“Madam, beans don cost.” Felicia explained to the woman in front of her stall.
“No be last week I buy one derica ₦150? How the price come be ₦170?” the lady whose makeup was way beyond clownish replied.
Felicia sighed, she had initially mistook the lady for a mad woman due to the different combinations of colours on her face. With the way the lady was bent on starting a tug of war, she was convinced that the lady had gone bananas.

The price of beans had risen for over six weeks, most traders sold theirs for ₦180 and here was someone insisting on paying ₦150.

“Madam, no vex but na ₦170 last,” she replied, the lady left the shop murumuring words that Felicia could not fathom. She was about to sit in the interior part of the shop when somebody called.
She came out to discover it was the female clown.

“Aunty, sell am ₦160 for me now,” the lady said with a mischievious glint in her eyes.
Felicia lost it at that point, “Madam, I say he no gree, shooooo, infact I no sell again, dey go,” she shouted.

The lady left immediately while laughing. Felicia shook her head, she pitied the lady but she prayed the lady would not return to disturb again.

She sat back in her shop and was about to eat her food when somebody said, “good afternoon” from outside. She cursed silently, why would the lady come to disturb again?.

She stood and was about to shout ‘go away’ but the words disappeared when she discovered who her visitor was.

———————

The more he approached the manager’s office, the more he dreaded the outcome of him meeting with the manager. The manager hardly summoned members of staff to his office which implied that something was wrong.

He had logged out of facebook chat when Halima had called to inform him about the manager wanting to see him in his office. He knocked on the door and went in.

“Good day Sir,” he greeted while trying to sound confident. Deep within him, he was nervous since it was a meeting with the manager.

“Mr Oladele, have your seat, there’s no need to be nervous now. Is there?” the manager asked, it was obvious he knew the effect he had on employees, despite the fact that he was not the highest authority, his subordinates regarded himwith great awe.

He passed information through phone calls, letters and mostly had meetings in the board room. A tête-à-tête with him meant you were in trouble.

The manager laughed, he knew Femi was in no trouble, he simply wanted to explain some things to him but the nervous expression on Femi’s face was amusing.

“Joking apart, you have nothing to worry about, I just want to explain something to you,” he continued.
Femi relaxed a bit, “Okay Sir, its just that this is quite unusual.”

The manager nodded in the affirmative, unusual was a very suitable word, he thought.
“Well Mr Oladele, today marks the end of the month and from the company’s records it equally marks twenty two months of your stay in this company.

Femi regarded the expression of the manager, why was the man driving at?
“I’m sure you are aware that senior staff are given one month leave after they must have worked for eighteen months,” the manager continued while tapping his ballpoint pen on his desk, “twenty two months and you are yet to go for your leave, may I ask why?”

Femi heaved a sigh of relief, so this was the reason the manager summoned him, “sir, I’ve never really considered it,” he responded.

“So you’re a typical workaholic, well Mr Oladele according to company’s policy, if after you are qualified for leave and you delay for a maximum of five months. Automatically you forfeit the chance of going on leave.
Which simply means that starting from tomorrow which marks your twenty third month, you automatically lose the chance of going on your first leave and the next chance you get is till eighteen months after your first leave was due.”

The manager threw a form towards Femi’s direction, “I really don’t see what you’re going to lose, you’d be getting your complete salary afterall. Just take the break, my opinion though.”

Femi collected the form and was about to speak when the manager continued, “Remember today is the only time you have to make a decision, what you choose to do is entirely up to you.”

“Okay Sir, thank you, I’ll just take my leave.” Femi replied. The manager nodded his head and waved his hand in a motion that told Femi he could leave.

——————–

Femi walked back to his office while different feelings enveloped his mind. How would he survive without coming to work? His manager wanted him to die of boredom but the thought of getting his full salary without having to work was appetising.

Before he had gone to see his manager he had been chatting woth Tony, Tony had been his roomate back in his university days.

Dami logged into her facebook account, she opened her secondary school group. She had to contact Tinu at least to save her head again, she clicked on members, after scrolling through about one thousand and thirty eight names, she got no result.

