FED UP!

(…continued…)

As Cynthia’s hands went through the nylon bag, she felt a paper. She reached in and brought it out. It was a complimentary-card-sized paper with a write-up.

  “Which one is this?” she said.

  “What’s that?” Mabel asked, looking up from her phone.

  “A note.”

  “What does it say?”

  “It says, ‘I am really worried about you. Please take good care of yourself. I care.’”

  “What?” Mabel said and sat up. “You are joking right.”

  “That’s what it says.”

  “Give it to me let me see.”

                Cynthia handed the note to Mabel and continued grinning. Mabel saw the write-up boldly written on one side of the small card.

  “I wonder why that smile is on your face,” Mabel said to Cynthia.

  “What are you not telling me?” Cynthia asked.

  “There is nothing to tell. I don’t even know who dropped this in there. Anybody could have done it.”

  “Who bought these things for you?”

  “It is Coker.”

  “No Wonder!”

  “No wonder what? He couldn’t have dropped the note. He is getting married soon.”

  “So?”

  “Even if he is the one, it doesn’t mean anything. He is like a brother to me.”

  “He likes you.”

  “Oh please cut that crap. You have not seen his fiancée. The chick is hoit.”

  “Men are the same everywhere o.”

  “Yes but not when they already have what they are looking for.”

  “Well, I don’t care who it is from as long as it is not from Segun.”

                Mabel thought for a while.

  “How did this note enter here?” she said in thought.

  “Is there no name written on on it?” Cynthia asked her. “Use your torch and check.”

                Mabel used the torch app in her phone and looked at the card well. Then she saw what looked like ‘Timi’ at the end of the write-up.

  “I Just saw what looks like Timi.”

  “Who is Timi? Could it be Coker’s middle name?”

  “I need to call him now to know if it is from him and know what this is about.”

  “Is it necessary? Won’t you be embarrassing him?”

  “No. Such things don’t offend him. He prefers ladies being open to him.”

  “Hmm. You even know him well.”

  “Please stop. One year of observation is enough for me to know what a person is like.”

  “Yet you did not know what Segun is like.”

  “I kinda knew but I refused to accept it.”

  “Love was shacking you na.”

                Their mother looked out from the kitchen door.

  “Any problem?” she asked.

  “No problem mum.”

  “Mabel, how are you feeling now?”

  “Better than when I came back.”

  “Food will soon be ready, then you can eat and sleep.”

  “Ok.”

                She went back into the kitchen.

  “Let me call Coker,” Mabel said and dialed his number.

                His number rang but Coker did not pick.

  “Maybe he knows you have seen the card and he doesn’t know how to face you,” Cynthia said.

  “I don’t think so.”

                Mabel dialed again and he ‘busied’ it.

  “Haba. Which one is this na?”

  “What happened?” Cynthia asked him.

  “He is rejecting my call.”

                Mabel’s phone rang. It was Coker.

  “Maybe he didn’t want to waste your credit,” Cynthia said.

                Mabel picked the call and spoke with Coker. She asked him if he dropped any card in her stuff. He sounded surprised about the question and asked Mabel to explain further. She told him she had seen a card and told him what was written in it. He said it could not have been him, that he had the guts to tell her anything he wanted to tell her to her face. Then she asked him who Timi was. They could hear Coker burst into full belly laughter.

  “Why are you laughing?” Mabel asked him.

                He told her that Timi was his brother. For about five seconds, Mabel kept quiet, not knowing what to say. Then she broke into laughter.

  “When did he write it and how did he put it in my stuff?” Mabel asked.

                He told her that he didn’t know, that he could have written it much earlier and had been looking for a way to put it. Then when they brought her home and he carried her stuff, he must have put it then. Mabel laughed.

  “Please tell him I appreciate his gestures but I am not in the mood for that at all.”

                Coker said he had been telling his brother but he has never seen his brother in love like that before.

  “Whatever, I am not interested.”

                Coker promised to sound it loud and clear to his brother. When they were done talking, Mabel hung up.

  “Yeye guy,” Mabel said when she hung up.

  “Who?”

  “Coker’s brother. He is the Timi.”

  “The other guy that came with him this evening?”

  “Yes.”

   “How can he fall in love with a girl in distress?”

  “If you ask me, na who I go ask?”

  “Men have a way of thinking that beats me o.”

  “Abegi leave men matter. Give me the cup cake inside the nylon bag.”

                Cynthia got it.

  “But if you eat this now, you may not eat the food that mummy has been suffering herself to cook since.”

  “It’s true. Keep it back.”

                Cynthia kept it back. Her mother walked out of the kitchen.

  “Food is ready?” she said.

  “So fast?”

  “Mothers know some cooking tricks that children like you don’t know.”

  “See how you are sweating. You just suffered yourself alone.”

  “I am going to take a bath now.”

  “Ok.”

  “Cynthia, dish the food.”

  “Ok ma.”

  “I hope you can do that.”

  “Yes.”

                Their mother went into her room to get her bathing kits while Cynthia went into the kitchen to dish the food.

  “Just little o,” Mabel said to Cynthia.

  “Ok.”

                Not long later, Mabel rushed into the bathroom. She almost pushed her mother down. Her mother dropped the bathing kits she was holding and Cynthia dropped the plate she was carrying. They rushed after Mabel and met her in the bathroom, vomiting.

(…to be continued…)

-©2015.Chinedu Isaac