The Music Deal (Episode 2)

Read the first episode HERE

My father was just normal. So far I came back home in one piece, he was almost okay with me even if that one piece was much thinner than four months ago. He asked me some vague questions which were so easy to answer. Vague questions beget vague answers and vague answers could have both lies and truths embedded in them. 

My siblings could only ask few important questions before they yielded to the temptation of making jest. They asked if my school was a giant dehydrating machine, I asked which school wasn’t. I said my new lean status was mainly due to the exercises I did during the semester. They laughed hard because we both knew it was a lie.

Few hours later when the homecoming party had died down, I was resting on my bed when I heard a knock on my door.

The Music Deal 2

“Come in,” I drawled. My brother, Festus ‘fine boy no pimple’ came in.

“Small bro, what’s up?” he said even though we were the same size before I got thinner in school.

“I’m cool.”

“There’s this concert coming up,” he said. My ears twitched.

“Who is coming?”

“2face Idibia,” he said.

“Are you serious?” I said after adjusting to a sitting position. He threw a ticket at me.

“I got one for you,” he said, “thought you would be interested.”

“Who am I not to be?” I said. I saw ‘regular’ printed at the top of the ticket and the date for the concert was three days away. How did I miss the news that 2face was coming to Ibadan? I must have missed a lot of information while in school.

I was so happy I wanted to cry and tell him what a darling he was but I knew he would just make jest and tell everybody in the house that I had been weakened emotionally too. So I just smiled and pointed my fist at him. He met my fist with his as an act of solidarity.

“Thanks,” I said.

“You’re welcome bro,” he said. “We’ll go by four on Saturday so that we can get a space in front. Cool with that?”

“Cool with all your arrangements,” I said. Even if I had to sleep overnight in scorching cold at the events centre, who am I to say no? I knew I had been unsuccessful in keeping the emotions out totally. I was just so happy I was going to see 2face, my role model, in person.

Before Festus came in, the aroma of a stew had been terrorising my nose but now, the only thing I could smell was 2face at the concert. How would he smell? Like milk or sweat or like a man who had just finished making love to one of his three girlfriends?

I pulled more breath in just to try to smell him from afar. The aroma of the stew entered my nose but I was only smelling 2face. What awesome timing from whoever was in the kitchen causing trouble. Well done. Time had slowed considerably and the three days now felt like three months away.

I wanted to continue my rest. I wanted to jump up and shout ‘hurray!’ I wanted to play the collection of 2face’s songs I had and dance till my legs gave way. I secretly wanted to steal out of that stew. I wanted to do all these at the same time, I was so confused. I just sat there and continued looking at the study chair and table beside the wall, with a smile on my face like a lunatic.
To be continued...
Read episode 3 HERE