So I got a strange, illuminating letter this morning addressed to me, right beside me on the bed as I woke up. Tore it up and proceeded to read, the first thing that scared me was that it said at the top ‘from me to me’, second was; the letter was in my handwriting, third; the date was 19 december 2099!!

Scared as I was, I couldn’t resist reading the letter as it glowed magnificently more than an ipad in the dark. Done. Now I’m sitting down thinking through all my choices, opinions and goals in life. Life is really more than you know. Let me share with you what I wrote to myself:


From me to me

AIR GRINTH 211,
WA334FRT,
19 DEC 2099.
Dear me,
This might be coming as a surprise to you but I’m sure you (i) are one to understand out-of-order things. I am in my home right now, sitting by the larvist (window), writing this letter to my young self and hoping you will get it. I really hope you do.
Today marks the beginning of something great and ground breaking in the entire history of mankind. Everyone becomes immortal today. Let me bring you up to speed about the things that used to matter during the time you are in.

Well, FIFA finally found out Messi was an alien after he scored more goals in a particular year than the entire population of india.

Cristiano Ronaldo became a dancer that year.

The first igbo president sold Nigeria to Ghana.

We now live in the air after we lost all trees to deforestation and we couldn’t breathe well on ground.

Pharrel is still alive.

The world is now split into zones and we are in zone 4.

Women stopped giving birth.

I am writing this to you at this age the hatred in you was freshly born. Yes HATRED. My greatest concern as I become immortal today. I have walked by and ignored a lot of things I should have done for people, situations I could help change for the better, lives I could have saved, starving children I could have fed and many other things. All this is because of the hatred I have carried in me all this while. My greatest regret today is that I am going to carry this hatred for eternity. The hatred my father’s death gave birth to.

Let me tell you what you already know. I grew up in the home of a disciplinarian father and inconceivably meek angel of a mother. My father was a respected proprietor of one of the first private secondary schools in the old Nigeria. He started from below the bottom. After being abandoned by his father at the age of 11 in a day secondary school in oyo state, he had a burning passion for education and he wanted it by all means. He spent most of his secondary school days beside the window of the classroom as he was a celebrated debtor constantly sent out of class to go get his school fees from parents who were nowhere near. He loved mathematics. That love was hereditary. Different homes, churches and Hard times of constant hunger and missed classes still saw him through the secondary school as the best graduating student of his set. He later gained admission into the University of Ibadan to study vertenary medicine contrary to his love for mathematics.

In his second year as an undergraduate, there was a long strike in school. He told his friends of his idea of starting up a kindergarten in the area. Being the most energetic and convincing of the lot, he got them into it with himself as the head. From house to house during the school break, he gathered loitering children and convinced the parents. The children loved him. They sang from house to house as the children gathered and followed him to each of the remaining pupils’ houses. Thus started the beginning of something great. The beginning of his group of schools.

Years later saw him an accomplished man whose name had gone far and wide in the education world. The school kept winning national awards year after year. This gained him popularity and respect from far and wide. Many did not even know his real name because he was constantly called the name of the school. Of course the family had started growing; I as the first child, a perfect carbon copy of his father and inexplicable was the fact that we exhibited the same behaviour, temperament, intelligence, reflexes and any other thing you can think of. Two sets of twins followed as my siblings. I called him UNCLE because he was also my teacher in school. Oh yes, before his death, we were of the same height. HIS DEATH. That constant reference point in my life. A day never to be forgotten.

October 19, 2012 was the day my hatred was born. Right after my father died in U.C.H Ibadan. I had taken him there the previous day for his regular check up after being incessantly sick for years from kidney disease. Funny story, he was neither a smoker nor a drunkard but then death doesn’t try to vindicate his method, does he? Immediately we got to the doctor’s office, he ordered admittance stating that his blood level was lower than 10% again. YES, again. He had pulled that stunt many a time and got away with it. He hated U.C.H. He often complained about the staff’s inhuman attitude to patients. Irony of life; that was the cause of his death.

to be continued...

to be continued...

Hmm

Very captivating.

nice one if you won't mind adding me on bbm 7F05443E i will like to av a chat

saintanji:
nice one
if you won't mind adding me on bbm 7F05443E
i will like to av a chat

thanks.will do

Chinum:
Hmm
Very captivating.

thanks..updating soon

INCEPTION
Uncle was a graduate of University of Ibadan, so he knew a lot about U.C.H and its many faults. I had my first hand experience of the consequence of the staff’s incompetence and negligence in 2008. My grandmother had been admitted on December 23 following numbness of her right foot. She had been warned earlier by the family doctor not to eat things like meat, egg and other things. And that she should not take soft drinks anymore. Well, she made sure she ate precisely everything the doctor advised against and took two bottles of maltina everyday. Whenever she was scolded, she would reply that she was old enough to die at 87 and she really was wondering if she wouldn’t have what she wanted just because of one doctor that was trying to scare her with death.

