Radio After dark (final chapters)

Written by @big_stan

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Chapter 9
Deji sat in the car, listening to the radio as he waited for his wife to come out of the supermarket. He decided not to go in there with her because he had learnt overtime that following her to shop meant they were going to buy lots of stuff they wouldn’t be needing. While he waited, He admired the various cars parked in the parking lot, then he got a ping on his phone and clicked on the link he’d been sent. What opened up before him was something he had gone through before. Two years ago, he’d dated Darasimi before she became an air hostess, then she was in between jobs and he liked her a lot then. He still liked her now, but back then, he’d lied to her about his marital status, letting her believe he was single. He didn’t know she had cameras planted in every part of her house. He had a key to her flat back then and whenever she was out of town, He would bring some random girls to her house and make love with them. The cameras captured everything back then. Now, looking at the colourful pictures and the video on Linda Ikeji blog, He knew it had all the markings of Darasimi on it. Another married man had been fingered. He hated Darasimi ever since that episode because it crashed his marriage and it took the grace of God to get his wife back again and he was still paying for that mistake, that was why he chose to remain in the car, so his wife won’t Max out his credit card. He still planned on wreaking havoc on Darasimi, after all, revenge was better served cold. He was waiting for the right time.
Chioma started to notice the stares she was getting from colleagues and customers, at first she thought they were just admiring her new suit and the bracelet, it was when she overheard one of the customers call her a “husband snatcher” that reality dawned on her that with all the new stuffs she had on, she was stark naked. That was when the barrage of insults started. “Husband snatcher!” “bankers are prostitutes!” “clueless bitch!” she started to wonder if all these people were related to some of the men she’d been with, when some of the customers noticed how clueless she was regarding the true state of things, one of them went on to play the video of her ‘sexcapades’ he’d saved on his phone. She heard her moans before she saw the video. The customer had one of those China phones with very loud speakers. The banking hall was quiet as her moans got louder, she was telling another woman’s husband to go deeper. Then she fainted.
Tunde listened in silence as his wife poured out her heart in tears, though she may be far across the Atlantic, He felt her hurt like she was in the room with him. His friends had always called him 007 for his ability to always extricate himself from compromising situations like James Bond ,but right now, with this discovery, He was 008 and stuck. When his wife hung up, she sent him a link and he clicked on it and lost his appetite. He saw himself in ways he’d never believed he could be captured on video. There he was in colour, making love in ways he couldn’t and had never done with his wife. The image of himself in the pictures and the accompanying video were so real that no forensic experts could claim it was doctored. He felt a pain in his chest as he realized the impact of what he had done. He had with one singular stupid act, lost his family, his job and also his reputation. He wondered how many people had seen the video. He didn’t need to wonder for long. The next call was from his boss in Canada.
Darasimi had a wonderful breakfast of pancakes and was really impressed by how well they turned out. At first she was skeptical about taking a bite, but when she did, the rumblings in her stomach reminded her that she had to eat the pancakes as well. Femi really had honed his cooking skills and apparently every other skills, they ate in silence with her wondering the kind of friendship that would now forge between them and thank goodness he was finally wearing clothes for she was powerless to his charms and she was also wearing his clothes as well with his familiar smell enveloping her a constant reminder of the night before.
Femi watched from the window as Darasimi reversed her car and drove out of the compound, in the silence they shared at breakfast, a whole lot was said. He still was trying to understand what Darasimi meant when she said “we shouldn’t see or talk for a few days.” He most definitely didn’t need a few days to be sure that his best friend was definitely the woman he wanted spending his life with. He didn’t need a few days to be sure that Chioma was now a memory of his past but if Dara needed a few days to process everything, He was going to respect her and give her that. A message on his phone peeled him away from the window. He read the email he just received and couldn’t believe his eyes. He went to the bathroom to wash his face, then read the email again. Not only had he been found innocent of all the allegations that was levelled against him, the bank was offering him 20 million naira compensation for his troubles and also his job back but as the branch manager of a new branch, the branch close to his house. He knelt down, gave thanks and forgot about Darasimi’s  few days, He needed to share this wonderful news with someone. And who else than the woman he planned on spending forever with. After 5 rings and she didn’t pick up, He proceeded to go shower and planned on driving over to Darasimi’s house later that day to tell her the good news.
Chioma got to the house she’d shared with the best man she’d ever been blessed with and for the first time in all the years she’d been coming home, she couldn’t enter the house. She stood outside the door, with the keys in her hand, wondering what explanation was reasonable enough. She was so sure Femi had also seen the video, she wondered who leaked the video out to the internet, especially to Linda Ikeji’s. In the space of two hours, she had lost her job, her reputation, had found out that Leke was Tunde and was happily married with kids, what she was scared of finding out was if Femi would forgive her and take her back. She finally let herself in the house and for the first time she appreciated what it meant to come home to love. Femi loved her deeply. She stood there sobbing as she heard him whistling in the bathroom. At first she started cheating on Femi for the fun of it, especially after he lost his job and was depressed, when she started getting expensive gifts and Femi wasn’t giving her money for her monthly upkeep, she decided to just go ahead enjoying her life. Now see how far that enjoyment had brought her. She sat on the sofa sobbing and waiting, scared of going to join Femi in the bathroom as she would have, if it was on a different day. While waiting, she looked around the house that was her home for three years. She saw the pictures her and Femi took together in all the places they visited, then she saw two used plates of food and two glasses with one of them still having orange juice in it. She wondered who Femi had over for breakfast. Maybe the person that came to give him the news of her sexcapades. Femi’s Laptop was opened beside her and she turned to it and saw the answers to all her questions. Well some of her questions. Femi was the one that leaked it out but how did he know and for how long had he known?  She didn’t Have to wait for long.
