“You should be working,” his bald-headed boss replies instead. The man is dressed in a shirt meant for a smaller physique, the buttons straining against the pressure of his bulging stomach. In the passenger's seat is a beautiful girl young enough to be his daughter. “Where are you going to?”
“My wife, sir,” Molua says. “She is in labour.”
The man gives him a curious look, unimpressed. “And who is in the kitchen?”
“Olu has accepted to fill in for me until I return.”
The hotel manager shakes his head in disapproval. “There is too much work at the moment,” he says. “You can not leave now.”
“But, sir...”
“Go back to your post. If you are not there when I come back, do not bother to return.”
With that, the car speeds away and Molua watches it get swallowed by the fog, its rear lights fading. He stands at the threshold of the gate, rooted in indecision. They both know the denial has nothing to do with the work load. The manager is too proud to say Molua is the best cook they have had in a long time, and the quality in the kitchen will suffer in his absence. For an employee like that, you might think they will treat him better. He has worked in the hotel kitchens for over five years yet he has never received a motivational package even by mistake. Now they would not let him go to his wife, just as they had done the past two times.
He pulls out his phone and reads the text message again.
“You wife is in labour and we are going to the hospital now. She needs you here. Hurry.”
Molua makes his decision and walks out the gate. His wife needs him. This is her third pregnancy, though the last two were stillbirths. He has always wondered if things would have been different if he had been by her side, to comfort her in their grief at least. Instead, he had been at the hotel, working for money which did not seem to make his life any happier. His marriage has been distant for some time now and Molua has never been able to shake off the guilt.
It was already raining by the time the taxi drops him off at the central station. He is instantly deafened by the shouts of hawkers and the speakers of mobile carts and the honking of cars and bikes alike. He makes his way through the chaotic press, always one step ahead of a bumper or a front wheel. The cars are trying to avoid the commercial bikes that squeeze between them, the pedestrians dodging the bikes and the buses swerving away from the pedestrians. It is a miracle there has been no accident yet, everybody shouting at somebody.
“Get out of my way, useless boy,” a grey-haired man was shouting angrily to a biker who had just appeared in front of his taxi. “You look like a missed abortion.”
“Shut up, old man,” the biker retorted. “If I was your son, I will not have escaped the abortion. Where were you when your age mates were making use of their youth?”
The transporters are well-known for their foul tongue, but leave it to the weather to make everything worse. Molua leaves them still insulting each other, sheets of rain twisting around him. He is soaked to the bone by the time he reaches the Guarantee Highway agency and makes his way through a line of their distinctive red and black buses. The clerk at the desk frowns up at the shivering apparition who is dripping water onto their pristine floor.
“Welcome to Guarantee Highway, sir,” she says nonetheless with a rehearsed smile. “How may I help you?” “I will like a ticket to Buea.”
“Our last bus to Buea just left, sir. I am sorry.”
Molua steps back in disappointment, his teeth chattering. He would have prayed for his wife to have a safe delivery but he feels it was futile. If there is truly a God, why do the undeserving suffer? He has just lost his job, been beaten by the rain, and missed the last bus to see his wife and the possible birth of his first child. How could the day get any worse? He must be the unluckiest man in the world right now. Perhaps if he buys a mortuary, people might just stop dying. Molua wonders whether to hurry back to the hotel and take a chance his boss might still be away. With the way his day has been, he doubts the likelihood. However, more than anything in the world, he just wants to be with his wife. It has been too long already.
“Molua,” a soft voice whispers behind him.
Molua glances over a shoulder to see a familiar face. “Ndip?” he replies as he turns to face her, still unsure. “Yes,” the girl says, beaming behind expensive medical glasses. She is dressed in a pink suit and skirt, tailored from the kind of material needed for high office. “It has been a long time.”
Ten years, he wanted to say but Molua's voice deserts him. He could hardly have recognised her without the usual torn uniform and dirty fingernails. She was his 'soft drink girl' in high school, he remembers, another girl on a list of many. Their break up had been hard on her until she had to move to another school. Of all the people whom he could run into, why Ndip? It seemed somebody was trying to make all his nightmares come true. So the day could get worse after all.
“Sorry but I overheard you tell the clerk you are going to Buea,” she explains. “I am heading up there myself, if you do not mind joining me.”
“Of course not,” he replies. Perhaps the dark cloud hovering of his day has a silver lining, and this was it.
But he discovers the lie of that as they begin the journey to Buea. It turns out Ndip is a successful writer with a wonderful life, and she is just too glad to talk of it. Her husband is a renowned doctor who works for the UN and she is from dropping off her son in a boarding school. His first child would have been of the same age, if the girl had lived. His companion did not even seem to notice him grow silent at the thought. He had led a happy and contented life even when the pregnancy came along. Molua had never known such excitement and expectation. It had been a wonderful feeling. What kind of God will tease with such things before taking all of it away, again and again?
The rain had subsided to a drizzle now as their car came upon a scene less than a mile away from the station. There was a small crowd gathered beside the road and Molua could see the twisted form of car in the bushes to their left, bits of glass scattered across the road. Then as their own car slows down, he sees the upturned carriage of a bus, its tyres raised to the sky. Molua instantly recognises the red and black striping of the Guarantee Highway buses.
“Oh my God!” Ndip exclaims as she pulls over. “What happened here?” she asks the first witness they meet. “An accident, madame,” the man replies with both hands still on his head. “A driver lost control of his bus and crashed into incoming traffic. All forty of them are dead.”
THE END
By J.E. Mfombep
Very well written man. Loved it. Waiting to read more from you.
ReplyDeleteThanks man.
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