Uncle being who he was, we had many celebrations and anniversaries and the cows always went to the slaughter. This was always done in the house and the tradition was to give ‘mama’ the cow tail and assorted parts, she cooked it herself and ate it all till the meat got tired. She never got tired.

It was one of such times in the house and she was given her part. But this time she kept the uncooked tail on her wooden cupboard. Days later, her room was full of odour. We tried to convince her to throw away the decaying tail but to no avail. She said she couldn’t smell a thing.

Uncle later noticed the odour and after finding out its source, he forcefully took out the decayed meat amidst shouts from grandma. He told us to burn it so the odour could stop. We did burn it and we all went out. Came back home in the evening and went to check on grandma, but something was wrong. No, not her displeased face consequent of the loss of her meat, it was the fact that the odour was still very much there and had become a stench. The stench was from her right foot which had become black and swollen.

She was rushed to the family hospital where she was immediately referred to U.C.H. she had tried to cut her toe nails herself despite previous warnings and she had cut herself. That’s the thing about diabetes, the wound never heals, it spreads. The wound had rendered her foot numb and she couldn’t walk even with support. After series of silly tests that all could have been carried out in a day spread over 3 days, the doctors decided her foot had to be amputated. We had no problem with that. Grandma had a big problem with it.

She shifted her attention to blank space and disconnected from everyone. She was not improving. Instead the amputation process be sped up, the doctors spent more time using her as a case study to teach student doctors while poking and pinching her.

One of such times, uncle was there and he had already complained early that morning to the matron how they were delaying her treatment. Then the doctor and students came and proceeded to the usual. My father was getting angry but he was calm. Then it got to a point where the doctor pinched her right foot to show absence of life and then, maybe mistakenly, pinched the left foot hard to show sign of life. A loud scream from grandma was all it took. He was mad with rage. He told them to leave her bed and use the doctor’s mother as a lab rat. The doctor said something about him being uncivilized and uncle went near him with his hand raised but was stopped in time by his childhood friend who was present at the time. He had no problem with the teaching. He had a problem with the fact that they saw her as a lab rat and not a patient. She eventually died December 28 without even being amputated. You can understand why uncle was not very fond of U.C.H

Back to him.

Following the doctor’s order, we took him to his ward( he had a regular ward and was popular for his head strong attitude despite his sickness). The ward was a large hall that contained up to 24 beds with 12 beds on each side. there was a small passage before the main hall with toilets, bathrooms and some sort of kitchen which was majorly used for sorting of meals as the hospital had a huge kitchen where all meals were prepared and patients had to buy food tickets for meals, days, weeks or months, however you wanted or could afford it. We got into the ward and there was a nurse seated at a wooden table adjacent to the entrance which enabled her see what was going on in the ward and whoever was coming in through the entrance.

She saw uncle being supported by me and my brother and said to him ‘Mr Johnson, oto ojo meta taa riyin(it’s been long we saw you)’
Then he looked at her feebly and said ‘I have told you several times that I am Dr. Johnson’ and pointing to me, he said ‘this is Mr. Johnson’
She only smiled as she was well aware of his funny character in the ward.
She took down his details and the report from the checkup centre and motioned to another nurse to take us to a vacant bed which was the second to the last on the left side. At the end of the hall was a small television placed on a wooden platform nailed to the wall. There was a boring NTA show on. The hall had several doors on each side that allowed air come into the hall. The ward was on the third floor so most patients complained of cold. Uncle regularly complained of the boredom and cold of the place. He was a very active and jovial man whose presence was easily recognized everywhere he went. The bed allocated to him a white iron bed with tyres put in place for patients who might have to be moved to the theatre. It was already laid. We placed him gently on the bed and he let out a small groan. All the while, he was breathing through his mouth seemed to have a hard time breathing.

A doctor finally came and checked him up. He said ‘how are you, Dr. Johnson?’
He smiled broadly and the gap between his teeth was visible. He responded ‘I’m fine, doctor’
He jotted down some things and told me to get some immediately and others when I could but he said to get oxygen for him immediately and told me categorically not to give any attendant there cash because they will deny collecting it and eventually not bring the oxygen, but to pay at the payment centre and take the receipt to the oxygen centre.

