“They all have princesses,” the junior says in a tinny voice. Her eyes are wide and watery. She stares at you watching to see what you will do. Yes, she’s afraid. Everyone gathered in Room C7 is afraid. Girls are packed together four, five, six, seven to a bed, peering down from top bunks in crisp polo shirts that were straightened with loving precision the night before, generously sprayed with contraband perfume between unforgiving passes of the iron. Three girls are wearing the same shade of pink sparkly lipgloss that they borrowed from Chimezie, who keeps her pink and pretty things locked away in her suitcase for the entire school year, not even taking them out for visiting days. Today is bigger than visiting day. Today is bigger than every girl sitting here. Your eyes drop to your yellow shorts. 

There’s an obnoxious knock on the door and two girls in red shorts, with high gel-slicked ponytails open the door before any of you can answer. Their hair is imprisoned with red velvet ribbons a darker, richer shade than their shorts.

“Oh,” one says with a sneer, “Sorryyyyyy. We didn’t know anyone was still here. Everyone has started moving out. It’s about to start.”

The other girl pauses, her laugh starting to escape as she asks, “Aren’t you guys ready?”

“Get out,” you say calmly, and they run off snickering.

Every girl in Red House is sporting the same exact ponytail and bloodred velvet ribbon and the 

same exact sparkly star earrings and lacy red socks and gel-swooped edges and on top of it all, at the head of their march past platoon, they’ve appointed a princess. 

You imagine it now, Edima Bassey with her long eyelashes and smooth armpits that she shaves every single Saturday, as the head of the Red House platoon in the sharpest red satin dress you’ve ever seen. And the other three secret princesses that you didn’t know each house had picked. Blue House will choose Belema, taller than every boy in SS2 with smooth dark skin. Pink House will probably pick pretty petite Emmanuella, who has won every inter-class debate for three years in a row. And Yellow House will have no one to lead them but you in your yellow shorts and white shirt.

You begin to sweat. The judges will think they’re organized. Synchronized. Serious. Yellow House is going to look unserious. After the countless midnight marching practices behind the kitchens, where you forced everyone to ignore the flies hovering around the giant pots of leftover beans and put each foot in front of the other left right left right left right in the perfect straight line, chanting “Scatter the ground!” in time to your steps. After one of those long practices, an exhausted junior, Anita snapped “What does it even mean?” and everyone shrugged and looked to you for an answer like they all started to do a few weeks into training, you just shrugged and said “It’s something soldiers say, I think.” 

After Iremide twisted her ankle practicing long jumps and trained stout-legged Ibinabo to take her place until she could jump as far as James Akande in SS2. After Gloria and Mercy ended their 2-year war that dated back to the time in JSS2 when Mercy put Veet shaving cream in Gloria’s shampoo bottle, just so they could both be on the relay team. After Boma broke up with her boyfriend, the prettiest, freshest boy in SS2, Prince from Blue House, because he said Yellow House would never ever win the Inter-House Sports. Especially not with a clown like you as House Captain.

After all that, you are going to lose. And not just you, your entire house. You can’t lift your head from your yellow shorts, until someone taps you on the shoulder. Anita is smiling at you, “Who cares if they have princesses?” she says to you. She spins around the girls, pointing and shouting “We’re soldiers!”

That’s what you’ll remember on graduation day. Not the straight As and one B on your final paper or the noxious fried fish smell of the cafeteria on Tuesdays or even the Inter-House sports trophy the girls put under your blanket for you to find after a night of winners’ cake and Chimezie’s smuggled chocolate. You’ll remember Anita spinning as the girls drummed pens against the metal frames of the bunks and stamped their feet against the mopstreaked tiles, chanting “Scatter the ground!” back at her. You’ll remember the moment when you knew you had lost, but still felt a bright yellow sun erupt in your chest.