MY STORY AND MORE BY KAYGEEGAL

Kaygeegal wants y’all to enjoy this as we go to the polls in Nigeria tomorrow. We hope you’ll love it.

Oscarpoems blog got nominated in the Best Book, poetry, or Writing Category of the Nigerian Blog Awards. Please vote for us here.

Birthday blessings to a very wonderful sister, Oyinlola Durosaro. God bless you dear.

Enjoy today’s story and Don’t forget to drop your comments too.

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“I want you to do your Masters now and that’s final!”
“Final? Oh no, you won’t dictate to me on how to live my life!”

“Its just about what’s good for you babes.”
“No! Its not about what’s good for me, its about what’s good in your friends’ eyes. I’m tired!”
“What do you mean? Masters is for you to get a better job and bigger prospects, not for them now.”
“Been hearing that for a while now.”
“Are you saying that you won’t?”
“I’m saying not now! I have a dad to look after.”
“What’s wrong with you? Leke’s girlfriend is doing hers now in England, Shade too. Must I always shout before we agree on things? Who will marry who between us?”
“See? Leke’s girlfriend! Shade is Akin’s fiancee, right? Who else is doing her Masters? Mtcheeeww.”
“This is for your own good, not for them. How many times will I say that?”
“Hundred times ni now. See just leave me. I had a bad day at work, I’m on a busy road and I just wanna go home and rest. I don’t need this at all.”
“Lola, this is the last time I will mention this. Just forget about this relationship if you won’t do as I say”
“I won’t, and you can go to hell”

I snapped and pressed the red button so hard the phone switched off. “I didn’t just do that, right?” I pinched myself in the most sensitive part of my body…my nipple! I mean I dug my hand right into my shirt, passed my spag and bra to pinch myself.

Don’t say its uncalled for, I have always been the ‘Yes lady’ to my boyfriend of four years; succumbing to his whims and caprices, his blackmail and manipulations for 4 years. I mean a whole four years!

We met when I was in my final year. He was a graduate already, had finished his Masters and was already a chartered accountant. He was by then a full member of about three or four professional bodies, and is still working on more.

I cannot even keep tab on his professional qualifications anymore. He is currently doing another Masters and there are other refresher courses on his mind. He calls it ‘updating one’s skills’, I call it ‘complex’.

“You don’t really need all these for social acceptance, right? I don’t know sef“, I have told him severally. I just hate the fact that he always want me above his friends’ girlfriends, as if they are in a competition. If a friend’s girlfriend has a Masters degree, I should have at least two. He is just like that.

Let me just say Boye is a cool guy, very studious, good looking and more than comfortable, rich actually. He is every lady’s dream husband. He is very proud of me, displays me like a trophy in front of his friends. In the presence of his friend’s girlfriends, he treats me like the most expensive and rare ornament ever. Of course, I love the attention but I got tired because I was sacrificing my freedom. I have to dress to suit his league’s taste, my hair must be done always and my skin must be glowing and more. I cannot live my once upon a time carefree life any longer. You cannot catch me with first grade Yaba clothes anymore, no rubber slippers just to get something at the nearby market, it must be NEXT or any other designer.

“You could bump into anyone on the way babe. I want my babe reppin’ always”, he would say.

Boye’s idea of living is way too expensive for me. He rented a two bedroom flat for me which I refused in the first place because he complained of my parents’ house being old and all. He could not bring his friends along and moving to his house was out of the question because we are not married yet. He can’t marry just a graduate which is why he insisted I get my Masters before planing any wedding, before he can even propose at all. He has accused me of lacking ambition severally. That is because I do not see things his way.

Well, I have had enough. I have in fact moved back to my parents’ temporarily. Dad is ill and he needs somebody around him, age is catching up with the old man. The health condition of the old man is the major reason I cannot do my Masters now. Okay, I take that back…let’s say its out of defiance, let Boye go to hell instead of bossing my life around. I’m tired of him, his cliches and his clique.