Moments later, I was in the oxygen centre with the receipt I was given after paying at the payment centre. I told the attendant what I wanted, he told me it was for 4,000 naira if I went to the payment centre but if I paid him 2,500 cash, he would bring the oxygen to the ward straight away. I told him I had already paid. He looked at me with disdain, collected the receipt from me and told me he would bring the oxygen soon. That was around 2pm.

7pm he was still nowhere to be found, he had locked the centre and was not picking up calls. Around 8pm he brought the oxygen without an explanation for the delay and grudgingly set up the oxygen and left. By 8pm all visitors were told to leave the ward as usual and return the next day or would be contacted on the phone if it was urgent. I told uncle we were leaving as my brother placing some of the things he went to buy into the drawer attached to his bed. He looked at me in a way I still can’t find a word in the dictionary till date to describe. It was not goodbye, it was not good night. He simply looked at me and looked away still sort of gasping for breath.

We went outside with other people who had come to visit friends/relatives who were patients in that ward. I remember a cleaner of the ward introduced me to a prophetess outside the ward who told myself and my brother how uncle’s life was in danger and if we could provide her the things she needed, she could help save his life. I told her my father would rather die at that moment than allow such. He was a man of principle, he never feared death and he always said his principles were higher than death. We left the ward after we were kicked out and went home to return the next day with necessities as his admission was unprepared for.

8am next day I went to U.C.H with my brother armed with uncle’s stuffs. We had no trouble getting them. This was not the first, second nor third time he was admitted in the much loathed UCH. He was alternating between being discharged and admitted. Right after my service year, I became a known face in UCH because of him. He had been there even before I went for my NYSC. Finished my service JULY 2012. He was home this time. He was smiling from ear to ear despite his frail body ,no thanks to the prolonged sickness. He made me organize a party and invited my friends over to celebrate. My mother said he had told her that morning to watch the way she spoke to him as she was speaking to the father of a young graduate. I graduated at the age of 21 (considered to be young at that time).

The first thing I noticed before entering the ward was the cleaner from the previous day, she sat on a bench and leaned her head against the wall, lost in thought. I greeted her but she responded like someone who was sad, I couldn’t make anything of it. I got inside the large ward which housed up to 24 patients. Uncle’s bed was the second to the last on the left side. I did not see anybody on the bed. My mind told me he might have been moved to another bed overnight and proceeded to look for him. At this time I had passed the matron, a fat, dark woman in the infamous white uniform. She called myself and my brother back and asked who we were looking for. I was surprised. I was 100% sure she knew us. Then I gave an explanation and the name of the patient we were seeking, then she started asking questions like:
‘are you the eldest child?’
‘do you have an elder with you right now?’
‘where is your mother?’
‘why is she not here?’
I got pissed off and asked her where the Bleep my father was. Then she looked at me and said I had to be a man and take care of my mother and siblings. Then she said those words I thought was a joke; ‘am sorry, we lost him last night around 11pm!!!’ the bag I was holding and phone fell from me as I felt instantly numb. I had seen such in movies but never knew it was true people did that after hearing very bad news. My head grew bigger. I had more than 10,000 voices in my head, all trying to process what I just heard. Only one result came out of the processes; UNCLE, my father, my teacher, my role model, my disciplinarian and my photocopy IS DEAD. I walked out of the ward to the balcony which was guarded by a net which made it impossible for anyone so impulsed to jump. I held onto the net as did my brother beside me. I wept( truth; right at this point I wept as I wrote this). He died at the age of 48. I had grown to see this man as a fortress and a legend, a legend that could not die. I could not picture his death. It felt like a dream that I needed to wake up from but reality is a bitch, it bleeps you over.

He had already been taken to the morgue and we went there to see his corpse but my brother was not allowed in because of his uncontrollable tears. I got in and saw his corpse on a table with another corpse placed almost on him. The corpse on him was fresh, with blood still coming out of the body, an accident victim who had died instantly maybe. I asked the man with me in anger why my father’s corpse treated like a dead rat and was not placed inside one of the refrigerators, I threatened to deal with him if I came back and found him still on the table. Amidst my controlled tears, I noticed something about his corpse. His mouth was wide open, like someone who gasped for breath before he died. Then I remembered the matron told me he had died around 11pm that same day he was admitted. The oxygen guy had brought the oxygen around 8pm. My eyes went from red to blood shot, the oxygen guy’s greed had killed my father!!!

I went to the oxygen centre in blood rage. I was not going there to ask questions. I quickly summarized in my mind how I would have to either face a firing squad or die by hanging. Maybe life imprisonment. Those were the three possible outcomes of what I was about to do. Holding the pen in my hand firmly, I went into the building that housed the centre with only one clear intent. Stab that bastard to death!!!

to be continued...

you can like to continue already please...

i'll update today..lol

HaiIaintNoJoke:
you can like to continue already please...

