Blindside of Cassandra Read online

  Blindside

  of

  Cassandra

  by

  Imma Afro Super

  All characters and events portrayed in this story are fictitious. Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  I actually made certain this captivating book of mine did not miss my exceptional eclecticism in writing. Blindside Of Cassandra is of literary prowess and rightly removes the cost of hindsight—The painful understanding of an irreversible situation only after it has happened, and that means you would have done things different.

  —Imma Afro Super

  Director, Whyworry Books

  Preamble

  History had shown that there were two kinds of angels; the good and the bad. The war that broke out in heaven was going to bring out the comparing dichotomy. Lucifer was the general that led the rebellious faction—thus the bad angels, while Michael was the general that led the loyal faction that kicked his strike force out of heaven—thus the good angels. History was impeccable, especially on its relationship with the first coup d’état that was accurately recorded in the holy bible. But here in the world of Eve, smart minds had discovered that history had actually missed an account of a certain angel. Another type of angel totally in a different league. While history omitted this particular account was still unknown. Maybe it was because of the non-alignment policy of this angel; or because of the controversial gender of this angel; or because of the paradoxical nature of mission of this angel. Whatever, history nearly killed the predestination of the chief inhabitant of this world, with that negligence in recognising the angel of contradictory nature.

  In a corner this angel in a different league was considering missions poles apart from Cherubim’s and seraphim’s, WyiWorri Jamike’s quagmire on earth was captured. From the vantage point of present, all the missions of this angel, from the time immemorial, achieved little; so the next task was going to be a huge landmark. Now this angel of controversial gender watched the target of mission again; he needed to be helped seriously. He was a nice guy of big dreams, only that these dreams were very close to delusions of grandeur—judging with things without. He was a paradox too, and that was what made him and this angel in a different league. Approve him or object him, bless him or cause him, he foolishly believed in his farfetched dreams for sole survival. In short, take him or leave him, that was his faith, and unbendingly he communicated it to everyone he met, which was the most reason why this angel in his league had picked him. The world thought he was a basket case; but he thought the world gave him witch-hunts. A certain amount of conformity was particularly required of an inhabitant of earth toeing her line of fate; but he was a dissenter. WyiWorri Jamike was a malcontent.

  He had a vision to own an ideal home; he had a vision to add peerless value to the literary world; but he lacked cooperate vision to see the countervailing vicissitude that made them unrealistic. Just two years plus ago, he was standing long on the road, waiting to get a bike for his journey back to school, when he saw this angel on the ground of earth, walking towards him. He needed urgently a girlfriend to turn a wife and protect himself properly, so he calculated things quickly. This beautiful fair skinned robust angel from heaven had everything to offer; and he measured them. She was his complementary left and right. He always knew he had many faults about his build, and this angel was a make-up physique for him. In short, she was overall, voluptuous—and he followed her, leaving out his journey.

  Just exactly one year after that, they climbed the numerous steps of St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Okigwe, and had a certain secret marriage on their own. A secret marriage that was actually a vow of engagement. There was no law to give binding reason that this angel was going to be a faithful partner—since it was done before a priest-less altar. However, he gave her a name that he thought God had actually put in his mouth the very day he met her. That name was MyAngel.

  Now, another one year, WyiWorri Jamike was waiting for a visiting angel in the night, when there was blustery wind, and her bus was late to come by. It was a matter of anxiety, but Prince Williams, the corps member serving the nation with WyiWorri Jamike, was an understanding companion. He was also an ex-seminarian that just had his philosophy before the theology, and felt it was nice to continue his work of sublimation as a laity rather. Sometimes WyiWorri Jamike thought rudely, maybe the wicked combustion of continence burnt off his bud of chastity too early enough, before he could be ordained.

