The Moment I Met You (Chapter 349)

 

By Nightengale Ben-Onyeukwu

At this same moment in the market, at the fruit and vegetable line, Louisa who was selling apple to a customer, suddenly looked up and saw four men walking towards her. They four of them were all dressed like gangsters, with uptight hair, silver chains, ripped jeans, scary faces, and a cigarette in their mouths.                                        

The smile on the face of Louisa vanished immediately. She could feel that something was off.                                                                                     

‘Old woman, someone reported that you stole his wallet,’ one of the men said to Louisa.                                                                                            

‘Who told you that?’Louisa asked, frowning. ‘Did you make this up?’                                                                                                                                                

‘I also heard that you have not been paying for matching ground and for protecting your stall.’                                                                             

‘I have always paid for my matching ground, but never paid for protection fee because I don’t have a stall. I push my cart home everyday,’Louisa replied.

          

‘Well, you should first return the wallet to the man,’the broad shouldered man said in a threatening tone as he picked up an apple from the cart, took two big bites and threw the remainder on the ground.                                                                                                                                             

  ‘Can I see the man,’ as Louisa said that, a young man sporting a brown vest, black trousers, and a pair of green plastic slippers appeared from the side.

                    

The young man’s hair was messy, and also had a mature and handsome face. He was still young and could have found a decent job instead of doing this, Louisa thought as she looked at him from head to toe. She felt that a city like Abuja shouldn’t have people like these men, because such men are the stain to the city’s name.                                               

‘Hand me my wallet else I will drag you to the police station and make sure you rot in there.’                                                                             

‘Ibrahim, we are here to get your wallet for you,’one of the men assured Ibrahim.                                                                                                                 

‘Shouldn’t fellas like you be studying instead of duping people…?’                                                                                                                                                

‘You might as well call us hoodlums or even unknown gunmen…we don’t care. We are just doing our job.’                                              

‘Please, I just want to sell my fruits, then go home in peace,’Louisa said calmly, trying to ignore the men.                                        

  ‘How dare you ask us to leave?’One of them yelled as he yanked Louisa’s hair.                                                                                                                 Louisa had turned to a customer and was about to know what she wanted when, caught unaware, he had her hair jerked, and her scalp tingled numbly.                                                                                                  

‘Stop it!’Louisa said loudly, attracting people to the scene.                        

The man was pleased. ‘I don’t want to. What are you going to do? Just give Ibrahim back his wallet that you stole, pay your matching ground and protecting fee, then we will leave you in peace but if you don’t then all your fruits will be feast on.’                                             

‘But those who didn’t open a shop don’t have to pay protection fee, and I know that Louisa would never steal from anyone,’one of the onlookers said.                                                                                   

   ‘Whew!’One of the hoodlums loudly laughed. ‘I see. Louisa has supporters now. But unfortunately, we would never listen to anyone.                                                                                                                                             

Another hoodlum wildly laughed. ‘We need to teach Louisa a lesson, after that we will bring her to the station.’                                                                   

Without waiting for Louisa to say more, he sent her flying by kicking her on her abdomen, her body slammed into the roadside garbage bin. The remains of vegetables and fruits covered her whole body, even her clothes were soaked by the dirty water.                                          

Louisa felt both pain and tears stealing into her eyes. The putrid smell of the garbage wafted into her nose, causing her to sneeze.                    

‘This old woman loves to play action movies,’Ibrahim said and the hoodlums laughed. ‘I’m sure she will do well playing James Bond.’ He carried the fruits belonging to Louisa and threw them at her; some of the fruits were smashed. ‘I will learn martial arts just for you, Louisa.’                                                                        

                 

  Several onlookers witnessed what the hoodlums did, but none did anything to stop what was done to Louisa. These hoodlums had always been domineering, so no one dare do a thing to stop them. Even the man that spoke up for Louisa became afraid and hid in his shell. Louisa was accused of stealing, they were afraid of being dragged in the mess.                                                                                                             

‘Who gave you the right to treat this woman like this?’ A charming voice rang out.                                                                                                    

The hoodlums were about to drag Louisa out and beat her mercilessly, when they heard the voice. Startled, they turned to look at her. Sharon was behind Jessica, donned in white shirt dress, paired with bright pink earrings and nude heels.                                                                         

  Focusing his gaze on Jessica, Ibrahim said, ‘Madam Jessica, what are you doing here?’                                                                                                          

‘What’s going on here?’Jessica asked.                                                              

Ibrahim chuckled. ‘I respect you so much but I can’t tell you.’ Standing before her, he slapped Jessica across the face.     