I got there and looked over the desk. He was not there! I asked of him from the new lady at the desk and she told him his shift was done that morning and he had gone home. She asked what the problem was but I told her not to mind. I left the place with mixed feelings. A part felt angry and disappointed I couldn’t carry out my revenge, another part felt relieved I wouldn’t be in court for murder. I then went back to the ward to get the papers signed so the corpse would be released. Then I saw a doctor I recognized and he asked about uncle’s health. Told him he passed that morning. He seemed touched. Then he held me and took me to the verandah of the ward tried consoling me;
‘I am really sorry about your loss. His case wasn’t chronic, so I never saw this coming. I had frequent chats with me and he told a lot about his life before being sick. Quite frankly, a lot of lives in this hospital might have been saved if half the people who show up at their burials came to check on them while they were sick. Most people give up hope after realizing people they thought were friends really were not and they were totally neglected only for the burden to be carried by the immediate family.’

‘your father told me he was a man who always had people around him and couldn’t even remember where he got the crowd of ‘friends and acquaintances’ from right after his business got successful. He mentioned he did realize most of them were just there for the ‘good goings’ and didn’t really care about him but that he was disappointed in a lot of childhood friends, relatives, wards and many other people’

‘he told me he was a realistic man who was quick to adapt to current situation and since his sickness was terminal, he was just going to move on’
‘I didn’t know he meant this’
My eyes were soiled one more time and I couldn’t hold it back. Here was a man who so readily gave out and reached out to help others but was deserted to face his problem. I only heard it outside our home that he was a rich man but our standard of living never confirmed that. We never lacked though. He was one who could spend any amount on any child’s education. If you asked him for 6,000 naira, he could send you 10,000 naira. He made money seem peripheral. I didn’t have to lie to get money from him, all I had to do was ask. We grew up to seeing cash around the house and not being moved by it. If uncle ever lost his money, he looked for it outside. He never asked who took his money. We learnt to hold our integrity higher than any other thing. He proudly boasted about his children’s honesty outside and a particular memory of one of those periods will never fade away;
Integrity and discipline:

It was late 2005 and I was done with my Cambridge exams. I had been enrolled in an A’ level tutorial school in Ibadan which had boarding facility. I was a hostel student. After my exams, I had gone home in preparation for our ‘valedictory service’. It wasn’t really that, it was a party we outgoing students had organized and I had to bribe the housemaster to call uncle on phone and tell him we were having a valedictory service and that, more importantly, parents were not invited. If the housemaster had not said that, uncle would have showed up at the service unannounced even if it held in Jupiter.
On the slated Friday for the party, I was given enough money for merriment at the ‘service’ and was given a task to carry out. Bring back your cupboard from the hostel. It seemed too easy. The party was to hold in a new club which was almost opposite the school compound which housed the hostel. All I had to do was leave the party at an appropriate time and get my locker from the hostel and drive it home. Simple, right?
Right.

The party had started in the afternoon around 2pm with all guys and ladies ‘baffed up’ for the event. It was an opportunity to show off clothes, shoes in vogue (transparent timberland boots, the navy blue sean carter reebok shoe, roll ups timberland boot, phatfarm shox, the airforce ones and so on) ,the baseball cap, cars and girls. We were young and delinquent. We had paid to occupy the club the whole day and next.
While in the hostel, all we could do was sneak out through the gutter under a net that was used to fence the school, we often got into trouble in the club and with the police and all we had to do was show our id cards. But we had to return before morning. Sometimes we couldn’t because of the assistant house master. Left to the housemaster who wasn’t staying with us, you could bring a prostitute into the hostel so long you could bribe him. While there I was naïve and shy so I couldn’t really score any girl. Not couldn’t really,sorry. I could not score any girl. I was new to the system of ladies.
Inside the club, everyone explored the freedom, we didn’t sneak in today, it was our day and everyone was having fun, well almost everyone. I just moved around the club trying to dance or get a girl to dance with me but to no avail. All the hot girls were talking to the hot guys and we the wannabes just moved around, occasionally asking a girl to dance and moving on immediately she said no.
It was BORING. By 6:30 pm, I thought it right to leave as I wasn’t getting any lady’s attention. I left the club and gave my ticket to a guy who was behind the security line and was not allowed in because he had no ticket. Good luck in there with girls who looked at you and practically asked for your C.V before dancing with you.