  It was Ikare—Onitsha road, and buses were coming down from Onitsha; but she wasn’t a passenger in any of them. Moment after moment. Then this particular helpful one arrived at the terminal park. An eighteen seater passenger bus. On the third seat, the one before the rear seat, a fair complexioned dish in the middle, with aura of beauty, was perceptible in the gloomy bus. A face that wasn’t hard to recognize. Then a voice that exclaimed breathlessly, ‘Sweetheart’.

  “Welcome, Dumebi, my Lady!” WyiWorri Jamike jubilated, darting his eyes for Prince Williams.

  She hopped down to him, her arms going around his waist. Excessive affection. She buried her face around his shoulder. Her mien spoke of heavenly love, and was just nice. Just nice.

  Later in the night, when only two of them were in his room, there wasn’t, and had never been, any hardness about her. There was just lovingness. And passion. A crazy kind of passion. A wonderful kind of passion.

  “Please, make love to me,” she beseeched.

  He touched her, she was ready; beauty of love. He reached his hand for a pack of durex.

  “Leave the condom, Sweetheart,” she said. “Skin is intimate… and still better.”

  That statement was a notice inside WyiWorri Jamike’s head, because he had stolen a look in her purse and found something that hit concern in his instinct. But no need for caveat now—actually.

  Much later, about two months added, long deep in the night, WyiWorri Jamike was counting neurotically…

  Dumebi visited on ninth January—Friday, and that same night we made love all through the night. No sex on tenth, Saturday. No sex on eleventh, Sunday. Well, this Sunday night Dumebi encountered an ailment that tried to block her heartbeat, and Prince Williams had alerted the entire compound, and the corps members were obliging to carry her to the hospital that early hours of day Monday.

  No sex on twelfth, the Monday night, ipso facto. We made love on thirteenth, Tuesday, at Cynthia’s place, another close lady corps member. No sex again till sixteenth, Friday evening—that day I supposed to attend a corps members’ football competition. She went back to Lagos on the following day, Saturday.

  From ninth till now is seventy one days. From thirteenth till now is sixty seven days, and from sixteenth till now is sixty four days…

  Was WyiWorri Jamike actually a basket-case?

  Chapter One

  “You’re what?”

  That was SonOfMan’s instant reply to MyAngel, who was actually Dumebi by her native name.

  She said; (So you’re going to deny your baby?) She was referring to his question.

  “No, my lady; just that it’s a bit surprised. It’s rather incredible.”

  (What’s incredible? That you squirted your semen inside me at the wrong time of the month?) She snapped. (WyiWorri, you need to keep your unguarded thoughts under control. Jesus, they’re ingrate personified! You know!)

  “Right, my lady, right.”

  The line was angrily cut at the other end and SonOfMan picked his books and beat a retreat, leaving his students sitting there wondering in perplexity.

  Even after two months anxiety of his prospect of fathering a baby, he still let the unthinkable inkling follow and get to him—allowing them touch that naked wire responsible for triggering doub
ting mechanism. Reaching the staffroom shared by the corps members serving the nation here in this school, he threw the books over the table with every ounce of bitter feeling, picked his sunglass and left without exchanging words with his colleagues. He walked into the sun, going away. The same pointing suspicion, the same impelling fact, kept reappearing mechanically. The system was arousing them out like when a home-truth was irrepressible.

  Seeing a phone booth under a parasol, and a redemptive-worth thought flashing inside him, he crossed towards it.

  “Lady, what about removing it?” he suggested, seeing his present position.

  (No!) the curt reply. (I can’t abort this baby; it’s a product of love. WyiWorri, it’s a blessing; it’s love.)

  The line was cut again from the other end, and SonOfMan was thinking; It’s love, but of whom really? He was a confused case. He had compromised virtually all his footloose and fancy-free. For this lady, he had rearranged his life. What he wanted was rectitude in his engagement with her, where her love would register with him without dent. Pure and blameless. He wanted dividends of love only on unsullied bliss and sacred union. He wanted the cutesiest partner, a willing beautiful lover, but more than anything he wanted a trustworthy wife. At least he wanted an inamorata, who would give value to his costly vow. An inamorata that was totally in for him.

