[: Evening in Abuja. Loud traffic. Danfo drivers yelling. Afrobeat blasting from a bar]

Kemi ran with her bag bouncing on her back. She was late.
The last bus to Nyanya was loading.

“Last bus! Last bus!” the conductor shouted over the music.

Inside, the bus was full of noise.
A guy on TikTok. A preacher on a loudspeaker from outside. Two women arguing in Pidgin and Hausa. The driver’s radio playing Davido.

Kemi pressed her forehead to the window and watched the city blur. The sound was heavy. It made her head hurt.

This is how movies show Lagos and Abuja, she thought. Fast. Loud. Alive.

[: Bus leaves the main road. Traffic fades. Road gets bumpy]

20 minutes later, the noise started to drop.
One by one, people got off. The music was turned down.

Now it was just the sound of the tires on the rough road.
Dug-dug. Dug-dug.

A woman in front started humming softly. An old hymn in Igbo.
No one told her to. No music was playing.
But the whole bus got quiet to listen.

Kemi closed her eyes.
For the first time all day, she could hear herself think.

[SFX: Crickets. A dog barking far away. The bus stops]

“Last stop,” the driver said quietly.

Kemi stepped out. The bus drove away, and the sound of its engine disappeared into the dark.

Now there were only crickets. And the humming from the woman, still echoing in Kemi’s head as she walked home.

In the distance, a drum started at a small gathering. Slow. Steady.
It didn’t tell her what to feel. It just told her: you’re home.

[ Drum fades out]

End.