Honorable Secretary #8 (KPAKAM!) By @maskuraid

Just as I opened my mouth to scream, something beeped. Something loud and insistent.
And I opened my eyes instead.
It had all been a dream – or better still – a very very graphic nightmare. The room was empty and I was alone, atop my bed – blanket flung to the floor – and in my sweat soaked pyjamas. My heart was doing over a hundred kilometers per hour and threatening to burst out of my ribcage while I could still feel Daddy’s grip on my poor neck and Orubebe’s chilling words in my ears. Such was the vividness of the nightmare, but it was just a dream, an ordinary dream. However, the beeping sound that brought me back to reality was not. It was still there, loud and insistent and very real.
It was my phone.

I scrambled off the bed and plucked it off the nightstand.  The time was ten minutes past two in the morning and I had another SMS.  This time it was three words.

YOU CAN’T HIDE!!!

The whole of Monday was miserable. I had a terrible headache, probably from waking up that suddenly and shortage of sleep as I didn’t shut my eyes again till morning. Throughout the whole day I was moody, distracted and very irritable, like a bear with a boil on its ass. Even my colleagues noticed and pretty much left me alone in my corner to stew. Susan came around briefly but I just waved her off and turned away when she tried to catch my eye, as I wasn’t in the frame of mind for any stupid playacting. Toyin was back from her mini vacation and she too tried her best to cheer me up during lunch but I just wasn’t in the mood. Even the pictures of her boobs she sent to my phone afterwards did little to alter my state of mind. All I wanted was to be left alone, in peace.  

The drive home didn’t help matters at all. One stupid Keke Marwa broke my side mirror around Alagomeji in Yaba while trying to prove that his three legged bug was as nimble as a ballet dancer. All the pent up rage of the day welled up inside me and at that moment I really felt like I was going to ‘hulk out’. I drove after the muntula who sped off as if nothing had happened and blocked him into a corner a few meters down the road, jumped out of my still running vehicle, and ran over to his tricycle, reaching for his neck. The dude must have seen the murder in my eyes because he just dived away from me, escaping my closing fingers by inches while screaming “oga no vex” over and over. I was incensed. His passengers joined in trying to placate me while he ran and stood out of reach a couple of feet away still begging for mercy. In my frustration I turned off his engine and yanked his keys out of the ignition, marched angrily back into my car and drove off with it to the bemusement of all watching.

Tuesday was much better although I still wasn’t fully back to my old bubbly self. I had to cover for the stuff I’d left undone the previous day so I got in earlier than usual and got down to work with so much seriousness that I didn’t even break for lunch.