  But it seemed he had unfortunately plight his throat with an errant lover. So far sacredness of love was concerned, one who wanted nothing integrity. Maybe she didn’t know love really, and then aspired to nothing, as she had now accomplished nothing with this controversial pregnancy. Gawd, should he say from another man? Maybe he didn’t want his own MyAngel anymore—his vowed wife-to-be? Not as a blast bunch of betrayal!

  This was something that started with genuine mesmerizing promises and luminescence of love. Words hadn’t needed anymore. They had shown in their eyes and displayed in their emotions. It wasn’t anything like mickey-mousy involvement. They had taken those vows on their own, and sealed them with passionate kisses there at the altar. No priest was there, but they believed God was present as their witness.

  And then they went home that evening and perfected the conjugal promises with sacrosanct consummation of love. Call it expensive engagement, pooh, they wouldn’t care. Call it secret marriage, oops-a-dairy, then they were going to present it to their parents with a fait accompli at the right time—but look at her now! He shook his head disgustedly.

  Now he looked around with the awareness of weather. Glancing at the surface of his handset, he realized that it was close to the time for the school to dismiss for the day—the need of going home from there. He wasn’t in the mood to go back and sign out. Damned, really he wasn’t.

  He crossed the road and thumbed a bus heading to Ayepe. En route his thoughts compete with two countervailing thoughts—a possible looming outcome, and a possible divine outcome. He separated the inspiring contending thought to a clean corner of his psyche and upheld it. To keep up with the Joneses, it was one of those wishful thoughts that played prevalent part in his prayers all through his teens, the stripling and this period of adulthood. Last year November was his twenty seven. This year ushered him to twenty eight, and the next twenty nine and then thirty; the anticipated fulfilling years; when his request should be considered at long-run. Nothing had reminded him that he was behind schedule but this controversial pregnancy. It would have been the inspiring mark of accomplishment.

  He waited and fantasized that noble fulfilment before thirty, when even if a pot of wealth didn’t come along, he had an envious home—a beautiful wife worth of pride—a child probably a son, and then children. Maybe he got a lucrative job to crown them—the divine intervention—the answer to his age-long prayers. Seriously? Could this controversial incident actually be a miracle? No! He was too sceptic to allow the inspiring thought get strong. And before he realized it the ungovernable pessimism was wearing it out. With one abrupt thrust of his thoughts he shoved the dwindling dregs, asking himself what kind of Band-Aid he would term that. Fallacy, hocus pocus or maybe sophistry?

  When he alighted from the bus, a lovely sister was approaching to enter. “WyiWorri,” she said. “You’re a bit early to home today. In fact, I was just going to Akungba and thought I’d visit you in the school.” She smiled. “You know, you have a friend who’s proud to tell your colleagues that you’re a sweetheart.”

  The congenial sister was a Yoruba lady who was a stone-throw neighbour; one of the few good ladies. She was christened Chrisette, and had Iyebiye as her family name. She was also a nurse. Her free close relationship was one she had hunted and craved for, especially when she had heartbreak from her fiancé. The sympathetic fragile condition gave SonOfMan expected chance to bring her closer in his friendship. He would have loved to go back with her and brag a little, but he was really not in the mood. “That would have been a fine thing,” he said, and then watched her likeable demeanour and added; “I wish I could take back my last twenty minutes now; you’re actually a good sister with good heart.”

  Swaggering along the street of fawning villagers, SonOfMan wondered how many admiring eyes had idolized him particularly, and then he had to walk the way back from school every day. He wasn’t exactly associating their courteous idolatry with the obscene habit of ogling. If every other one who was a corps member, with high regard NYSC uniform, could get the same fashion of admiration, they could watch him anyhow they damn pleased. He was a proud precious son of his country. An expensive graduate serving his nation on an envious one year national service. There had to be fringe benefits.

