A Mafian Boss

Photo credit: biography.com

I recently celebrated my twentieth wedding anniversary and so I pondered a lot on what was, is and could have been. I went back to my days as a young lady ripe for marriage and the different proposals and matchmakings that went wrong.

At the age of eighteen I was ready for marriage but Ferdinand wouldn’t hear any of that even though he asked for Beatrice’s hand in marriage at about that age. 

For some strange reasons I wanted to marry early and had a vivid imagination of how I would meet my husband. I was going to get hit by a car and I would pass out for days. I would open my eyes afterwards on a hospital bed with a very fine young man looking into my eyes. The story would be that the man who hit me wouldn’t leave my side in the hospital. 

It was going to be love at first sight with a total stranger, anyway, that did not happen. Vic happened instead and it wasn’t anything close to what I imagined. It was meant to be casual but it blossomed. Thank God it worked out and Christ has since been the center of our union. 

I remember how a young lawyer (God rest his soul) in Ferdinand’s firm saw me as a fit for his brother in law who lived in Europe. He did all he could to set up a date so we could meet each other. 

Finally the day came, the guy came home for a visit and one of the reasons he returned was to meet his future bride (me). I was invited to the home of the young lawyer, I was received like a queen on that day by the lawyer and his wife. The reason I honored that invitation was out of respect and love for the learned fellow. After I got admitted to study law, father handed me over to him and asked him to help me with registration and all. 

He performed that role with so much care and ensured that I suffered no problems at all. As an alumni of the same school and same faculty, it was a seamless process. 

He was a mentor and so even though I was not too keen on meeting this guy because my heart was already stolen I could not disappoint him. His wife was also very excited that her brother would bring me into their family. 

As I rode the bus from school to town on that day, I was not sure what to expect but I prayed and believed that what would be would be. 

I got there before my future spouse, I had an image in mind; tall, dark and handsome, well shaven and all. A Denzel Washington sort of, that was the only way my heart would be captured from where it was already. 

When he finally arrived, I was gobsmacked; the only criterion he fit was height. He was way taller than I envisaged, not like it mattered but he was not dark, he had a protruding belly that fit his height and what made me keep staring at him like I was love struck was his hair; it was permed!

I couldn’t stop staring at him which he interpreted wrongly. Food was served and we all ate while the introductions were made. I was speechless all through only managing to smile at intervals. 

He had a V-boot which he sent back home for his use whenever he was in town. The drive from Okigwe town to ABSU was about twenty minutes and after 6pm there was no more transportation until about 11pm when the famous Romeo’s last bus would stop on its way to it’s loading spot in Uturu to pick stranded passengers who were mostly students.  

When I wanted to leave, he told me not to be in a hurry as he was going to drop me off.  After 6pm on that day I knew I was at my future husband’s mercy but because he had promised to drive me back I relaxed and conversed with him as much as I could with until he asked me to spend the night. 

Our hosts left the living room for us to have some privacy and it was then he began to plead with me to stay. When I declined, he turned it into a command and that was when I knew it wouldn’t work. In a short space, I saw three different characters. First he asked politely if I could spend the night then begged emotionally and later he used a commanding tone. 

At that point I told him I would sleep over but needed to pick up a few things for the night. While in the car he kept using all sorts of perfumed wet wipes to wipe his hands all the time looking at me from the corner of his eyes to see if I was impressed with his display of wet wipes. In my mind I was saying, “please concentrate and drive me safely to school” 

He offered me some wet wipes to keep and as soon as I got down from the car, I said bye to him. He was livid and said I deceived him. I just said good night, heaved a sigh of relief and walked through the gate into the off campus apartment complex where I resided. 

The next day when I returned from lectures, my male neighbor whose apartment was close to the entrance said to me, “Amy one Luciano Paciano came looking for you”  and he was laughing hysterically. At first I wasn’t sure what he meant then he explained further that someone who looked like a Mafian boss came asking for me and which apartment was mine. Then it clicked who had come looking for me, when he told me that he was hanging around and said he was coming back, I ran all the way to the bus stop, jumped into a bus to the motor park and headed straight to Lokpanta. 

I attended lectures from home the next day and the rest of the week. I heard he came looking for me a few more times and eventually interpreted the handwriting on the wall in his own language. I found a polite way to tell my mentor and his wife that it wouldn’t work when they tried to get through to me by going formally to Ferdinand to ask for my hand. 

On my traditional wedding day, his sister said to me. “Congratulations Amaka, I’m sad it never worked out but maybe our children can get together in marriage” 

Again?!

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