Going through the busy road can be tiring sha. I entered my street looking like a camel rider. No, I was breathing like a camel rider. Boye sure knows how to ruin one’s day and also make a ruined day worse.

Getting to the gate, I spotted Bones coming from the corner. I stopped a while to let him catch up with me. Now, Bones is somebody my Boye would kill me if he catches me talking to. I just referred to him as my Boye, right? He was! So, back to Bones, he is a street guy…the kinda guy you meet but can’t remember how. He is playful and protective and he is a bus conductor…you see why Boye would kill me?

Bones hails from Ibadan, dropped out of school after his junior secondary school to train as a barber. He did that for a while before opting to leave for Lagos in search of greener pastures. He majored in barbing but later dropped it when PHCN kept holding the light and petrol was out of range for a small scale business like his. He joined the boys in the street and was introduced to life as a bus conductor.

I really cannot remember how we met but we became friends pretty fast. He protects my friends and I in the street, and carries himself like a kind of big brother to us. He is well known to my family too. He is easily likable.

“This one wey you dey sweat like this, wetin do you?”, he beamed as he caught up with me.

I opened the gate, entered and waited till he entered before locking the gate from inside. Everywhere was quiet and I made a mental note to see what did not seem right. I picked it, the grasses surrounding the house needed to be cut.
“Oh no, it will spoil your manicure. Pay someone to do things like this for you baby”, I heard Boye say to me, in my mind of course. I grinned.
“This girl don dey craze o. Na who I go report you to now o?”

He moved away from me and entered the sitting room before me.
“I no get your time, walahi!”

I sank into the nearest chair to think about the lonely future I was about to live. I went through my conversation with Boye on my way home. Did I do the right thing? I know how many girls would jump at the vacant space now.

“God, I dey craze o”, I said forgetting I had company.
“Did I say that out?”, I asked breathlessly.
“See Jamb question.”, he responded as he slotted the chosen disc into the player.
“Guy, I don break up with Boye“, I said, sounding as if I was announcing.
“Ehn ehn.”, he replied. His face was void of any emotion and he did not sound surprised. After making the CD player come alive, he spun and turned to me, seated on the floor like a dibia.

“I no like the guy, he too pompous like say him na peacock” He hissed.

Why did I tell him sef? Of course, he hates Boye because I do not allow him around me when Boye is around. I hissed.

“See, better thank your star say una no dey together again. See as he turn you from original to plastic“, he pointed at my hair, my eyelashes down to my nails and hissed.

How true and bitter the statement sounded. I want to move on, I want to be fine without him. I really wish!

“Anyway, I have something to tell you”, he said as he sat on the table directly in front of me looking so serious. I had never seen him that way before and it got my full concentration. Seeing that he had my full attention, he spoke.
“I don join”
“What?”

He hesitated for a while before answering. “Politics.”

My mind somersaulted like how many times, ten, twenty? Politics he said but something else rang in my head: political thug, assassin, death messenger and the like.

My mind made a quick dash to the newspaper headlines I read the previous day…”New Hunt Man Discovered”…”Ten Die As Gangs Clash”…”Political Thuggery: Ten Die…

I remembered what Bones said yesterday when I told him about the contents of the newspaper.

“If you wan make them recognize you, na to do the work and make them ask. Na who do this?Find me the person, he will be useful”, he said with a glint in his eye.

“This world no be about wetin you dey do abi wetin you fit do , main thing na wetin you don do“. I nodded in agreement and he continued, “The result? Wetin you see for paper na selling point wey dey show dem politicians say you sef dey useful and available. If dem notice you, na to call you for initiation remain. If dem initiate you, babe na hammer you don hammer so“.

I secured the sound that was about to escape from my mouth as I stood up slowly.
“Oh my God! Oh my God!”, I muttered.
He must have realized that I had added it all up. He tried to move closer as I moved backward. “No think am that way now, please“