  He got home and took his handset again, wondering this one he was calling again with his own line if MyAngel would pick. But she had to; because the doctor in the General Hospital early hours of Monday, that twelfth January, said something about the ailment that actually tried to block her heartbeat Sunday night. It was Prince Williams that alerted the entire lodge, and the corps members carried her deadweight to the hospital. “It’s… it’s… kind of bent of nature… about the doctor’s clairvoyance,” he spluttered into the device.

  MyAngel didn’t just start talking. She took her time. A longwinded time that was only an exacerbated suspended animation to SonOfMan. At last she started plaintively; (I’ll tell you what; men are a confused bunch… Accept his gifts, he thinks you’re a gold digger… Refuse his gifts, he thinks you’re playing hard to get… Alright, smile at him easily, he thinks you love him… Then let him kiss you, he thinks you’re cheap… Accept his love still, or act passionately, he thinks you’re kinky or anyone else can have you… Uh-huh, combine him with others then, he thinks you’re insatiable… Become too…)

  “Lady, don’t forget; the doctor’s suspicion is kind of propped up my misgivings…” he tried to cut her.

  (Wait a minute,) she mercilessly went on; (Become too understanding, he takes you for a ride… and confront him with the truth, he thinks you’re being bitchy…)

  “I was just trying to remind you that the doctor’s suggestion, after all, shored up my…” he started again.

  (WyiWorri,) she stopped him rudely again. (Men are this confused bunch, and you’re not exempted… you’re, in fact, the worst… the blossom worst!) She cussed and cut the line that way again.

  Chapter Two

  He had a knock and tried to repress his frustration.

  Ms Iyebiye, the sister he met on his way back from school, entered and was different almost. She freely lay on his bed and was even thinking how his room was unkempt and needed urgent attention. Anyway, she would volunteer herself to get the room tidy and clean. It had the bed she was lying on as the only comfort furniture—except the wooden back-chair at his reading table.

  “God knows how much ages you’ve worn that.” She jeered at the small short he was wearing on. “Dirty boy,” she joked.

  But that satirical camaraderie wasn’t what SonOfMan needed. He wondered with some spasm of pity if Ms Iyebiye realized how deeply he cared about his love to MyAngel. Never
theless, he moved to her; very close that her face was inches from his. Then he drew her suddenly and kissed her lips.

  “Ah!” she breathed.

  “And that’s a pleasant one?” he said daringly.

  “I know you’re not indirectly pressurizing me for sex?” she rather accused.

  “But if you’re going to love me, Sweetheart, you’re going to do it.” He tried her exorbitantly.

  “The wisdom of relationship is first of all chaste,” she pointed.

  Of course that was a situation congenial to the expression of his self-restraint, but he insisted; “Still we’re going to need to take it to some next level.”

  “Next level…” she intoned; “sounds like manipulative words men use to pressurize ladies into having illicit sex.”

  Impractical almost; yeah, when he thought of his on-ground case with his fiancée. “Then you’ll need a relationship that is morally clean and respects your envious chaste sexual boundaries.”

  “Of course, I won’t settle for anything less.”

  Gawd, this was unfair! Why couldn’t he settle with a good skirt like this sister? He saw his sincere effort to have a worthy relationship failing again? This was the second of his miserable snafu, and compellingly his mind dragged him to some wrench of fiasco of love he had been subjected to. There had been something about her—something about this paramour that was real different from any other. And he had dangerously believed in her.

  Aye, the miserable tears had come when he had to face the truth that he would never see to it he married this lady he had so much loved. Her love had been such redemptive love that he had cried for something to be rescued from the wrecked of his dream. He had known that what struck was gruesome, because his heart was grievously bartered. Yeah, for Lady Telma, he had lamented—

  Maybe SonOfMan knew what to do now. Maybe this was what he had to do now; leave this sister here and find some spot—some palliative rollicking spot.