The story of the trio begins with Grace (The gang leader).
Grace was never meant to be quiet.
At fourteen, she already walked with the measured grace of a woman who knew her worth. She was a striking sight against the emerald-green backdrop of Etche—beautiful, tall, curvy, and fair-skinned. In the dusty playgrounds and the narrow, red-earth paths of her hometown in Rivers State, she didn't answer to "Little Girl" or "Junior." To everyone who knew her, she was simply the "Gang Leader."
The nickname didn't come from a place of mischief. It was born from the fire that danced in her eyes and the natural authority in her voice. When Grace spoke, the neighborhood children stopped their play to listen; when she pointed toward the stream, they followed. She possessed a rare charisma that turned a chaotic group of peers into a loyal tribe. She was their compass and their voice.
Life in Etche was simple, predictable, and warm, like a well-worn wrapper. Grace was the vibrant heart of a family of six. She lived in the comfortable shadows of her older sister, Gift, and her older brother, Dominion, while acting as a fierce guardian to her younger brother, Daniel. Their home was filled with the rhythmic sound of her mother pounding yam and the deep, boisterous laughter of her father returning from work.
But the world as she knew it ended on the 12th of June, 2017.
It was a Monday morning that smelled of impending rain—that heavy, metallic scent that hangs in the Nigerian air before the clouds break. Her parents had been on their way to the market, a routine trip that should have ended with heavy bags of foodstuffs and stories from the stalls. Instead, the screech of tires on asphalt and the sickening crunch of metal on a lonely stretch of road claimed their lives. In an instant, the vibrant tapestry of their family was shredded. The silence that followed was a cold, heavy thing that no amount of wailing or mourning could ever fill.
The "Gang Leader" was suddenly a girl without a command. The accident hadn't just taken her parents; it had ripped the foundation from beneath the four siblings. The village life Grace loved—the community school, the evening stories, the safety of her father's roof—became a collection of ghosts and painful memories.
The separation came quickly, like salt rubbed into an open wound. In the weeks following the funeral, the family of six became a scattered few. Gift, the eldest, had just completed her National Diploma in Marketing at Ken Saro-Wiwa Polytechnic in Bori. With the sharp, desperate resolve of a grieving daughter, she looked at her paternal relatives—people who suddenly felt like calculating strangers—and made a choice.
"I am not staying here," Gift whispered, packing the remnants of her life into a single Ghana-must-go bag. She refused to be beholden to uncles who looked at their inheritance with more greed than they looked at the orphaned children. She fled to Choba, seeking refuge with their maternal grandmother.
Gift took on the mantle of the head of the family, but the weight was crushing. She found a job teaching at a small school that could only afford to pay her fifty thousand naira a month. It was a pittance for someone with her drive, barely enough to keep her own stomach full, let alone fuel her dreams of returning for her Higher National Diploma.
The boys were scattered across the sprawling city of Port Harcourt like seeds cast into a gale. Dominion, whose mind was a maze of logic and codes, had his sights set on studying Computer Science at the University of Port Harcourt. He was sent to live with an uncle in the quiet, paved, and affluent streets of Rumuibekwe. Daniel, the baby of the house, was sent to a paternal aunt in Eliozu. For the boys, life maintained a ghost of its former normalcy. They were fed, they were clothed, and most importantly, they were sent to school.
But for Grace, the road led to Rumuigbo—and into a valley of shadows.
Her aunt's house was not a home; it was a gilded cage. Grace was supposed to be starting her first year of Senior Secondary School (SS1), a time for literature and equations. But her aunt looked at Grace—at her height, her glowing fair skin, and that undeniable spark of leadership—and felt a poisonous seed of envy take root.
"Why should this orphan be better than my own daughters?" the aunt would mutter to the kitchen walls while Grace scrubbed the floors.
With a heart as hard as a river stone, the aunt made a decision that felt like a death sentence to Grace's future. She refused to pay for school fees or uniforms. Instead, she dragged Grace to a cramped, humid shop down the street: Mummy Vero's Hair Salon. To the neighbors and the inquisitive relatives, the aunt spun a jagged lie: "Grace has no head for books. The girl is stubborn. She begged me to let her learn a trade instead."
And so, while her brothers sat in classrooms, Grace spent her days standing over the heads of strangers. Her fingers, once used to holding pens and leading her friends, were now stained with hair relaxer and dark pomade. She wove braids while her own dreams seemed to unravel on the salon floor.
Across town in Choba, the air felt lighter for Gift. Their maternal grandmother was a vibrant woman in her sixties who refused to let the world dim her light. She was a retired soul with the energy of a woman in her prime. Her house was a clever patchwork of history; she had converted the main building into single-room rentals to ensure her survival, leaving a cozy two-room wing for herself, a loyal house-help, and Gift. In that small space, there was the smell of fresh peppersoup and the sound of genuine laughter—a stark contrast to the cold bitterness Grace faced.
September in Port Harcourt usually arrived with a frantic, electric energy. The air changed, losing some of the heavy August humidity and replacing it with the sound of progress. The streets were filled with mothers haggling over the price of "Bata" shoes and vendors weaving through traffic with towers of white school shirts balanced on their heads. But for Grace, September arrived like a cold, sharp blade to the heart.
