Ifeoma, Chisom and Egusi soup

Ifeoma

That's how I was seating in the 608 bus, feeling the cool breeze of the day, (because the clouds were darkened and heavy with rain water), along Awka road, dreaming about the most beautiful pair of eyes in the world- Idoko Chinenye Elsie Ifeoma 's eyes and the beautiful egusi soup I was planning to make, which made me think of Chisom Idoko, when trouble 'come nearly, fall on me.'

And it’s not a small trouble o. It was that kind of trouble involving a huge woman seating directly opposite me, exploding suddenly, on me for no reason. And If I tell you that her voice sounded like thunder, you will say I am lying. But, I’m not lying. She even threatened to beat me up for no reason at all.

“If you do nonsense nah, I wee slap you,” she threatened.

Her eyes blazed like that of a hawk. Her breasts jumped up and down, as if they were going to suffocate me to death. And I hadn’t done anything to deserve such a painful death. Because, before she sprang up, I had been minding my own business in the slow moving bus in the ever present evening traffic, head tilted backwards, a pair of ear piece stuck in my ears, Sia blasting high, my eyes staring at nothing but my mind and the dreams in it.

That's how I spend my time in the traffic when I’m not driving. Who driving epp in this onitsha where if you just make one mistake, or take a wrong turn, the agberos in yellow shirts will just come and jump into your car and ask you to pay twenty thasan naira, just like that?

So, most times I don’t drive but use the buses that even though they are so old one could hear the creaking in their joints, they  still offer  one the chance to sit and think and dream. And to catch every bit of life in this old city of chaos and hustle

I was dreaming about Paris and the Eiffel tower and me walking down the isle with ifeoma and Chisom Idoko. Nwodo Ogenna Ọdịdịka Chimezie was the best man, wearing that his funny blue jacket and bow tie. He was with the camera, clicking away.

“Smile”…chick!
“Hold her hands”…click!
“Lift her up gently”...click!

Beautiful dream. The kind that I love.

Chisom and ifeoma were very happy and were all smiles, each smile bringing out their beautiful dimples and shiny eyes. I was smiling too, my heart melting each time I beheld the beautiful sisters. In my mind, within the dream, I was singing praise to God and Dr Idoko for making those awesome sisters.

My suit was deep ash and my GUCCI  pants a deep black, matching my Armani bow tie. I looked like Edris Alba. My legs were covered by the most beautiful pair of brogues by Clark and I had a bounce in my steps.

We were in front of the big cathedral when Mark Zuckerberg came to congratulate me and hug me. He and Dr Chan said they were honored to have been invited to my wedding, that they were happy to meet my beautiful bride, that she’s the most beautiful pair of eyes in the world.

They gave me an apple I phone. “It’s from Apple Inc.” Mark said. “They deeply regret that they’re not here to celebrate with you,” Dr Chan added.

Another man in the most perfectly cut and sewn suit I’d ever seen came forward and gave  my best man a package.

“It’s a laptop, from Bill Gates,” he said, bowing, smiling.

Ogenna collected the package and thanked the man. The man eyed Chisom as he walked into the reception hall. I could already imagine him falling for her and I felt intense jealousy at that moment. But, shaa I told myself to just calm down because, no body will ever take my chisom away from me, my chisom with the most radiant skin in the world.

Meanwhile Mark and Chan came back and gave me something else. A beautiful little computer. “It’s from our Child,” Mark apologized. “He couldn’t make it because of school,” Chan explained.

I smiled and told them not worry because “we’ll meet them, everyone, soon in New York, anyway, since we’ll be having our honeymoon there."

Chan smiled and said something about New York being a noisy place not fit for a honeymoon but, my bride explained that we’d chosen the place because we were also going to have a meeting with Donald and Melinda Trump on some important issues like the corrupt nonsense that is APC, even though Chimamanda Adichie had warned us not to ever talk to Trump because as she put it, "he said he’d never cook for Melinda." But, I no send Adichie. Who she epp?

***

The  wedding party was about to be started when that thunder of a voice startled me up. Or rather, jolted me up. And suddenly, I was back in Nigeria.😭😭😭😭😭. Onitsha😭😭😭😭😭. Awka road.😭😭😭😭.

And just like that, I was back in an old 608 molue, facing a possible deafening slap from this woman who was so tall her head was touching the roof of the big bus. A woman who’d mistaken my empty stare into the distance and lines and lines of cars in the traffic, for an erotic ogling at her massive flabby breasts, barely covered by her scanty sequined  top that had the garish prettiness of cheap things.

She screamed and screamed.

 “Shameless he goat!”
“Idiot with no comparison!”
“Potential rapist with no ‘meKwantalism’!”
“A nonentity nicompu!”

And on and on and on she went. And not even my jittery  explanation that I wasn’t  staring at her breasts, that I was just sleeping and dreaming with my eyes open, that it wasn’t  even breasts I was dreaming about but, the most beautiful eyes in the world, was enough to calm her down.

She was even about to raise her massive hands when I cried for help. In fact, it was a shriek, a last  ditch effort to save myself from a possible deafening slap. Trust my voice nah, when I am in trouble. It got everyone’s attention immediately and they all came to help me, by restraining her and begging on my behalf.

The gods would soon send the rain and the leaking roof got the big woman so uncomfortable that she forgot me and instead, got preoccupied with keeping her hair from the drops of water from the leaking roof.

***

Anyway, I shaa survived and my bag of ingredients for egusi soup, which the big woman had also threatened to throw away, also survived and now, here we are.

Okeke Chizzy, tell the little angel to come come chop. How's she?

Carlie Chinenye Emecheta, darling, I just want to tell you that I love you. 😍😍😍😍😍


©Nnaemeka Ugwu