I didn’t get home till six that evening. First, I had to bear a forty-minute traffic from Heritage bus stop to Wuse market; a distance I could have covered in less than fifteen minutes on foot. It was a very abnormal hold-up by Abuja (and I’m not talking Maraba and Nyanya) standards, and on getting to the Wuse terminus, it was clear why.

The incoming lane had been closed, cordoned off by flimsy red-and-white tape while a handful of tractors, and the construction workers milling around them in their neon-orange reflector vests, set about their business, repairing and reconstructing stretches of road that to me seemed in perfect condition as I headed to court that morning. I suppose it was just routine maintenance, but what I didn’t understand was why these oafs would choose today, a Monday of all days, to do their maintenance. The World Economic Forum On Africa had held in Abuja the week before, and it didn’t make sense to me that these Pakistani construction company workers didn’t take advantage of those three days while the entire city was shut down, to spray bitumen on the blacktop —like it is the most delicate task in the world —and trudge around with their hard hats like they are doing a photo shoot for a tractor and equipment sales brochure.

I was still seething, thinking of the apparent brainless state of a lot of the world’s population, when I found myself in another traffic jam, this one even much worse. Before this I had waited ten whole minutes at the top of Wuse bridge before one of those green and white cabs going to 3rd Avenue, Gwarimpa came by; it took another ten minutes for the cab to fill up, while I baked in the back of the car —a Golf coupe —with window controls that didn’t work. Now to bear all that, and find myself in another terrible traffic jam, could only mean my planetary influences were in anything but perfect alignment.

Thirty-minutes of vehicular crawling and two near collisions later, we were at the source of the go-slow: a seventeen-car pile-up; by far the most expensive accident scene I have ever seen. It was an amazing sight, really; the sort of thing I’d only ever seen in Hollywood movies —and I’m not talking low-budget, straight-to-DVD flicks.

Clearly, a tipper laden with sand had crashed into a Range Rover that crashed into a Jaguar that crashed into a new model G Wagon, which broadsided a 2014 M-class, and so on. Between the cost of repairs for all those cars —which damages ranged from not-so-bad to terrible —was, I’m sure, enough money to offset Majek Fashek’s debts, keep him constantly laced with cocaine, and still revitalise his music career. I felt bad for whoever was behind the wheel of that tipper, who if he had any sense should have bailed, and by that time should have been halfway to the Cameroonian border.

I wanted to take a picture of the accident scene as our car picked up speed, but my phone was dead —damn Blackberry battery. Thankfully however, it was smooth riding from there on out.

Once home —at my aunt’s where I am staying for the duration of my attachment program —I headed to my bedroom to get out of my sweaty clothes, and then dived into the kitchen.

‘Oluchi is there anything to eat?’ Oluchi is my aunt’s house-girl.

No answer. Her ears were plugged, and I suppose she was listening to those her heavily auto-tuned Igbo gospel songs that spoil speakers, and sound their worst when you hear them on chinco phones like hers.

‘Oluchi!!!’

‘Ehn!’ She gave out, yanking out the earphones and looking alarmed, before turning round to find that it was only me. ‘Oh, it’s you sef’ she said. ‘I even think it is Mummy that is calling me.’ “Mummy” is what she and the other domestic staff in the house call my aunt. I’m the only one who gets to call her “Aunty” and get away with it.

I didn’t care for Oluchi’s bad grammar or her diminutive tone but she was for all intents and purposes HOD Kitchen Department, and I needed her services in that instant, for which I easily stifled the Grammar Nazi in me.

‘Is there anything to eat?’ I reiterated.

‘No o’ she said with a long fatalistic sigh, like though her not having made something for me to eat was due to some unforeseen circumstances beyond her control. She looked almost apologetic, and by this time I was nothing short of livid.

‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ I snapped. ‘I thought I saw something in the pot just now when I came in.’

‘The food I make is for only me and mommy, and it have finish. I just eat the last one.’

‘What rubbish is that? Didn’t you know I would be coming back?’

‘I don’t know na. I would soon make night food, oh? Sorry please.’ And then she started doing the most annoying thing while I was still standing right there: she started whistling the tune to “Adi’m Well Loaded.”

I hissed and stormed out of the kitchen, back to my room where I laid on the bed, then stood up; sat on the swivel chair, flipped open the court attachment logbook on my reading table, then snapped it shut. I was hungry. And angry.

