There's a Tiny Difference between Life and Death

Most times, we don't realise how easily we can lose our lives until we're faced with certain situations.

_{Photo by Max Kleinen}

About some few hours ago, I had called my little brother just to ask him how he was doing. I tried his number but it was switched off, so I had called my elder brother instead and asked him to give the phone to my little brother and that was when he began to tell me about everything that happened to him today.

According to my brother, he had gone to get something from a store downstairs when he got approached by some guys who claimed to be cultists and had told my brother that he was putting on their color. Of course this was a lie as this is a method they use all the time to get things from you (my bro also said he had an ash colored shirt on) but before he could say or do anything, one of the fellows had brought out a gun and pointed it at him.

That was all he needed to do to have my little brother comply and hand his phone over to them. The crazy thing was that they had even asked him to unlock the phone before asking him to walk away, threatening to shoot him if he looked back. This was a phone he got just two weeks ago after saving up for months for it. Hearing him tell the story made me feel sad for him and I wished I had some money or another phone to give to him but I don't.

Also from the sound of his voice, he obviously had been scared, which I really don't blame him because if I was approached by some guys, threatening to shoot me, I'd be scared too and I say this from experience because someone had pointed a gun at me in the past.

I was at my hostel, minding my business when I heard a knock on my door, luckily for me I had a peephole and the people I saw there weren't looking friendly, so I had hidden my phone just in case. And surprisingly, they had walked into my room, pointing a gun at me while looking for things to steal. But there was nothing to steal so I was good.

But I remember not sleeping at my hostel for the next two days and only coming out at night for some fresh air at my "safehouse". The whole thing made me realize that I could have been killed at that moment and that me being alive was a miracle because I saw them point the gun at me, whether it was real or fake didn't matter, all I knew was that a gun was pointed at me and all that was left to unalive me was for the guy to pull the trigger.

Anyways, I guess this is kind of like a testimony, because living in a place like lagos state (which is where my parents and siblings reside) and knowing that a lot of people have been killed for things way less than that, I'm just glad my brother got out of that situation unharmed. We could always get him a new phone.