“I’m sure you’re here to pack your stuffs. I was generous enough to help you pack everything you brought into this house when we came in together. I couldn’t pack the memories because unfortunately for me, that’s something I would always carry with me.” “Femi, I’m terribly sorry. Please!” she sobbed but the look on Femi’s face made her realize it was a futile attempt to try pleading with him. “I don’t know what you are sorry for, Chioma. Being caught or being sacked. Well, you and Tunde deserve each other, do you know the pain I went through when my old friend told me how he made love with someone I loved, someone I was hoping to get married to?  Do you know how I felt?  You cheated on me because I lost my job and could no longer keep up with your expensive lifestyle. Well, news flash Chioma, I got my job back 10 folds and I also fell in love with my best friend. So you see, it’s win win situation for both of us. You got what you deserved by being foolish and I got what I earned by being patient.” Chioma just sat there on the floor, sobbing as the harsh reality started to sink in. All she could say through her sobs was a mantra of “Please Femi!” She watched through her tears as he went inside the room and brought out all her stuffs. He’d meticulously packed everything like someone that took his time waiting for a moment like this. She wondered how long Femi had known. She never knew Femi and Tunde were old school friends. She obviously didn’t know much for she also didn’t know that the woman she met in the elevator yesterday wasn’t just taking her place in Femi’s life but was also the one that caught all the tryst on camera. One thing she was very certain of though was the fact that she’d lost Femi for good. Her next hurdle now was how to face her mom, because her mom liked Femi as well, who didn’t?
Three weeks passed and Femi didn’t hear from or see Darasimi. She’d immersed herself into her work, shutting him out. He was back at work himself but the workload didn’t keep thoughts of Darasimi from his mind. He even started carrying the engagement ring meant for Chioma around with him for any day he bumped into Darasimi. He planned on proposing to her on the spot. If only he knew her itinerary. He’d been to her house countless times but never met her. The life of an air hostess definitely wasn’t something he was used to. He came back to an empty home every night and turned to the radio for companionship, then he started tweeting to the Radio After Dark presenter on her matchmaking program, He was doing it just for the fun of it, but he would never drop his number even when the presenter asked that he did so. How did he plan on getting a match if he didn’t get someone to call him and be his match? The presenter would always ask him. He doubted he was going to meet someone that matched Darasimi. He’d spent the last week avoiding calls from Chioma’s mom. There really was no going back on his decision with Chioma, He would never take her back even if she were the only woman left.
Darasimi was in her hotel room with her fellow hostess, Deola who had been hammering on Dara to pick up or return Femi’s call for it was obvious Femi really liked her. Darasimi still wasn’t so sure. She felt Femi needed her because he was heartbroken. She needed Femi too as a lover, not just as her best friend and she missed him terribly too. But she had to be sure. Though she was far away in the UK, she still monitored Femi’s tweets, especially his tweets to the Radio After Dark program he always told her about. She read his tweets for the past week where he wrote about the kind of woman he’d like to be match made with. She smiled, knowing that she was the one he was obviously hoping would be his match. She checked her time, confirmed the time it was back home in Nigeria and knew from Femi’s tweet some twenty minutes ago that he was still up. Then she sent in her own tweet to the radio presenter, letting her know specifically that Femi was her match. Then she sent a direct message to the presenter with her new number, urging her to pass the number to Femi and the presenter did just that.
Deji saw pictures of Darasimi and her new man on the cover of a wedding magazine his wife was reading and decided in that instant that this was the right time to exact his own revenge. He leaked the evidence he had to Linda Ikeji’s blog and also sent a copy to Darasimi’s husband and then waited for how the news would unfold.
Segun kept wondering how to let his friend know what he’d done. But then again, it was better Deji found out stuffs himself.  Deji had paid him handsomely to meet and date Darasimi two years ago and video all their love making and he did all that as an actor till his heart got involved. He fell in love with Darasimi and when she made him understand that her heart belonged to someone else, they stopped being lovers but became very good friends. Then he went on and got married to an old friend while Darasimi married the man she’d always loved. It was at Darasimi’s wedding he remembered the video evidence Deji had and then he went to pay Deji a visit. Deji had handed him the video evidence to edit it and set the timing so it would appear recent but Segun had swapped the video and instead of the video showing him and Darasimi’s sex scenes, he’d replaced them with a video of Deji’s kid when he took his first steps. After all, the video would also ruin his own marriage if it leaked. He destroyed the video when he got home, surprised that Deji had not even checked or found out yet.
Deji still checks Linda Ikeji’s blog waiting for the day he would see Darasimi caught in the act.

The End

Stan

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