The short story that has Oz & Friends eagerly sharing their opinions on this episode is titled “Call Her No One,” by Frances Ogamba. This story was published in 2021 by CRAFT literary magazine with a content warning: Human Trafficking. It is a story that talks about multiple forms of abuse. Statutory rape, human trafficking and possible kidnapping are some of the themes explored in Call Her No One.
Narrated using the first person technique, Frances’ protagonist, Nne, tells a haunting tale that will grip you and won’t let go. Nne speaks in a disturbingly passive tone, as if she is outside of her body and experiencing everything happening to her like a third party watching it. Habiba hosts the episode and is the only one that doesn’t fall under the infamous Daniel’s spell. On the other hand, Debby is his biggest fan. Daniel, though an enabler in this horrid scene, impresses Oz with his efficiency.
We are urged to call her no one as even the name Nne is not really hers. We do not see enough of her home, her family or who she was beyond the life she was forced to live after getting impregnated while in senior secondary. Instead, Frances focuses on the birth of her child, and another and another, even as her ‘aunt’ wasted no time in selling them off before they are a week old.
There is little that anyone could have done to save Nne from it all as she is conveniently, the perfect victim. With no family who cared enough about her, it was easy for the ‘aunt’ to spirit her away to Port Harcourt where she knows no one and no one would come looking.
You ask yourself, how she gets repeatedly pregnant, well, this is where the infamous Daniel comes in. Seven days in every month, he visits Nne until she is confirmed pregnant. He does his job with a fastidiousness that can be envied. During the act, he religiously avoids all eye contact, leaving no room for any further intimacy between him and Nne, then departing as soon as he is done.
Listen to the episode to find out what happens with the babies and what fate has in store for Nne. You can also follow the link below to read the story for yourself.
https://www.craftliterary.com/2021/03/05/call-her-no-one-frances-ogamba/
Frances Ogamba is the winner of the 2020 Inaugural Kalahari Short Story Competition and the 2019 Koffi Addo Prize for Creative Nonfiction. She is also a finalist for the 2019 Writivism Short Story Prize and 2019 Brittle Paper Awards for short fiction. Her fiction appears in Chestnut Review, CRAFT, The Dark Magazine, Jalada Africa, The /tƐmz/ Review, and elsewhere. She is an alumna of the Purple Hibiscus Creative Writing Workshop taught by Chimamanda Adichie.
