor door.

I began to knock on it.

I was expecting Papa and Mama to be deeply asleep by that time. But I was wrong.

Because after the third knock, the door opened.

It was Papa.

As soon as he saw me, he stepped out to see if anyone had followed me there. I saw real fear in my father’s eyes.

Then he pulled me inside the house and locked the door.

For the first time in a decade, he hugged me so passionately. Heaven knew how shocked I felt.

“I’m glad you’re back,” I heard him mumble. “My instinct was right, I knew you’d come back this night… I was heII worried about you.”

“Dad,” I said, pulling from the hug. Then I sank on the sofa closest to me.

Honestly, it felt so warm, and the cold had suddenly disappeared.

“I couldn’t stay there for the three nights as we agreed,” I said, shifting my gaze to the floor. I couldn’t muster the boldness to even look into his eyes while saying it.

“I had to run from that mortuary, because if i didn’t, It is my d3ad body you would have seen instead.” I added.

“God forbid.” He snapped, almost immediately, his voice barely above a whisper.

Then he stood up from his sofa and came to sit with me. At that point, I knew the next thing he wanted to ask me, and I didn’t want to prolong anything. My eyes were already becoming heavy for sleep.

I brought out the red envelope; in it was a small Flash drive.

I handed everything to him.

“Were you able to record anything?” He asked, collecting it from me.

He inserted it into his laptop.

“Yes, I did… more than you expected me to.” I answered.

Now, all the time I was at the mortuary, trying to pry into the activities of the mortician, everything I saw was recorded into the flash drive.

“Wow!… My son, you’ve done well,” he said in excitement, as the recordings displayed on the screen.

“You see,” he began, still staring at his screen. “As a detective and officer of the law, I can go any length to prove a point…

This evidence you just brought is all I need to crack this current case I’ve been trying to investigate in that mortuary…

it’s about a woman whose daughter’s b0dy parts were desecrated and tlṣṣues unIawfuIIy rem0ved and used for 0rgan trafflcklng.”

As he elucidated, the smile on his face remained there. It was obvious my mission to the mortuary meant a lot to him.

“But Papa, does that mean I would be given the two mill…” he didn’t let me finish.

“I haven’t forgotten… I will write you a cheque by tomorrow…” He cut in.

The moment I heard that, the sleep in my eyes vanished.

I leaned back slowly on the sofa, staring at nothing in particular, while Papa remained glued to the screen, replaying the recordings like a man who had finally found what he had been searching for.

His excitement filled the room.

But strangely… it didn’t reach me.

All I could hear, playing over and over in my head, was the voice of that woman at the mortuary… the one with the sack.

The way she spoke so casually.

The way the attendant laughed with her.

The way human fIesh had been handled like ordinary meat.

I swallowed hard.

“Papa…” I called softly.

He didn’t respond immediately. His eyes were still fixed on the screen.

“Hmm?” he finally answered.I hesitated.

For a moment, I didn’t even know what I wanted to say.

Then it came out.

“Those things… those people… all the things happening there… how long has it been going on?”

That made him pause.

He slowly lowered the phone and looked at me.

“For longer than you can imagine,” he replied calmly. “That’s why cases like this take time. You don’t just catch them… you build it properly.”

I nodded slowly.

That was the phrase. I looked down at my hands. They were still slightly trembling.

It wasn’t from fear anymore… but from something else I couldn’t quite explain.

I couldn’t tell if I had done something right… or something I would never fully be able to explain to myself.

Papa tapped my shoulder lightly.

“Go and rest,” he said. “You’ve done enough.”

I nodded and stood up slowly.

But as I walked towards my room, I realized something had quietly changed inside me.

That night, lying on my bed, I kept asking myself one question I couldn’t answer no matter how hard I tried—at what point did it stop being about the money?

Was it when I agreed to sleep beside the d3ad just to prove something?
Was it when I lay there, pretending to be asleep while evll walked in and out like it owned the night?
Or was it when I ran through that cold, empty road, my heart in my mouth, praying not to dle… only to return home and still ask for the money like nothing had happened?

Because somewhere between fear and survival, between doing the right thing and doing what I was told… I lost the ability to tell the difference.

Papa got his evidence. Justice would be served.
And me?

I got my reward.

But deep down, I knew something no amount of money could fix; I had seen how cheap a human life could become… and how easily mine was placed on the line for a cause I didn’t fully understand.

And the most frightening part of it all wasn’t the mortuary, or the people inside it…

It was realizing the fact that there’s nothing in this world… This life you’re enjoying now could be lost within the twinkle of an eye. In a nutshell, endeavour to do the right thing while you’re alive, because you shall give account when the time comes.

THE ENƊ

WHY I SLEPT INSIDE THE MORTUARY FOR THREE NIGHTS—EPISODE 8

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