*Little Black📓 Book*
*Episode Two: I’ve Been A Very Bad Boy*
Now, little black books are tedious things. For those of us who carry them around, it is lot of work to keep them updated. For example, look at this entry:
Marianna, the ex- X
Idowu from Addax- X
Bukky from NSE- X
Ochanya, the waitress at Raddison Blu- X
Laura Haynes, the white chick in Presidential Suite A- X
Shiva Varun, the Indian homeopath in Presidential Suite B (she said she was curing him of his deadly sexual issues)-X
That was just my entry two days ago, on the 19th. It was now the 21st and I could see that restless look in his eyes that said ‘I want more’.
He was seated facing her table like one of her pupils. His eyes were water that calmed her annoyance, yet she fought to express her displeasure. She was his little cousin’s school principal. The kid’s parents had travelled abroad for medical reasons and my boss had been saddled with the responsibility of guardianship for an entire month. Big mistake. The kid and his brother had suddenly turned into small versions of him.
Today’s mischief was that the boy had kissed a girl on the playground and made her cry all day (classical case of Georgy Porgy). Now my boss was in the hot seat – and he was enjoying it. I was stunned because the woman sitting before us was nothing near his taste. She had this black, velvety scarf and wore no earrings; her dressing literally left nothing to the imagination and I could swear she had the whole Bible crammed in her head. One word for her: Deeper Life, MFM, Scripture Union… But he wasn’t seeing what I was seeing, he was looking beyond the whole Mary Amaka appearance.
I was seated beside him because he had asked me to join him. Why he always wanted me around him these days, I couldn’t tell. Of late I had become his confidant and go-to person for everything and last week I even picked out a date for him.
“This is a church school, sir and we don’t tolerate such behavior from our pupils. I am afraid I have no option than to suspend him,” Mrs. Deeper Life said and my boss raised a brow.
“He’s six years old,” he said with a puzzled smirk. “He was just goofing around. Boys do that.”
“A six year old kissing a girl is ‘just goofing around’? I’m thinking maybe he saw a much older boy goofing around too?!”
He laughed easily and got up.
“I’m not done with you, sir. Sit down!”
“It is still work hours and I have a meeting in a few minutes. May I be excused?” he asked. “If you want to suspend the boy, go ahead but you will have to face his mother. My work’s done here.”
“Fine!” she fumed and proceeded to pull a blue A4 paper to herself.
“My P.A will get the letter. Have a nice day, ma’am,” he smiled and walked out.
“Ma’am?” she spat. “Do I look like a ma’am to him?” she asked me and then added, “Is your oga always like this?”
I shrugged. “He likes you.”
Believe me, how that got out of my mouth still baffles me till date. I could have said, ‘yes’, or ‘no’ but I had to say that. She finished with her impromptu suspension letter and walked to the window where she could spy the parking lot.
“He’s still around,” she said, her voice dropping its edge and taking on surprise. “And he’s playing with the kids.”
Now this I had to see. I got up and walked to the window and true to her words, I saw him playing with not just his cousins but other kids who had formed a cheerful crowd around him.
Oh, he was good.
“I will take the letter to him myself,” she said.
I followed her out and stood at an eavesdropping distance.
“Here’s the letter,” she told him, trying hard to revive her anger.
“You came out yourself to give me,” he replied, taking the paper from her hand. “I must be a very bad boy.”
Some of the kids laughed but he smiled, never taking his eyes off her as she turned and walked back into the school.
Back in the hotel, I dared to ask him what he saw in her. He looked at me, smiled that knowing smile of his and began, “when she met us at the hallway that led to her office, I saw all I needed to see. As a man who wants a woman, you have to do the Sherlock Holmes on her. You can’t just follow your pointer. If you do, you will lose.”
“Why? Isn’t that what you men follow?”
He twirled his pen in his hand and said, “God gave man eyes and a brain first. The merry jack in the box comes later, hence, order of positioning. A pickup artist like myself always has to be very observant and look for telltale signs that reveal a woman is very available.”
“But she didn’t look available with what she was wearing.”
“To begin with, the absence of a wedding ring indicated she was single. Women don’t joke with such things. Secondly, her long, red nails contradicted her born-again looks. Then, I noticed the red stilettos and I knew instantly that she was a vixen. In addition, her skirt was very tight despite being below the knee and when I shook her, her hand melted at my touch; and as I withdrew, she lingered a second longer. Finally, the last one I think that got me was her lips. They were freshly glossed in brown and pink, a sign that this woman took her time with her appearance this morning, meaning all she was wearing on the outside was just a façade. And sadly, those lips were not bruised or puckered, a sign that they were suffering from lack of stroking. Anna, that girl needs a man and she needs a man bad.”
I need a man too.
“So you, what do you look for in a woman?” he asked teasingly and it was then I realized I was wasting time in his office when I had loads of work on my table.
“Sir, I am not a lesbian,” I said as I got up. “I don’t know how many times I’ll tell you that.”
He looked at me searchingly and said, “virgin, then?”
“No!”
“Well, whatever seems to be the problem, I’m here for you. I can help.”
Was that an invitation? One of his famous I-will-free-you-from-your-cocoon moves? If it was what I was thinking, then it was going all wrong. I wanted him all for myself; I didn’t want to be one of his conquests. I had to go back to the drawing board fast. He was bored and if he didn’t get something to occupy his mind soon, he would turn to me. I decided to devise a plan to steam things up.
* * * * * *
“Oshoke,” I called the naughty little kisser the next morning with five hundred naira dangling in the air, “I will give you this money if you go to Uncle and cry and tell him that you want to go back to school today.”
“But I don’t want to go back to school!” the spoilt kid stamped his foot. I got out a thousand naira.
“How about now?”
“Do you have Robb?” he rubbed his eyes and I grinned and set the plan in motion.
By break time, Oshoke was back in school. By afternoon, I was making reservations for dinner somewhere in town. By 5am the next morning, I got a groggy phone call from my boss to come pick him from her place. How it all went down, I have no idea but when I saw her months later, I could hardly recognize her. The black scarf was gone and replacing it was a Rihanna hairstyle. A bandage skirt and a revealing shirt did nothing to hide the voluptuous curves on her which I was noticing for the first time. As I fellow female, I had to admit that she was hawt! But then again, it had cost her her job but she didn’t seem to mind because she still seeing my boss. I, on the other hand was back where I was ─ unnoticed!
I would like to take credit for hooking them up but I would be a liar because two days after they met, as I cleaned his office at the close of work, I found the ‘suspension’ letter she had written and these were the details:
15A Gbaja Street, Surulere. Second floor, house on the right with the pink doorbell.
Ping before coming: 27GF****
P.S: Oshoke is suspended for just a day. He can resume next tomorrow.
I had missed a lot of details in her office that day. Obviously, it was all about body language.
I opened my Little Black Book and penned down the entry:
Rosemary aka Miss Deeper Life – X
One of the most useless and stupid story I ever rad this year