The grinding machine rang loudly in my ears. I tried not to wander too far from my mother’s side, but the white butterfly had asked me to follow it, and I just had to. The smell of pepper was already irritating my eyes anyway.

My mother was distracted, arguing with the pepper seller about how fuel had jumped from ₦65 to ₦141 per litre and if that was as bad as it could get.

I followed the butterfly to the street beside the shop, where I stumbled on a Mirinda canter. It was still very neat, which meant more value.

My heart jumped. I blocked out the faint sound of my mother calling my name and bent to pick it, calculating how many I would give Mary in exchange for a new doll head.

That was the last thing I remembered before I received a resounding abara.

I had never been under anointing before, but I had seen women in my church. I was sure this was what it felt like.

I cried as my mother beat me. The pepper seller begged her to stop, but she dragged me home by my ear.

“One hour,” my mother said. “Let me just see those hands come down and you will see yourself.”

We were in the backyard, and it was getting dark. My arms burned, but I knew darkness meant my father would be home soon.

Then my mother’s Blackberry rang from inside the house.

It was my father. He was at the gate.

I cried harder until he came in and carried me. He called me his little princess and told me to stop crying.

A few minutes later, my mother said the food was ready. Her eyes met mine, and I followed her to set the table and bring the lantern. She lit it, served the food, and waited.

When my father sat, we prayed and started eating.

That was when I noticed it—two small pieces of meat floating in the soup.

Her apology.

We ate in silence. The lantern flickered. The smell of kerosene mixed with the steam rising from the food.

I don’t remember much after that.

Only that I still counted canters, making trades that made sense only in childhood logic.

But slowly, something began to change.

The news became heavier.

The country began to choke me.

My mother’s discipline grew harder.

My father’s presence became less constant.

And I started forgetting.

I try now to go back, to trace it all backwards like a thread.

But I never get far. Everything always stops at one place.

The backyard.

The lantern.

The two pieces of meat.

The white butterfly.

Maybe I developed amnesia, or maybe my mind refused to carry the weight of how it all began.

Maybe I am better off with this one memory.

All I know is that I would give anything to go back to when life was small enough to fit into canters, doll heads, and a white butterfly.