She had to change her game plan, she clicked on another group suggested by facebook. The reason she clicked on this group was because she saw a familiar name as a member. She requested to join the group, instantly she got a notification that she had been accepted by Tinudiva pweedylips.

She clicked on Tinudiva pweedylips, what if this was the Tinu she was looking for? She viewed the pictures only to be disappointed. There was a particular picture however that caught her attention, it was the picture of eight girls wearing blue shorts on white tops, some of the girls looked mature than the others.

Tinudiva pweedylips was in the picture along with two ladies whose faces where familiar, and then it was as if fate decided to smile on her. She saw that Oloyede Tinu was tagged in the picture, there was only one girl she knew by that surname, but she seriously had doubts that the Tinu she knew would use a simply facebook name like that.

On Clicking the timeline of the Oloyede Tinu, her doubts were confirmed.

———————-

Osagie knocked on Iya Bobo’s door, he knew the woman was a housewife. If she was home, she would be able to supply him with explanations as his imagination had continued to run wild.

He knocked slightly again, the last thing he wanted was creating a disturbance. The door opened with Iya Bobo holding a broom,
“Ah! Baba Victor, good afternoon, when you come back? Welcome oh.” she greeted.

“Good afternoon, he never tey wey I land jaweee,” he smiled. If he was going to get any information from this woman, he had to be courteous as possible.
“Shey you bring something for us shaaa?” she asked while hitting the head of the broom on her palm.

Osagie sensed that she was busy, it would benefit both parties if he cut to the chase, “Yes I shaa buy bread, abeg you know where my wife go?”
“She no dey?” Iya Bobo asked, she obviously had no idea as to Omoye’s whereabout.

“No, she no dey house,” Osagie replied.
“Ha! maybe she go market or her shop,” she suggested.
“He be like say you no understand, she pack all her bags, she tell you say she wan travel?” he finally asked.

“No ooo,” she dropped the broom on the floor and adjusted her wrapper, “And I see am yesterday oh, but she no yarn me anything.”
“Okay, thank you.” Osagie said while turning away from her door.
“Call am for phone now,” Iya Bobo shouted from behind, “and no forget our bread oh.”

“I don hear, greet your husband,” he said before finally heading out of the corridor.
Walking on the street, he kept on asking himself questions, was this how he was going to be punished for playing a fast one on Sandra. Speaking of Sandra, the last time she had called was when he was in the bus.

He knew Sandra would call again, he just hoped it wasn’t going to be soon. What on earth was wrong with Omoye anyways? Couldn’t she come out from wherever she was and allow them resolve the issue like adults?

The annoying part was that he had no clue to what the problem was, she had been avoiding his call ever since.
If she moved out, where could she have moved to? The only friend he knew she had was Rosie, but Rosie was in Lagos. Her parents were out of the options, they had made clear their stand on him years ago.

Omoye had to choose between them and him and she had chosen him, although Omoye’s mother was still in contact with her daughter and grandson. She did it without the knowledge of her husband, so there was no way Omoye would have gone to her parents.

He had Omoye’s mum phone number, he could call to inform her of the situation of things, he might even be lucky to get some information on her whereabouts, She was their daughter after all.

But what if calling the woman put him into more trouble, Omoye’s father was a cruel man, the man could hand him over to the police by fabricating some silly story.
Before he realised it he had gotten to the end of his street, where was he going to in the first place?

He asked himself, he turned and started walking back to his place.
He was feeling back pains, the journey to Benin had been fairly rough with the driver making sure to scare the hell out of the passengers. The passengers had kept on bouncing like children having fun in a bouncy castle, the difference however was that they screamed out of fear unlike little kids who screamed out for joy.

How he managed to sleep in the bus was a mystery to him, that was an obvious sign of how tired he was. And here he was in Benin only for Omoye to complicate issues, he took out his phone and dialled her number only to be told it was switched off.

Women were just complicated, did she not know the mental torture he was going through.

He cursed silently, she had better have a good reason for all this drama. TO BE CONTINUED…………….

CULLED FROM STEFIKAL’SBLOG