‘How dare you want to know what is going on?’                                                                              

The onlookers gasped collectively. Gracious!       

This man dared to hit Jessica who was from a rich and powerful family?  Not only that, she was also the rumoured girlfriend of Michael.                                               

One of the hoodlums glared at Jessica. ‘You deserve what you got.’ He grasped her hand tightly.                                                                                     

‘I will make all of you pay for this!’ Jessica gritted her teeth, breaking free from his grasp.                                                                                

  Just then, a police car drove by, two policemen wearing their smart uniform came out of the car, walking towards the scene with a grave expression.                                                                                                            

The leading police officer coldly asked, ‘Where is Louisa Chima? She was reported to have stolen a wallet from one Ibrahim.’            

‘She is over there.’One of the hoodlums pointed at the garbage bin. ‘She hid herself in there once she saw the police coming.’         

  Louisa was brought out of the garbage bin. She didn’t know why this was happening to her. This could be a plot by someone, but whom? She wondered who it was that did this to her. ‘Sir, why are you looking for me?’                                                                                                                   

The police officer flashed his badge, and said with cold arrogance, ‘I am a Nigeria police force officer; someone reported that you are a perpetual thief in this market, right now we want to bring you to the police station for questioning.’                                                                       

Louisa understood in a flash, seems like the hoodlums were really payed heavily to do this. It was obvious that the mastermind actually had the police to work for them.                                                                         

Sharon hurriedly went up to explain, ‘Please, I think this is a misunderstanding. Louisa wouldn’t do that. I don’t believe she could steal from anyone.’                                                                                                     

‘We have heard lots of theft going on in Abuja. If we don’t do something, this might continue.’                                                                                      

‘What about the hoodlums? They even slapped my friend…what will you do to them?’ Sharon asked.                                                              

‘Your friend never reported anything to us.’ With that the leading police officer, waved his hand and the other police office came forward.                                                                                                                                          

‘Please, call my children,’Louisa pleaded after being handcuffed.                                                                                                                                

Sharon glanced at Jessica, and what Jessica said some minutes ago flashed in her eyes. It was Jessica that plotted this scene but pretended to care. She even let herself to be slapped.                                            

After the police officers brought Louisa away, and the hoodlums disappeared, the onlookers which consisted of traders and shoppers started cursing the police and hoodlums, aloud. ‘What a shameless country consisting of hoodlums and criminals in police clothing.’                                                                                                                                          

‘This country will never get better with such people around.’                               

Every one of the onlookers said their own piece, but in front of the police or the hoodlums they would never dare to say these words.                                                                                                                                                        

When Jessica and Sharon returned to the car park, Jessica was about opening the door to the driver’s seat, but Sharon was quick to block her.                                                                                                                       

  ‘What movie did you just act a few minutes? Sharon asked, enraged. Her smile disappeared as she glared at Jessica.                                    

‘I am not a movie star.’ Jessica feigned not to understand what Sharon meant.                                                                                                             

‘You’re still pretending not to know?’ Sharon gave her a cold smile.                                                                                                                                        

Jessica had originally wanted not to tell Sharon about this but since Sharon had found out already, she told her everything.                               

‘How could you plot this? What has Chioma really done to you? We arrived yesterday from Paris and you rewarded Michael with this?’                                                                                                                                          

‘I am not after Michael.’                                                                                    

‘Even so, Michael is Chioma’s beau. Why do you love the role of a villain? You could have become a lead character but you shamefully chose this role that will ruin your future. To stoop so low you even came to this market and bought ice cream and cake and threw them away…’

                   

‘I could bring them back from the garbage bin for you. Let’s go home.’ Jessica went over to the door and got in the driver’s seat, then, Sharon got into the passenger seat, sighing disappointingly. If she had come with her car, then she wouldn’t have gotten into this car.              

Jessica smiled as she started the car. With the engine rumbling with several vrooms the beautiful red Porsche exited the market in a whirlwind.                                                                                       

With one hand on the steering wheel, Jessica used the free one and reached for her ringing phone. ‘Nathan’s calling,’ she said before picking up the phone.                                                                                             

  Shooting a glance at her, Sharon murmured, ‘You don’t love my brother but you will prefer to love a man that doesn’t even care about your existence.’                                                                                                          

Jessica pretended not to have heard what Sharon said. After speaking with Nathan, she hung up the call.                                                                                      

Shortly afterward, they arrived at a luxurious restaurant belonging to the Ojukwu family. Jessica drove and parked the car by the entrance of the restaurant. They went straight to the private room. Sharon pressed her palm against the bio-metric scanner and they went in to see Nathan and Prince already seated before a large spread of sumptuous dishes. This room only has Nathan, Sharon and Prince’s palm print registered on the bio-metric scanner. No one else has access to this room except for the three of them.                                                                          

  Jessica sipped her champagne with satisfaction while waiting for the smartly dressed waiter to fill all the glasses on the table.                                       

Nathan raised his glass when the waiter was done with filling the glasses. ‘It’s my pleasure,’Nathan announced, ‘to propose a toast to my darling fiancée, Jessica,’ he said. ‘A happy ever after for us both.’   