I got to my room in the hostel and told the junior colleagues in there I came for the cupboard. Then I was told a guy had put some of his things in there and had locked it. I asked of his whereabouts and nobody knew anything. Got his number and called him to come around for his things because I had to leave asap.
I waited a whole hour. In between calling him and he refusing to pick up, I got pissed and decided to force open the padlock. I did so and emptied the contents on the floor. I asked a guy to help carry the locker to the park inside the compound.
As soon as we got to the park with the cupboard, the guy I had been calling came in, saw me and went straight inside the hostel, the gateman was asking questions about the cupboard when he returned and asked where I had put his N500 which he put in the locker. Told him I saw no such thing there but he insisted his money was there and that I had stolen his money and that was why I didn’t want him to be around before I took the cupboard.
It was funny to me because that was the first time anyone would accuse me of such. He was screaming at the top of his voice and a little crowd of hostel students was starting to gather. I maintained I had not seen any money in the locker. The gateman tried to intervene and asked me to provide a witness who saw me remove things from the cupboard. The guy who had brought out the cupboard with me signified and said he had not seen any money also in the cupboard and so the gateman asked the accuser to produce a witness who had seen him keep money in the cupboard before he left the hostel. He was mute and then like a wounded lion, he started his noise again and kept calling me many silly names.

The gateman cleared the crowd and helped put in the cupboard in the car. I got in the car and checked my phone, it was 8:45pm and I had some 34 missed calls from uncle and my mum. I was scared. He was a no nonsense man. He had told me to return by 6pm. I just knew I was a dead meat, all I needed was sauce and pepper. I started the long journey home driving like a fast and furious character. I got home around 9:30pm to find my parents inside a car outside the gate with the engine rolling. I parked and got down, went over to meet them and as I prostrated to greet uncle, I was met with his infamous echoing slap as I raised my head up. Uncle’s slaps always carried messages. All he had to do was slap me and I knew I was to park the car with me inside the house, drop the key, lock the gate and get back into the car they were in. he didn’t say a word.

As I got in the car, he made turned the car around and made to leave the street, then he started asking me, amidst slaps still driving, where I had been. I tried explaining the ‘service’ ended late and I was delayed by a guy who was calling me a thief because I had forced his things out of my locker. He just kept looking back and dishing out the slaps amidst telling me we were going back to the school. Going back to the school?! I was just going to die, that boy would just readily expose me and tell him there was no service but an all night party. why didn’t I just wait the few minutes it took the boy to get to the hostel, at least he would have been there and there would not have been any case of accusations whatsoever.

I pleaded with God to intervene. Flat tyre. Engine problem. Empty fuel tank. Those were my prayer points as we journeyed back to my school. None happened. As we got close to the gate, I lost hope and started singing ‘nearer my God to thee’. Eventually he pulled up and the gateman inquired from inside who he was and he introduced himself as a parent. The gate was opened and he drove in. he got down and asked of the proprietor who was like an elderly friend of his and he was told he had gone home ofcourse and he wasn’t picking calls as uncle had tried calling him earlier.
He shouted at me to get out of the car. I did and the gateman saw me. He told the gateman all I had said about the locker and how I had told him it was he, the gateman, that had settled the problem. Then the gateman confirmed that I was telling the truth and I would have truly been home earlier if it had not happened. I felt relieved. So he came here just to know if I was really In the school till that period? Nice, we can go home now.
But not quite.
In a thunderous voice, he asked of the guy who had delayed me and someone called him out. Then sighting my father, he greeted him.
Uncle asked him what had happened between us and he cockily said; ‘he stole my money that I had kept in his locker, he is a thei… before he could finish pronouncing ‘theif’, Uncle had given him a very hot, resounding slap. He fell to the ground and uncle had removed his belt in a split second and started giving him lashes, I remember what he said in between the lashes
‘how dare you call my son a theif! A boy I raised myself, you open your stupid mouth and call him a thief, I have watched him for more than 15 years and he has never taken what is not his. How dare you tell him I have failed as a father and that I raised a thief!!!’
I was all smiles and was happy my father had stood up for me. Happy until he started coming towards me with anger still in his eyes and the belt still held in action mode. Oh crap. Well, First things first, I got a hot slap that made me hit the car. Next I had belt lashes on me too and I was hearing;
‘did I raise you this way? A stranger calls you a thief and all through the story, I didn’t hear any part where you slapped, hit and even wounded the guy! I didn’t raise you to be stupid, you should have wounded him and called me to come and bail you and settle his hospital bill!!!’

All the while, my mum was in the car. She knew she couldn’t stop anything. The gateman was dumbfounded because he beat me more than he beat my accuser and that was just because I didn’t beat my accuser.

