twenty-four

First let me tell you Dafe is. Apart from the fact that he was Mrs.Obie’s Godson and

the director of P.R., Dafe was the cockiest sonuvabitch I had ever met in my entire

life. Poise was generally known for giving young people chances which explain why

we have a lot of twenty-something’s heading our departments. Now back to Dafe: Some

months ago he set up a meeting for both of us at Tea tree. I thought it was

something about work but how wrong I was. He made a lame attempt to bring work in

but i knew was totally hitting on me. He had arranged for us to be the only ones in

the restaurant. The fool even tried to kiss me! If he was being sweet, I would have

at least stayed till the end of the diner and explained gently to him how nothing

and nobody could make me cheat on my husband. But the fool was so arrogant! So he’s

a fine boy? Who cares? He was even on Exquisite Magazine’s list of top 20 bachelors.

Abegi! Layefa was in TNM’s top 25 young and successful men last year, so there! Dafe

talked like he had the keys to Lagos in the palm of his hand. Even when I rose to

leave telling him I was going to meet my husband, he acted all “Well, it’s your

loss”. Since that night, we’ve managed to stay out of each other’s way. Until today,

apparently.


I closed my mouth and stared straight ahead of me. He didn’t deserve even a muffled

hello. I raised my hand to smoothen my hair.

“Don’t worry your hair looks fine” he said with a lopsided grin (I saw from the

corner of my eye). I didn’t even say anything in reply. I just continued humming

along with the music. Just as the doors opened on the 3rd floor, he called out, “See

you around, Delores” and walked out. I hurriedly got out too before the doors shut.

I walked into the head of department’s secretary’s office quickly before I could run

into anyone else.

“Ah! Good evening Mrs. Thompson!” the secretary who I’m sure I wasn’t really older

than greeted rising from her desk. “Good evening! Are you guys done with the

articles?” I asked taking a seat. She looked like they had just been busted. She

started stammering explaining how her boss had everything under control. I chuckled

inside then said, “No pressure, no pressure. The deadline’s not today abi? I was

just passing by.” I swiped one of the free samples of organic lip balm from her

table then headed back upstairs to check on Kiki.


“So??? What happened? What did he say? You guys good?” I interrogated bursting into

my office. Kiki was all smiles typing away on her blackberry. She didn’t even look

up at me, “Huh?” “Kiki! Answer me naww” I pestered. She typed some more then tossed

her silky Indian weave aside. She finally acknowledged me. “What did you say naww? I

just heard a mumble of different sounds”. Look at this mumu girl oh. I laughed.

Everything was probably good with IK now that was why she could be doing me like

this. “Kiki! Stop it! Just tell me!” she smiled, “Okay fine. He said he was sorry

for everything. I said I was sorry for avoiding his messages. He said he missed me.

That we should get together for dinner. Told him I couldn’t then-” “WHAT??? Why

would you say that”, I cut in. “I told you before naww. I have a date with Tobi.”

She replied like I was getting on her nerves.

I raised my hands in surrender and walked round to my side of the desk. i shut down

my computer while Kiki continued with her typing. Ten minutes later, we had packed

up our stuff and were headed home. I headed for the elevator while she headed for

the stairs. As a health rule Kiki always took the stairs. We waved goodbye and I

made a mental note to check out that suspicious Tobi character.