The gash across my chest
It all started at Sammy’s wedding. Nkechi’s waist swayed from side to side as she sashayed across the crowded hall, taking the eyes of half the men along with her. The black silk gown she had on was cut very low, revealing a significant portion of her firm breasts, and an ECG line tattoo right above her right breast, behind the slim strap of the gown. With every other step she took, the sea of sheer black beauty that was her gown parted from the left of her waist as her long, light-skinned leg gracefully broke through. As she waltzed past our table, I noticed the numerous, cellulite induced, cute little dimples on her left thigh as my nostrils were filled with a soothing fragrance that I couldn’t quite identify. When she walked past, the gown flowed behind her, covering the entirety of her stilettos and giving the impression that she was floating across the room. I hadn’t realised I was staring until Ebuka nudged me and asked “Nawa o, na babe dey make you no hear your name again?”. With that, I broke out of my reverie and re-joined the banter.
At the after-party, I was in the middle of a loud, full-throated, roaring laughter when I felt a tap on my right shoulder. “Don’t you dance?” a soft, sonorous voice asked me. As soon as I turned my head toward the voice, I immediately forgot all about Kingsley’s hilarious joke and felt my knees go weak as I was met with the most charming smile from the same face that had enchanted half of the reception hall a few hours earlier. “My name is Nkechi” she began, stretching out her right hand for a handshake. It took all the willpower I had to lift my right hand and accept the handshake. “I’m Chuka”, I replied, getting myself back under control.
We didn’t hit it off immediately. I found her attractive and I could tell by the way she looked at me that the feeling was mutual. However, our conversation seemed forced. That is, until her friend, Ema, joined us. Ema isn’t as drop-dead, stop you in your tracks gorgeous as Nkechi but she just made conversation easy. She had lots of insights into a diverse range of topics as we discussed everything from weddings, to culture, horoscopes, science, the universe, animals, etc. As the conversation progressed, I started to notice little things like how her pretty eyes lit up when we were discussing the universe and animals, the passion in her voice as she bashed the performative nature of lots of cultural norms, the care she took to divert attention away from her full, alluring breasts and the shy smile she let out when I asked about the tattoo on her wrist. It was already past 4 am by the time I walked them back to their hotel room. As I hugged them goodnight, I couldn’t stop it, nor did I want to, when Ema pulled me into the room and the hug quickly escalated to a kiss and then a full-blown make-out session. About 30 minutes into it, I came to and realised we had taken the only bed in the room, leaving Nkechi embarrassed on the chair. I pulled Ema off the bed, bade Nkechi goodnight and we retired to my hotel room where we spent the night.
The next 4 months were a blur. An exciting blur filled with so much colour, laughter and sex. We spent almost every minute we weren’t working, and many minutes we were working, together. She lay on my laps while I watched football games and I lay on hers while she was watching RuPaul. We cooked together, listened to podcasts together and every time was a good time for sex. We had sex everywhere: in the bedroom, living room, kitchen, toilet, car, nowhere was exempted and no part of each other’s bodies was left unexplored. It was Eldorado. Absolute bliss. Until it wasn’t.
It started like any other Tuesday morning. I listened to Seth Godin’s Akimbo podcast on the way to work that morning. Got to work pumped and had a very productive day. However, it was the series of events that occurred after work that changed everything. Nkechi had texted me while I was at work to say that she needed to talk to me. Therefore, I went to meet up with her after work at W bar. We started with light-hearted banter but by the end of the night, tears were rolling down her cheeks and mine as she finished her story. I finished my 3rd can of beer and decided to drop her off at her place in Oniru before heading home to Surulere. By the time we got to Oniru, I checked the map and Google was predicting that it would take me 2hours and 17minutes to get home. There was serious traffic along Ozumba Mbadiwe. As a result, I decided to wait out the traffic at Nkechi’s place and halfway through watching “The Wolf of Wall Street”, we had sex.
The sex was awesome. It started slow, sensual and intimate but evolved into a frantic romp as we couldn’t seem to get enough of each other. By the time we stopped to catch our breath and I checked the time, it was already 2:05 am. We had been going at it for over 4 hours! Obviously, it was already too late to head home, so I spent the night cuddled up in bed with her. While there, she revealed some of her deeply personal childhood details to me, including her bouts of depression and how it led to her getting the ECG line tattoo as a reminder that life is the ultimate gift and it should be enjoyed. Seeing this side to her made me realise how scared she must be of being vulnerable and I understood why our first conversation had seemed forced. However, none of these helped quell the pangs of guilt that haunted me for the rest of that day.