There was a hospital near so uncle gave the gateman some money to treat my accuser and get him some food if he still could. We got into the car and he told me he beat me because I didn’t stand up for myself and him. He made me know if anyone accused me of anything, that person was questioning his parenting ability and he would have none of it. I always had to stand up for myself.

We got home eventually and as he made to enter his room, he turned and asked me to bring all the textbooks I had used while in the school to his room. I told him ok and went to my room. Not to get the textbooks but to rest a little before another round of beating. I had given out all my textbooks to my junior colleagues after the exams.

To be continued

lol.... c'mon man just drop it already

haba..i only get the chance to type and update at night,i don't even review..no time during the day..another coming tomorrow though..sorry

HaiIaintNoJoke:
lol.... c'mon man just drop it already

so far, so interesting

iammrjohnson:
Not to get the textbooks but to rest a little before another round of beating. I had given out all my textbooks to my junior colleagues after the exams.

To be continued

I grew up used to beating partly because I was a stubborn child and partly because it was my father’s identity. I got beaten for just too many reasons; I once got beaten for scoring a little lower total exam points than the previous although I topped the class. I was got beaten because I came second in a national competition and the winner was just a point ahead of me. While I was in the nursery school, I had brought home my report card and the teacher’s remark for most of the subjects was ‘he did not talk’. My mother told me this story and it’s her favorite. She said my father was not really angry when he saw the report but later in the evening I was in the kitchen and my mother was preparing amala. I was said to be overjoyed and without being asked, I started reciting all the anthems and poems I had refused to recite during exams. My father was said to have entered the kitchen during my voluntary chanting and he got so angry he gave me the beating of my life.

I was later to know I got my stubbornness from him. He was an epitome and role model of stubbornness. What made his special was that he directed it towards achieving his goals. He turned it into determination. No matter how little or important the goal was, he would always find a way. An example of this was a story told by his best and childhood friend after his death;

For the love of football

It was the year 19** and there was a great football match to be played between the shooting stars club and a foreign club. the sports complex of The University Of Ife( later called Obafemi Awolowo University) was the venue. Uncle and his friend were in Ibadan. The match was the talk of the town and everyone wanted to watch it. Of course uncle wanted to watch it,he loved football more than himself. They both wanted to watch the match but couldn’t afford the transport fare and there was nowhere they could sleep as the match was supposed to hold in the evening.

His friend had lost hope until the morning of the match day when uncle woke up and told his friend to get dressed as they were going to ife, osun state to watch the match. His friend was confused and had asked him where he got money from, he told him not to worry and just follow him. His friend was the gentle type and he really was the one who knew uncle most. He knew him but he didn’t know what he was up to this time. There was a time after their secondary school days, uncle was back home with his father after his father had heard he finished secondary school despite his neglect and begged him to come back home. He stayed only a year in his house.

During his stay, uncle and his friend had gotten invited to a birthday party which of course was to hold midnight. He had told his friend to tell the others to come to his gate by 11:30 pm so they could all go to the party together in his father’s car as his father had given him permission to take the car. They all felt very excited and looked forward to 11:30pm. They ran errands happily, both the ones they were sent on and the ones they weren’t. late into the night, uncle had soaked his hair with ‘laide’ perfume jelly and with a very hot iron, he pressed his hair to make it look like micheal jackson’s jerry curls. He had on a jeans jacket and trouser. He had taken his father’s perfume and glasses and his stepmother’s gold chain. he got dressed and stood in front of the 6 feet mirror in his little room. He was going to be the star of that party.

By 11:30pm, they had all arrived and met uncle sitting at a dark spot beside the gate waiting for them. They were all happy and smiling and told him they were ready to go and he should drive out the car. With a mischievous smile on his face, he told them the truth; his father had not given him permission to take the car, he had planned to ‘steal out’ the car!

They realized he had tricked them knowing they wouldn’t be able to go back home even if they were scared, each of them had to sneak out of the house. Hence they had no choice but to do as he said. He took them inside quietly making sure no noise was made in order not to arouse suspicion. They got to the car and he told them his plan; they were going to push the car out of the compound and out of the street until they got to a safe place where they could start the car. He got in the car and the others pushed. At last they got out of the street and he started the car. Off they went to the party. They had a night of their life and unanimously made uncle the leader of the group and master of escapades. I saw photos of that night and the car…and the ladies.

This and other reasons was why uncle friend trusted him on that particular match day. If he said they would get to ife, then they would, he just had to pray about whatever was his plan.