Inside her aunt's house, the atmosphere was festive for everyone but her. The morning routine had become a ritual of torture. At 6:00 AM, the house would wake up to the smell of starch and hot irons. Grace was the one who plugged in the iron, pressing the pleats of her cousins' uniforms until they were sharp enough to cut paper. She felt like a ghost, moving through the steam and the noise of children searching for lost socks and misplaced rulers.
She stood in the corner of the living room, a shadow in her own home, watching as her cousins paraded their new lunch boxes—brightly colored plastic that smelled like a fresh start. They had new bags with sturdy zips and school shoes that clicked loudly on the floor tiles. Every time she heard the zip-rip of a new backpack being opened, Grace felt a sharp, physical pang in her chest. It was the pain of a girl who was being erased from the future she had imagined for herself.
The news from her siblings only added to the weight. She had recently learned that her younger brother, Daniel, was officially starting JSS3. Even though his school in Eliozu was modest—a small private school that felt like a government center—he was moving forward. He had a desk with his name scratched into it. He had a teacher who would call his name during roll call. He had a future that was being written in ink.
Grace, the "Gang Leader" who should have been leading her class into the challenges of SS1, was left with nothing but a comb, a spray bottle of water, and a heart full of unspoken questions.
When she arrived at Mummy Vero's salon, the pain didn't go away; it just went into hiding. She walked into the shop every morning with a smile that reached her ears, throwing jokes and making the other apprentices laugh until their sides ached. She was the soul of the shop, the one who could turn a boring Tuesday morning into a party. But as the school term officially began, the salon became a different kind of classroom.
Groups of students began coming in during the afternoons, still wearing their school uniforms, to get their hair braided for the new term. Grace would stand over them, her fingers weaving strands of hair while her ears drank in their conversations.
"Our new Chemistry teacher is so strict," one girl would moan, scrolling through a textbook.
"Did you see the literature list for this year? We are reading The Lion and the Jewel!" another would reply.
Grace would look down at the textbooks resting on their laps. Her eyes would hungry-read the titles on the covers—New General Mathematics, Essential Biology, Senior English Project. She wanted to reach out and touch the pages, to feel the rough paper under her fingertips, but she had to keep her hands on the hair.
Sometimes, the customers were too observant for Grace's comfort. A woman sitting in the styling chair would look at Grace's youthful, fair face, then at her height and the intelligent way she carried herself, and ask the question Grace dreaded most.
"My daughter, you are so smart. Why are you not in school? Are you not supposed to be in class by now?"
For a split second, the mask would crack. Grace's eyes would go dim, her vibrant spirit retreating into a dark corner. Her hands would freeze mid-braid, the comb hovering in the air like a broken wing. The lively "Gang Leader" would vanish, replaced by a ghost of the girl she used to be. But Grace was a master of the "up-and-down" mood. In a matter of seconds, she would force the light back into her eyes and the smile back onto her lips. She would act as if the hair dryer was too loud or as if she were too focused on the precision of a difficult parting.
"Mummy, this style is very fine o! Look at how it's bringing out your face," she would say, her voice bright and hollow. She dodged the questions with the skill of a politician, weaving her way out of the conversation as neatly as she wove a Ghana-braid.
Mummy Vero watched these exchanges from the back of the shop, her heart breaking a little more each day. She saw the way Grace looked at the school buses passing by. She saw the longing in the way Grace stared at the students' notebooks. Mummy Vero wished with everything in her that she could be the one to pay the fees, buy the books, and hand Grace a freshly laundered uniform.
But life was a hard teacher for Mummy Vero, too. With her husband's hospital bills piling up and three children of her own to clothe and feed, she was barely keeping her own head above the rising water. She could offer Grace love, she could offer her a trade, and she could offer her a hot meal in the afternoons—but she could not offer her a classroom.
Dominion was now a "Uniport student," a title he carried with solemn pride. He navigated the bustling campus, his bag heavy with textbooks, commuting daily from Rumuibekwe. He was moving toward a future, his feet finally finding solid ground. Even young Daniel had found a rhythm in Eliozu. He had become a protector to his cousins, a mini "Gang Leader" in his own right, enrolled in a modest private school that felt more like a community center, but at least it offered a chalkboard and a chance.
But in Rumuigbo, time was a stagnant pool for Grace.
Every morning at the salon, Grace would pull up a chipped plastic stool and watch the world through the open door. The sight of the yellow school buses was a daily heartbreak. She watched girls her own age, their uniforms starched stiff and their socks pulled high, laughing as they walked home in the afternoons with ink-stained fingers and satchels full of knowledge.
Grace's hands were stained with hair cream, not ink.
She was a natural at the craft; her fingers moved with a speed and precision that left Mummy Vero speechless. She could weave a perfect set of Ghana-braids before the afternoon sun reached its peak. But Grace's mind was never on the hair. While she tucked and pulled at the strands of her customers, her heart was a furnace of calculation. She wasn't just learning to braid; she was learning to survive. Every kobo she touched, every snippet of conversation she overheard from the wealthy women in the chairs, was a piece of a larger puzzle.
The "Gang Leader" of Etche wasn't dead. She was just in hiding, standing in the shadows of a hair salon, waiting for the perfect moment to lead herself back into the light of a classroom.