                  

Sharon looked at the two, confused at what was going on.She swallowed her glass of champagne in a single gulp. Prince was also confused. He knew how much Jessica loved Michael and hated Nathan. So, he was obviously surprised with the toast.                                                                  

‘Brother, I know how much you love Jessica and I know how much she hates you. Why did she suddenly agree to you?’ Sharon asked Nathan but her gaze was on Jessica.                                                                                            

Jessica rested her hand on Sharon’s shoulder, ‘Sharon, I have thought it through and so decided to accept your brother.’                                 

‘What are you really planning?’Prince asked Jessica.                       

‘Love,’ Jessica said. ‘I promise to love Nathan as my heart’s better half. ‘Inwardly she cursed nonsense! I am only with Nathan because I want to use him to conceal my plans so that no one will ever suspect whatever I do from now on. Wait until I win Michael over, I promise never to hesitate to drop Nathan like a hot potato. To win Michael over, I will have to think of something better to destroy Chioma. I want to see her on the floor begging me for mercy or else my heart won’t rest well.                   

                    

Sharon glanced at Jessica and thought, I have watched several scenes like this, they get together perhaps, not loving each other, but then, destiny will in the end find a way to make them inseparably. That might happen in your case. But how much would you hurt Chioma before realising you need to stop fighting her and love my brother instead. Sharon took a sip of her champagne and forced a smile. ‘I am glad you have realised that loving my brother is the best thing to do.’ She turned to Nathan. ‘Now, where is the ring?’                                  

Jessica frowned, and then forced herself to smile as Nathan waved his hand and a waiter swiftly brought in the bouquet of roses and a box.                                                                                                                                                

‘Uh, my big brother is so romantic,’Prince chuckled as Nathan walked over to Jessica and crouched down on his knees beside her.                                                                                                                                        

  ‘Jess,’ Nathan whispered, and immediately forgot what to say. He seemed to have forgotten how men propose to their women in romance movies. He had even memorised all of it, but now he found his mouth clipped, not knowing what to say. Perhaps, it was because he was deeply in love with this woman and was mesmerised by her beauty. He handed her the bouquet of roses and a box of chocolate. ‘Please, marry me. Please, I implore you.’                                                                      

  Jessica forced a smile. ‘And if I don’t?’ she smelled one of the long roses. ‘What will you do?’                                                                           

‘I’ll die, I swear it, Jess…’                                                                      

I will love if you disappear from here. I love Michael, not you, Jessica feigned a sweet smile, and said, ‘We don’t have to rush things. We can announce to the public about our engagement, and then carefully plan for our wedding.’                                                                                      

Nathan embraced her as he had been waiting to do this for so long and kissed her as though his life depended on it. He kissed her with such force that he left Jessica gasping. Before she had time to recover and curse him in her head, Nathan drew a box from his suit pocket. ‘This is for you, a pledge of my undying love.’                                               

‘I hate to listen to our country’s pledge. It’s so boring. Tell your father to change that.’ Then, she lowered her head and opened the box; the ring was carefully crafted to showcase the beautiful diamond, six slim platinum prongs to support the centre stone. The slender silhouette and polished finish of this solitaire obviously exemplify timeless design, which of course proved that simple can be truly stunning.                                                                                                                                    

Nathan had bought the engagement ring for a thousand dollar. He wished she would like it, for he spent so much thought and thought selecting an engagement ring. ‘Do you like it?’ he was so afraid she might say no or even change her mind towards accepting him.                    

‘They are beautiful,’ Jessica said and Nathan sighed in relief.                  

But the thought of Nathan being her husband irritated her. She would have felt better and happier if they were all given to her by Michael. She imagined herself and Michael leaned towards each other, as if drawn by an invisible thread, and imagined falling into his arms, kissing him with all the passion she possessed.                                                                

   Nathan wanted to tell, not only his parents and friends but also to the whole world. Somehow, Sharon felt that Jessica’s presence was here but her heart was somewhere else. She was probably seeing Michael as Nathan.