Before noon, they left the house and set out on the journey. Uncle told his friend they were going to hitch hike (soole). They just had to wait for a bus or lorry or trailer. Still they had not a single naira on them. After more than an hour, a lorry stopped for them and they agreed on an amount. They climbed and sat in the back of the lorry while the driver sat alone inside and started the journey. It was after they had started the journey uncle explained his plan to his friend. He was scared. Not because the plan might not work but the consequence if it didn’t work. The driver had cutlasses and axe beside him in the lorry. Uncle didn’t seem baffled, he only chatted away about the match that was about to begin soon.

As they got inside ife, uncle knocked on the lorry and told the driver he had to defecate and that he should please stop by the bush. The man did and uncle signaled to his friend. Out of the lorry, they ran into the bush! The man saw them running and then realized what had happened; the boys didn’t have money to pay him. He jumped out of the lorry with a cutlass in one hand and the axe in the other. He chased after the boys and started cursing, telling them to come out of the bush and pay him up or else he would make sure they met their creator that day. Inside the bush, uncle and his friend squatted and held their breaths, any single breath would reveal them and that meant their end. Soon the man got nearer to where they hid, hot tears started rolling down his friend’s face. He regretted ever following uncle on this escapade. How would his family take the story that he had been killed because of football? He prayed inside and promised God he’ll pay all the tithes he owed if he got out of that predicament. He turned to look at uncle and he was surprised what he saw; he was just smiling like a child playing hide and seek. Then as if his prayer was answered, the man turned back and started walking back to his lorry. Then a moment later, they heard the ignition start and the lorry left. They left after some 10 minutes as they wanted to be sure he had left. Then they had to walk some 2km to the gate of the school. They got late to the match but still were able to watch it. After the match, they left ife that night for Ibadan and got home around 11pm. He never told me how they got back to Ibadan.

I learnt a lot from that story. It was his person. He would do whatever it took to get things done, he never liked excuses, didn’t fancy apologies. He did whatever he felt was needed to be done at the particular time. Uncle’s friend told me he was the one who ‘gingered’ the rest of them into making it in life. He influenced me in a lot of ways. He encouraged my fancy for repairing things, he never cared the cost of the appliance, I could wreck it all in the name of trying to fix it. He was responsible for me. He was responsible for a lot of people. He always felt he was blessed so as to bless others, he said he wasn’t created for his family alone. He made me proprietor of the schools at the age of 17 while I was an undergraduate and was home for the ASUU strike, he said I wasn’t too young since he started the school at the age of 24.

While working as the proprietor, I learnt a lot of things about my father. I saw a lot of letters from different people; students whom he was sponsoring in tertiary institutions, teachers who asked for different favours, religious and social groups who were asking to be sponsored for one event or the other and parents who begged to pay half of the school fees they were supposed to pay. It got to a point, UNILAG gave him a honorary Phd, OAU gave him an award for contributing towards the educational and economic growth of the country. He was given so many awards over time for affecting lives positively.

After I got the papers signed in the ward, we were told we could come for his body whenever we wanted and I told them I would be back to pay for his embalmment. I had called my mother after returning to the morgue from the ward. I heard a loud thud after I told her they lost him, she fainted. Then the phone calls started coming in. it seemed like I had been there for hours but it wasn’t even noon yet. I got a call from an elderly friend of my father, the only who stood behind him firmly in his trial times. He told me to wait in UCH and he and some of our relatives would meet us there.

I called a friend who was a student doctor in UCH and told him about the death and that I needed to stay in his room in the hostel inside UCH till the people I was expecting would come. He met us outside the morgue and we went to his hostel. The hostel was like a regular federal school’s hostel; many three story buildings with atleast 10 rooms on each floor. It had a gate and a security post beside the gate. We entered and passed by the security post and then I heard one of the security men call out;
‘heyyyssssssss!’
‘’hhhhheeeeeyyyyysssssss!’
I knew he was trying to call me back but I wasn’t in the mood. Then he started running towards us until he caught up with us. He pulled my brother, who was behind me, roughly and then shouted at me and asked why I didn’t answer him when he called. I told him I didn’t hear my name, then he told me I was stupid and told me to get out of the hostel. Anger is my second name:
‘you dey mad? You want make God punish you? I no go look your age, I tear you slap! See this bast@rd dey form say him dey do him work here, you come dey tell me make I comot, na your family get this place?! The work wey una suppose do, una no go do am, you come dey here dey ask me why I no answer you when you dey shout heeyyyysss!. Na one bast@rd like you cause my papa death when he no do wetin he suppose do because say he want chop pass himself. See if you make me vex here, you go lose your job!’
Everyone around was looking at me, even the security man that I was talking to. Then his superior came out of the post and apologized to me, he told me he was sorry about my father’s death. But his apology or any other’s person could not bring back the dead.

