P.C.
by Iyanuoluwa Mabel
My name is P.C. Most people assume it means something important.
Personal Computer.
Political Correctness.
Power Circuit.
No one guesses correctly. No one ever does.
I was born in heat. Moulded, pressed, cooled, stacked.
Identical to hundreds of others. No ancestry. No legacy. No warranty.
Designed for use.
Designed for replacement.
Designed to be discarded.
I am plastic.
I live in the courtyard of Block C, Moremi Hostel. My four legs are uneven. My back curves slightly inward like someone who has apologised too many times.
Nobody respects me.
Not the way they respect mahogany tables that shine like ambition. Nor the way they admire velvet couches that cradle important people.
I was dragged, stacked, scratched, borrowed, and forgotten.
You have probably guessed by now.
PC.
Plastic Chair.
Not Personal Computer.
Every morning, I wait.
That is what plastic chairs do best. Wait.
The first person who claimed me was Ada.
Ada never sat fully. She perched. As if the world might object to her weight. She was studying Microbiology, but really she was studying survival.
She would come outside around 5:30 a.m., when the sky still looked undecided. She would drop her books on my lap and begin to read aloud.
“Microbial metabolism refers to the comprehensive, enzyme-driven chemical processes …”
Her voice trembled at first. Then steadied.
Humans do this strange thing. They speak to themselves when they are afraid. When they believe no one is listening.
But I listened. Every sigh. Every whispered prayer. Every “God, abeg.”
Ada pressed her anxiety into my spine. And I’d held it.
I hold everything.
In the afternoons, I belonged to the cleaners.
They never really claimed me. They called me ‘that chair’.
“Bring that chair for me.”
They sat with confidence. They leaned back on my hind legs, testing physics and faith at once. They debated politics loudly, as though the government itself was hiding behind the water tank.
One day, Funke declared, “Nigeria is a scam.”
Another lady laughed. “Then who are we?” Funke didn’t respond. She pressed her heel into my leg so hard I felt a fracture forming.
Humans crack things when they cannot crack systems.
I have attended more meetings than senators. More fellowship gatherings than christians. Birthday hangouts. Emergency hostel parliaments. I’ve seen it all.
Once, I was carried into a prayer circle. They anointed me accidentally.
I wanted to laugh.
Because the same hands that said “Holy Spirit, take control” later clutched at trembling thighs while they ground their sins into my lap.
A + J = Forever. They’d carved when they finished.
One evening, rain came violently.
Students rushed indoors, leaving me alone in the courtyard. Rainwater pooled on my seat like a shallow memory. I felt myself grow colder.
You see, plastic does not rot.
It endures.
And endurance is a lonely thing.
Wood decays. Metal rusts. Fabric tears. But I remain. Unyielding.
Then I began to understand something: humans think durability is strength.
It is not.
It is exposure.
The crack in my leg happened during exam season. Ada returned; thinner and sharper. She sat fully this time, no perching. She no longer read aloud. Silence wrapped around her like harmattan fog.
Halfway through the night, she leaned forward and cried. Not loudly. It was the kind of cry that negotiated with dignity. Her shoulders shook. Her tears fell on my seat.
I did not break. I did not fall. I adjusted.
That is what plastic chairs do.
By second semester, I had become communal property. Freshers posed for pictures on me. Couples argued while sitting on me. One girl stood on me to fix a bulb then called me ‘useless thing’ when I wobbled.
Useless thing. Interesting phrase.
Because I have held weight without complaint. Supported bodies without preference. Listened without interruption. Witnessed secrets without betrayal. If usefulness were measured by silence, I would be president.
Humans have a thing with elevation. They tend to respect what is above them.
High tables. High offices. High salaries. High Pulpits
But I have noticed something: All their greatness still requires sitting.
Presidents sit. Lecturers sit. Pastors sit. Lovers sit. And when they sit, they trust something beneath them.
Something ordinary.
Something unnoticed.
Something like me.
One afternoon, a fight broke out in the hostel. It began over something trivial; noodles, I think. It always begins small.
Voices escalated. Insults sharpened. A crowd gathered. And suddenly, I was lifted.
Not to sit on. To throw.
For the first time, I left the ground unwillingly. The sky spun above me. I tasted velocity. I understood violence.
I hit the wall instead of the boy. My cracked leg finally gave way.
There is a sound plastic makes when it breaks. It is not dramatic. It is not cinematic.
It is small. Like disappointment.
They left me there. Broken.
Half-standing. Half-remembered. Days passed.
No one fixed me.
A new chair appeared; bright blue, confident, unscarred. I watched from the corner as life continued.
Ada now studied indoors. The boys leaned back on the blue chair the same way they had leaned on me.
You see, humans replace quietly. They do not grieve objects. But objects grieve humans.
I missed their weight. I missed the whispered prayers. The laughter. Even the insults.
One morning, the hostel cleaner approached. She examined me carefully. Touched my broken leg.
“Still strong,” she mumbled.
She carried me away. Not to the dump. To her small shop outside the gate. There, she heated a metal rod and pressed it against my fracture, melting the edges together. The pain was intense.
But something miraculous happened. I was fixed.
The crack remained visible, but I stood again.
Repaired.
Scarred.
Functional.
She painted me yellow. Bright, almost defiant yellow. Then she placed me outside her shop.
I became a chair for customers buying pure water and biscuits.
Different weights. Different stories. Same listening.
I watch students graduate and watch them return years later in cars they once debated about.
Sometimes, Ada passes by. She wears confidence differently now. Fully.
Once, she paused. She looked at me. Touched the faint line of my old fracture. For a second, I thought she recognised me. But humans rarely recognise what held them up.
Still, she smiled. And that was enough.
I have learned something in my existence as a plastic chair: Ordinary things are the infrastructure of survival.
We hold. We absorb. We endure. We are thrown. We are repaired. We return.
No applause. No obituary. No citation.
Just presence. And perhaps that is the purest form of purpose.
