You can never truly know for sure if you
can trust someone until you trust them.
This is a long age principle for me, which
probably explains my bunch of friends;
the good, the bad, the ugly, the religious
and the very-bad. Loyalty and love come in
mysterious ways. I don’t take the chance
of friendship and love away from people
without them earning the distance,
besides, everyone has their own roles in
our lives. Have you ever been stuck in ‘area
boys’ muddle? Believe me, it’s that your
‘gee’ in the park that can neatly pack such
dung for you. When you need book helps,
you fetch your nerds; when you want to
fight your demons, you run to the holy
fellows (though I have in my short-long
experience come to agree that no one is
righteous, no not one). I am sure you get
the picture. Life’s never complete at one
corner, if you don’t move you might never
know. Little wonder the old Yiddish
saying, “to a worm in horseradish, the
world is horseradish”.
Back to my kind of trust. I give a lot of
trust out easily; I accompany the package
with plenty free flowing love and faith too.
I love freedom, trusting keeps my wings
open and flying and free. The thing about
trust which is by far a costly compliment
to bestow on anyone is that like ceramics,
it can shatter and be glued together
almost in shape, but it can only be ‘almost’
because the rough edges and the cracks
remain.
Yesterday was different. I can deal with a
cheating girlfriend or a back-stabbing
boyfriend, or a back-stabbing boyfriend
that cheats with a cheating girlfriend. I
can equally deal with a lecturer that
promises the exams will be a walk over
because he attended classes just three
times out of fifteen in an entire semester,
yet he brings an examination that is totally
unrelated to the ninety-minute classes he
managed to hold altogether. I can forgive
him because he probably doesn’t want to
miss us when we are gone so he delights
in keeping us in school longer than
required. Not everyone believes the young
should grow; you can see that in the face
of our politics, where men in their eighties
are killing for a government sit. Whatever
happened to the youths being the future!
Anna has been a friend for three years,
though we only see face to face once or
twice in about two weeks, Lagos is a small
state occupied mostly by water and sand
filled islands yet housing over 22 million of
the world population, this means you
don’t get to see people you wish to as
often as you desire. It’s either the traffic is
frustrating you or your job is mortifying
you or worst still you have been a victim
of broad daylight robbery with hot slaps
from a dried palm, I think the dried palm
must be a key requirement in their CV,
whatever is keeping you busy is hardly
ever giving you the joy to go hitting up
friends. So, we resort to video calls or pass
on our messages via the busy body
neighbours if we happen to know any.
The day Ann talked about getting a fairly
used mini laptop from Ikeja, I didn’t quite
pay attention. Then she mentioned it a
second and a third time. It suddenly
became an obvious necessity that I sorted
that out for her. For someone that closes
work by 5pm and works on the island
which is about 30 minutes’ drive to the
mainland on a very good day and 5 hours’
drive on a very bad day of traffic, the bad
day which happened to be every day, I
needed to figure a way to help. Her
pushing the request my way I think has a
lot to do also with the fallible mentality
that ladies cannot get good electronic
gadgets themselves, they always need a
man to do it. Whoever sold this ideology
that all men are electrical and electronics
experts to nearly the entire world
population at the same time, needs to also
help the world and pitch repentance to
Satan (or whoever you believe the bad guy
is) so he can just apologize to God and
let’s all go back to when we were naked in
Eden playing with a lion’s mane.
Friday was a lucky day for us, my boss
travelled, this means I get to close by 4pm
prompt, which is the official hour unlike
other days I get to stay back till my boss
leaves. I don’t leave my boss behind at
work in all the three companies I have
worked so far, I feel this sense of
responsibility owed to them.
I was at Ikeja by 4:40pm pushing through
the Naira hungry eyes and hands always
stretched to grab at you and convince you
into buying stuff that were never on your
checklist. Lately they don’t grab at
customers, they grab at the butts of
beautiful girls in the markets. The ugly
ladies are feeling lucky. It started as a joke
until I learned of the protest in Yaba for
their butts to be left for the rightful
owners. The genesis of our problem is
beyond the devil and eve. It still amazes
me how amid this heated terrorism and
dirty politics in Nigeria, people find time to
leave whatever they came to trade and
start grabbing and sizing butts in the
markets. The last time I checked,
marijuana was hardly the cause of lack of
common sense. So what exactly is the
problem with my ‘not too young to run’
generation?