By Friday, I couldn’t bear the guilt any longer, so I decided to confess to Ema. To increase my chances of getting her forgiveness, I asked her out for a date after work to Sailors’ Lounge. I rounded up early from work and drove down to her office to pick her up. I waited for about 10minutes for her to round up with work and we drove down to Sailors’ Lounge. We had a wonderful time, and at the end of the date, she wanted us to head down to the club, but I convinced her to let me take her home instead. On the way, we couldn’t get our hands off each other as the sexual tension in the air between us was palpable. When we got to her place, she was all over me from the moment I turned off the ignition and we had an intense make-out session and a round of sex right there in the car. We were making out again on the staircase when I broke off and stopped her with “babe, wait, there is something I really need to tell you”.
“What is so important that it cannot wait?” she asked with a smouldering look in her eyes.
“It’s really that important. I just don’t know how to say it” I continued.
“Just fucking say it and stop acting so dramatic!”
After pausing for several beats, I continued “I had sex with Nkechi”
“You what?!”
“I had sex with Nkechi. It was a mistake and only happened once. It was because…” I was still in the middle of the sentence when she shoved me in anger.
“Fuck you!” she hissed at me as I went tumbling down the stairs.
When I opened my eyes, the first face I saw was that of a cute baby faced nurse who smiled at me and said, “good afternoon”. Immediately Ema and Nkechi’s faces appeared side by side, looking into my face with beaming smiles. “welcome back!” they both said almost simultaneously. In their voices, you could hear the combination of relief and excitement. I looked at Ema and made to sit up as I went “I’m sorry…” but she immediately placed her right hand on my left shoulder and the index finger of her left hand against my lips to shut me up. “Shhhh. We have already sorted it out. Just focus on getting out of that bed, okay?”
“Okay,” I said, as I gently nodded my head and lay back into the bed. “How long was I out for?” I continued.
“2 weeks,” Nkechi replied.
Then Ema continued, “You had a very bad fall down the stairs when I pushed you. There was blood everywhere from a large gash across your chest and you passed out immediately. Fortunately, we got you to the hospital in time and the Doctor has confirmed we have nothing to worry about except that the gash across your chest will likely leave a permanent scar.”
I went back to bed and must have been asleep for several hours because when I woke up, it was already dark. However, both Nkechi & Ema were still in the hospital room. To my utmost surprise, they were chatting happily and laughing while watching a show on TV. When they saw my confused face, they burst into laughter as Ema explained to me that they had settled their differences. That was when she told me the full story, filling in the gaps and answering my yet unasked questions.
You see, Ema and Sammy were ex-lovers and he was the new procurement manager at a company where she had an open bid for a big construction project. She had come to the wedding ceremony to seduce him into sleeping with her and then blackmail him into approving her bid. It was just after the execution of her carefully laid out seduction plan that she came to join us at the after-party. This was the information Nkechi had called to tell me the day we went to W bar. Apparently, she had fallen for me and was still trying to get to know me when Ema waltzed in and stole my attention. What was worse is that after that wedding, Ema stopped paying attention to her, always spending time with me and using that as an excuse to ignore her calls or pass on requests to spend time together. This deeply hurt Nkechi and made her tell me about the original seduction plot.
It was not until I was hospitalised that they finally had the opportunity to have an extensive conversation about the whole episode. On that wedding night, after getting Sammy alone, Ema couldn’t bring herself to go ahead with her seduction plan. Instead, she confessed to Sammy who forgave her and was still dejected from the episode when she walked up to Nkechi and me. At the time, she was just grateful that I helped take it off her mind and was unaware that Nkechi had fallen for me. Over the next 4 months, she fell deeper and deeper in love with me and didn’t realise that she was beginning to grow apart from her closest friend. For this, she apologised to Nkechi, who in turn, apologised to her for having sex with me and they had both forgiven one another. However, the story didn’t end there. I was still smiling, tears gently rolling down my cheeks when Ema stunned me with the big reveal: she was pregnant.
It took another 4 weeks for me to finally be discharged from the hospital. I was already friends with most of the nurses and we had been preparing for this day for the past 4 weeks. There were flowers and balloons all over the hospital room where I had been staying for the past 6 weeks. Nurse Bimpe came through with the rose petals I requested for and the entire room floor was littered with specks of red. The doctor on duty had just finished giving me final instructions for how to care for my injury and how to take my medication. To be honest, I wasn’t even listening to her; I was just waiting for her to finish her formalities and leave. There were more important things to be done. As she stepped out of the room, Nkechi slipped a little black box into my left hand and then, I dropped to my right knee before Ema. The entire hospital room went silent as I popped the question: “Ema, I know this all started as a mistake, but it has been a wonderful mistake, and I don’t want it to end.” “Will you marry me?” After what felt like an eternity, she responded amidst tears, “No.” You could have heard a pin drop.