We went to my friend’s room and later the people we were waiting for came around and we went home. On getting home, the house had turned into something else. There was a multitude of people. I found my mother somewhere in the private sitting room among a lot of people crying. I saw people I hadn’t seen in years that day. I saw people who were always around my father before his sickness that. Then I remembered the doctor’s words; ‘if half the people who attend a person’s burial were present while he was sick, maybe, just maybe the person might survive the sickness’

I was filled with hatred. I hated everyone. Where was everyone when he was down? Why was he deserted? all the people I knew he stood by and the ones I didn’t know, where were they? Did he really deserve that from people he trusted and loved? He had done a lot of things at the detriment of himself and the family. Did he really deserve that from life? Was life fair? It was not even about money, just to show concern. How hard was that?

At that point I thought I got to know the truth about people; ‘they only care about you when you can be of help to them, no one was worth it. No one. I hated how they would hail you just to get anything from you, I hated how they complained about how difficult life was and how much they needed help. I hated how they felt the rich should share their riches with the poor’. I only saw the negative in people. I hated beggars. I vowed never to help anyone. I didn’t care if I didn’t make heaven because of that. I began to live in solitude. I avoided people. I had no ability to pity. I wouldn’t lift a finger if it meant helping anyone.

I got married because I had to and had three kids. I was so lost in my hatred, I couldn’t even fake love for my kids and wife. I had inherited a fortune and I only focused on turning it into mega fortune. Money was my new friend and consultant. Everything was about money to me, nothing else. My family grew to hate me and the house was no longer a home to anyone of us.

Then one day, my wife and kids left. I never knew where they went. It was as though they had left planet earth. I searched everywhere and promised a robust reward to anyone who could find them. I got nothing.
A week later, they found their bodies at a river bank. They had been involved in a car accident the day they left home and instead of being helped, they were robbed of their belongings and their bodies disposed into the river. The bodies had washed up a week later.

I was contacted to come and identify the bodies. I will never forget that day. The payback of hatred. I couldn’t blame the perpetrators of the crime, I could only blame myself for bringing such ill fate upon my family. They only wanted to be loved and I could provide them every other thing in the world except that. I became desolate and would not leave my home. I dread leaving this home that has now become my prison. I dread everything out there that will remind me of who I am.

Like I said, today I decided to write so that you can find it in your young heart to forgive those people you hate. The human mind is selfish. I have come to realize they can’t help it. Look beyond the inadequacy and forgive that person. Hate is a two way road, what you give is what you get. Hatred will eat you up and you will finally become worse than the people you hate.

For you to avoid hate, you should learn the following;
Never lend out money you can’t give out.
Never let money define your friendship with anyone.
Give when you can and when convenient.
Understand the love of God and let it overcome your hate of man.
Never expect a return when you give.
Do because you want to and what you think is right, not because you are expected to.
Learn to forgive people and move on. You set yourself free when you do that.

As I step out of the house today for the immortality process, I do not know what the result will be. Of what use is immortality if it means I will forever be alone? there is a connection between the present and the future. I have gotten to where you are going but I do not want you to get here in this state. As you go to bed tonight, call that friend, call that relative, call that child, call that partner and tell him/her ‘I forgive you’ not only for them but for yourself. After all this while, I can still remember the most important thing about my father, he forgave people even before they apologized.

When you hate people, it is you who is in bondage, but when you forgive, you become a free man.
Yours truly,
MrJohnson.

P.S: I remember when I came back home from NYSC and uncle called me into his room and said
‘I am proud of you, my boy. Everything I have thought you, you have learnt so well. But there is one thing left to teach you; I have to teach you about women. It will be step by step but I am sure you will catch on.’
I smiled, thanked him and left his room. I went back to my friends in my room and told them what he said. They all went hysterical with laughter. They were not laughing at me. No, they were laughing with me. If only he knew his book worm son had turned something else. If only he knew I was the widely proclaimed king of the ‘south’. If only he knew I had become a legend.
Oh have you forgotten what you did? Let me remind you;
‘Legend of the bon*r: I remember what you did last summer
https://www.nairaland.com/2300920/legend-bon3r-remember-what-did’

nice ending,op.. i like the hot,warm and cold temps of the story..but you forgot to tell people that they have to open an account or login on nairaland before they can read your new story..

Wow wow wow

So touché

I pray to God to remove that anger in my heart caused by my brother's death.

thanks..i forgot that part..guess everyone knows now

charlesbailey:
nice ending,op.. i like the hot,warm and cold temps of the story..but you forgot to tell people that they have to open an account or login on nairaland before they can read your new story..

thanks..glad i could touch you..

Chinum:
Wow wow wow
So touché
I pray to God to remove that anger in my heart caused by my brother's death.