My Escapade with Aisha

I

 was just passing-by in a close-by cuisine on one unpredictable evening, I was bored all through the day- couldn’t think, couldn’t get excited and I won’t even laugh at what others finds funny.  Is not like I was hallucinating or suffering from asperger’s syndrome, everything I hurl at the wall comes back to me in bizarre. 

Feeding my eyes with flashes of people that flock into this cuisine and leaving after 30 minutes allotted to them for eating and that was how my eyes clamped on this Butter fly, a love at first sight, beautiful like she was made on Sunday.  Her laughs were so original to me, shiny white teeth that can easily blind the eyes, it can also show a blind man the right route to take when the sun shines on it, Butterfly was wearing nice cologne that almost made me to jump on her, I restrained because I will crease and stain her nice ashoke.  Her braided her was perfection for her beauty.

My intentions wasn’t to shag her, like most of the guys she told me about wanted to, “I am a virgin” I sheepishly said to her just to sound comical and make her feel safe.   Then she told me her name, after almost taking forever begging her to tell me, Aisha was her name, “what if I call you Butterfly?” I asked

“O that is a code name for gays,” she said

“Ahn ahn, must everything be link to gays,” I retorted

“Am just saying, I have lesbian friends and am fine with that anyway”

“Yeah, Butterfly, what if I tell you my best friend is gay? I asked hoping to see some changes in her face but she still remain calm “and I will like to meet him, we’re in for equality” she said grinning and sipping from her bottle of maltina.  We got to know the basic information of the both of us, from name to school we attend and from there we delve into family details and that’s where I got to know about her family, her dad is an Alhaji (a rich man but etymologically, it means a visitor in Mecca for hajj. Al hajj) that is happily married to a Syrian, an interracial marriage.  I upgraded my family profile by telling her my parents are into oil and gas, is selling palm oil and vegetable oil not the same as Oil and Gas?  Maybe she’s lying to me too.  We later exchange phone numbers and I promise to humour her with a call tomorrow, I paid her bus fare and watched the bus as it grew tiny and tinier until I can’t even here the noisy sound of it engine ringing in my ears.

I was waiting for her in that same cuisine, the next weekend, she had already told me she only have two weeks to spend before she could return to Glasgow where she’s is schooling, I and my best friend, Ola was chatting over a cup of strawberry ice cream that is not even ice enough to be called ‘ice’ when Aisha walked towards our table with her friend who was wearing a flashy pink Ankara with a pink lipstick.  Aisha gave me a half hug as introduce her to my friend, Ola, “you’re looking so gorgeous, especially on that glasses,’ she smiled admirably, “am falling head over heels, my friend here has got a good sight,” Ola teased back.  She introduced her butterfly friend to us, Osas-angelic and garrulous.  We chatted mostly about life in Nigeria and compared it to what Aisha told us about Glasgow, we drifted to politics- how it has divided the nation, plummet the modus Vivendi of the ragtag and bobtail, and how our hospitals has become a dump site of both the aged and sick ones waiting for medical attention of which is not forthcoming as a result of the strike action embarked by the NMA, Ola who is never interested in politics moved his attention to some Almajiris wandering hither thither waiting for leftovers and begging for money from those that came to patronize the cuisine, “men, I was thinking if these boys are products of unwanted pregnancies, because if they aren’t then I wonder how someone will push his kid into this horrible life of begging. Urchin,” he said with his face reddened with fury, we all shook our heads in unison to suggest that we all feel the same way.  When our one hour allotted to us for eating expired, Aisha brought out her purse and foot the bill while Ola dole out 200 Naira to the Almajiri children as they are already blocking our bath with their melodious tone of ‘Oga help me with food’ chants.  Aisha offered to drop my friend, so we sped in her father’s jeep with Owl City’s Fireflies playing over our heads, Osas took position in her stealing shows by keeping us alive with her talks, when Ola climb out of the car and bade us goodnight, Aisha gazing at me through the mirror told me that Ola is really cool and brave and sweet, ‘hope you are not having a crush on him because he doesn’t belong to the league,” Osas bellowed, “no, am crushing my crush,” she retorted immediately, we all laughed it away like we don’t really care.