At Checkpoint

I took my seat on the bus that was set to take me home, many things about the bus was getting me uncomfortable especially the sound of the engine.
It was going to be a long day, and the road was long and dry. It was 3hr journey to my house.

As we approached a police checkpoint ahead, the bus came to a halt, and my heart sank because they will be waisting more of our time. Instead of conducting a proper check on everybody, they were busy moving their eyes up and down through the passengers, and like a scene from a Nollywood movie, they picked three of us out from the crowd, two women and one guy.

One officer barked that we stepped forward, and then I felt fears running through me. What had we done to deserve this? Was it the way I was dressed? My sunglasses or my jeans? With hesitant steps, we approached them, and truth be told, I was scared.

As we stood by the bus, the officers instructed us to identify our belongings. I felt like a criminal. I slowly pointed at my bag. The officer’s expression was hard as they roughly went through our things, and I couldn’t shake the thought: Will they find something? Something that would turn this moment into a nightmare? Because I had some paracetamol and septrin tablets.

Do you have anything illegal on you?
one officer threw the question at me. I began to stammer but I was able to say no afterwards as I shook my head.