Johnny splashed murky water on a maize-sac doormat. Soon, Nana fixed her eyes at the water seeping from the teen’s black shoes. Then, the straw-like boy flapped a cardboard. 

Instantaneously, nana sucked in cold air, as flashes of light sliced through the cloudbursts. The blinking sky-bound light lit up the hut before nana shuts her eyes. She grabbed reddish soot, swallowed it, and waved at Johnny to mimic her. They gobbled grams of soot every time the lightning strikes. 

Afterwards, Johnny brandished the carton. “I’m the top in Mathematics,” said he, clenching his fist, as lightning flickers twinkled the blue-and-red logo in the centre of the certificate. The diploma was awash, but more rainwater dripped from Johnny’s blue shirt. 

The prepubescent boy tripped on his grey knee-shy short, before flagging it on a razor-sharp pole. Thereafter, the teen cocked his head towards the hailstones knocking against the rusty door. 

“I need papers to kindle the blue and yellow fire,” granny said, rubbing her hands. 

‘Let’s roast some sugary corn,” Johnny said, his saliva drooping on his see-through ribcage. “We’ve ripped many papers from my Math book,” he said, waving the thin numbering book. 

Soon Johnny spotted the syrupy corns swaying above his head. A minute later, he cat-napped but the smell of honeyed corn and the steamy butternut soup stirred him up. He supped the soup in an orange bowl and ground his teeth around the salted corn. 

Now, he gazed skyward where he had hung the cardboard. “What are you looking for?” granny asked, sprinkling salt on the garden-fresh corns. 

The rain had paused, and the croaking bullfrogs had replaced the clapping clouds. 

“Where’s my certificate?” said he, choking on corn. 

“You’ll get another cardboard,” granny said, patting his shoulder. 

First, Johnny spewed out the soup and popped out the corn. In retort, granny numbered the veins throbbing around his sharp-pointed forehead. Suddenly, the ballooned tummy boy spotted a burnt to a crisp box. The number-literate Johnny silently sobbed and rubbed the powdered pieces of a blackened carton flying towards him.