ADAUGO

It was in the early eighties, around the time a group of senior army officers overthrew the democratically elected government, when Austrian lace and aso-oke were trendy and church services were fashion shows - an endless, shameless carnival of women in colorful blouses blended with expensive ichafu which they tied in layers and pleats until the scarves were piled atop their heads like a large plant, obstructing the view of everyone seated behind them. Everyone looked forward to Sundays, going to church. Those who could not afford these processions snuck in very early for the children's service, because that was the graceful thing to do - worship with the children in their simple clothes of cheap blouses over Nigerian wax, and second-hand shoes whose heels had worn out and made koi-koi-koi sounds on the tiled floor.

It was on a Monday morning after one of those Sundays that Adaugo walked into Barrister Chike's office for the first time.

The room was empty. the fan whirled, scattering the papers on the cluttered desk. They floated to the floor, slid under the table, under the chair, by the door, and by her feet. She wondered if it would be awkward to walk in uninvited and pick them up. She knocked again, louder this time. "Hello!" she called out, her voice echoing. There was a click of heels. A girl emerged from the connecting door, her blue skirt so short she would not be comfortable if she were to bend over to get the papers. The name tag pinned to her white blouse said she was "Nneka".

"What do you want?" she asked, her gaze piercing.

"Your papers" Adaugo pointed at the floor, but Nneka wrinkled her nose, ignoring the scattered sheets, arching an eyebrow. "I am looking for Barrister Chike," Adaugo said, bringing out the business card her father gave her, holding it up for Nneka to see.

"Come in," Nneka said, waving her into the waiting room, and only after Adaugo had gone did she crouch carefully - not bend, because she could never bend without exposing her underwear - to pick up the scattered papers.

When her father described the address, Adaugo had expected to see a proper workplace, or at least, a hall split into cubicles. She had never been in a Barrister's office and so did not know what the place would look like. But this was anything but an office. It was a typical two- or three-bedroom flat, the same model many houses around the area replicated. Without being told, she knew that the 'waiting room' was originally the sitting room and that the connecting door led to Barrister Chike's office, which most likely had a master toilet. A small TV, half the size of her family's Philips black and white TV, was locked away in a metal cage knocked into the wall. She resisted the urge to laugh, because who on God's earth would want anything to do with that toy?

Nneka returned but headed straight for the barrister's office. "Barrister Chike will see you after he is done attending to the client inside," she said when she re-emerged, with an exaggerated air of importance about her.

Adaugo began to say thank you, but Nneka was already koi-koi-koi-ing away. She looked no more than seventeen or eighteen, perhaps a secondary school leaver like Adaugo, who was passing the time as a receptionist while waiting for a university admission letter.

A short bespectacled man walked in and took the seat opposite. Adaugo greeted him but the man did not respond. Soon, other visitors arrived, some wearing long faces, others tapping their feet impatiently after a few minutes. Adaugo wondered what cases they were battling, or if they had also come to seek Barrister Chike's help with things like gaining admission into a university. She opened her bag and brought out her JAMB result: 240. Good enough to get her into the state university. But her father wanted her to study in the east, so she had chosen the University of Nigeria in Nsukka. Nsukka was a place they barely knew, plus, often, the number of students that passed the exams exceeded the capacity a school could admit, so it was customary to go through people who knew powerful staff in a University. Why they needed Barrister Chike's help.