Ikeja is one market in Lagos that is
notoriously known for selling ‘fufu’ or
‘Amala’ for a Samsung phone after
payment. However, they manage to do the
swap right in your presence is still subject
to physical and spiritual investigation.
Sometimes I am tempted to admire the
smartness and creativity of these guys if
only they can channel it to our economic
good as a country since the government
has told us officially, they are clueless on
how to solve the problems of Nigeria and
therefore taken to the defense of calling
Nigerian youths ‘lazy’.
The laptop seller was an Igbo man, so was
I. Coming from the same tribe simply
means one thing, he will try to play the
counter psychology game of ‘I won’t cheat
you’ on me. Of course, he inflated the price
and appealed for my trust to believe I was
getting the best rate in the world, he was
partly claiming he was nearly making a
loss and how he doesn’t mind because I
was his brother. Well, it doesn’t work on
me, I always know the market value
beforehand. My new-found brother in
Ikeja gave me a rate of #90,000 because
It was me, and I ended up paying him
#50,000 the actual value because it was
him and I know his kind.
I called Ann the moment I got it and
headed to her place, she said her younger
sister that came in 3 nights ago would be
in the house, I have never met her before,
and she never mentioned about her.
When I got to the small bungalow with
two apartments, I called her that I was at
the door, she raised her voice above the
boisterous environment pleading I should
wait up for her for about 10 minutes,
explaining her sister was not at home
anymore and herself was already very
close to the house. I sat on the pavement
and waited, about 15 mins later, I could
still hear the two girls and the boy I saw
dash behind the compound laugh for the
second time.
“Why did she ask you to leave?” the boy
giggled
I didn’t quite hear the response and they
chorused a muffled laugh.
Chinaza! Chinaza!! I could hear a
neighbour call, everywhere was silent, the
laugh died. A brief chatter followed a few
seconds later. Just then Ann alighted from
the ‘keke’ she had boarded, beaming in
her night make up.
‘Sorry I kept you waiting’ she smiled
‘it’s not a problem, welcome.’ I nodded
and tapped her shoulder
‘I know you will like the one I bought; I
toured the whole Ikeja to get this one’ I
explained as she opened the door
‘I trust you Joor, I know what you can do’
she hugged me and smiled. She always
smiles, I consider her saintly, one of those
I could go the extra miles for.
‘So where did my sister in-law go by this
time of the night?’ I quizzed in honest
curiosity
‘So, what’s the make you bought?’
‘HP’
The door cracked open and an average
chubby young girl of about 17 years
walked in.
‘Aunty good evening’ she genuflects
slightly
‘Chinaza, what’s up?
‘Fine, welcome’ she walked past us into
the kitchen. This was the same girl, I saw
when I stepped in, the name is now
familiar all thanks to the neighbour that
was calling from the backyard. I felt a chill
in me. Why would Ann not allow me into
the house or best still just tell the sister to
take the palmtop from me when I get to
the house? She didn’t want me to meet
her alone? Was it for fear of me, or the
young girl, or herself?
‘Annie! I will be leaving now’ I called out
from the sitting room.
‘Hold on, I will be out soon, let me change
into something light’ she laughed
I knew I can’t stand her should she come
out ‘it’s late already, good night’
I walked out of the house slowly, thinking,
was I not to be trusted? Or is it just the
fact that people cannot give what they
don’t have? If you don’t have trust in
yourself, you can never give it.
I can better relate to the African adage
which cautions, ‘Be careful when a naked
person offers you a shirt’ if you are too
kind and easy, people think you have
ulterior motives.
What’s love without trust? Void.
A discomfort grew in me that night, one I
still fight to shake off. I have this nagging
hollow that makes me feel it’s suicidal to
still believe in someone who doesn’t
believe in me.