Can you imagine this stupid girl, I was thinking. It’s like she doesn’t know the sort of high pedestal on which my aunt places me. Clearly, she doesn’t realise I’m VIP in this house, and I can get her in a lot of trouble with my aunt, and with just half a complaint.

It was the same thing with Maria, her predecessor, who was the one in the house the last time I had been in Abuja for my friend’s call-to-bar in November last year; Maria who had gotten more than she bargained for one morning when she just came and dumped bread and tea unceremoniously in front of me, when unknown to me there was sardine, mayonnaise, peanut butter, chocolate spread, and all the likes lying in a cupboard in the kitchen. Unfortunately for her, my aunt had walked in on her, right in the middle of her German service —cook onye ocha—and she got the scolding of a lifetime, while I watched and tried my darnedest to look like a victim. Of all the things my aunt said to Maria that morning —and they all sounded like music to my ears —the most beautiful thing of all, which I would always remember with fondness, was when she said: “Chiedozie is my son. And if you disrespect him in this house, you disrespect me.’ Gbam! That was the sort of awakening Oluchi needed; a motion on notice.

My aunt stays in the main house with Oluchi, while I stay in the guest house with the troop of distant relatives and some of my aunt’s acquaintances that keep coming and going week in and week out. Spending a night at my aunt’s seems to be some rite of passage for all our village kinsmen who come through Abuja. Me, I don’t mind so long as I don’t have to share a bedroom with some stranger. And I don’t.

Now the groceries and other supplies stay in the guest house, and that’s where the main meals are cooked, but my aunt’s bungalow is where the treasure is. Her refrigerator is always stocked with cookies and chocolates and cakes, especially cakes. Her pantry is like an alcoholic’s wet dream: cartons of Hennessey and Camus, red wine and Laurent Perrier champagne. And I have carte blanche and unrestricted access to all of it.

So my plan then was to head to my aunt’s bungalow —and as per her usual schedule, I knew she was most likely in her living room, on the couch opposite the TV tuned to CNN, Channels or BBC; stroking her shy cat Peggy. I was going to root in the refrigerator for something to stuff my face with, and then I’d join her on the couch, easily looking my hungriest. As usual she would ask me: ‘Iri go nni?‘ Have you eaten? And I would shake my head, and when she asks why, I would just shrug and say: ‘Oluchi said there was nothing in the house for me to eat.’

She would say: ‘What?’ I would shrug. And then she would rise and head out for the guest house, while I follow right behind her. Bedlam! That was the plan, and I could almost see the scene playing out in my head as I reached and tried to yank the front door to her unit open.

Nothing. The door didn’t give. I tried again, going from mischievous back to frustrated in a heartbeat. The door was locked! I just couldn’t believe the day I was having. Nothing was going my way.

I stalked back to the guest house where Oluchi was still tinkering in the kitchen. ‘Oli, why is mommy’s side locked?’ I snapped.

‘She have go out na. Mr. James just open gate for her now.’ Mr. James is the gateman.

How come I didn’t hear her leave when one of my bedroom windows was just by the car port? Was I that hungry that my hearing had become impaired too?

I hissed again, and returned to my bedroom, frothing at the mouth with rage. Let me just say that if I was a steam-pot, I would have been shooting lava out of my ears. My stomach was yawning and grumbling, and it didn’t help much that I was lying on my front.

That’s it! I snapped inwardly. It’s not like I can’t cook sef. And with the theme-song from Sarafina playing in my head, I stomped into the kitchen, opened the fridge and started rummaging.

Oluchi stopped what she was doing and watched me as I took inventory of the fridge’s content: Eggs. Check. Left-over stew. Check. Carrots and broccli. Check. Left-over beans porridge. Never!

I took two eggs out from the crate, broccli, carrots, and the stew in a Tupperware container; then I got three packs of Indomie hungry-man packs from the pantry.

‘What are you doing?’ Oluchi asked.

Burying you alive in an unmarked grave, I thought inwardly, but said nothing.

‘Ehn? Edozie, what are you doing?’

Something about the look I gave her must have made her realise she was in mortal danger because she shrunk back from my burning stare, and visibly relaxed. When she spoke again her tone was softer, more respectful: ‘I’m just asking so that I wee know if you wee still eat this night.’

I didn’t respond. And she knew better than to press.

I made my Indomie in peace and wolfed it down like it was my last night on deathrow. It was only after I had finished eating that I remembered Miguel’s troubling short story on Walter’s blog.

The similarities between details from that story and Enkay’s account were disturbing at the very least, and it made me really curious. But then again, what were the odds that Miguel Chude was a homicidal psychopath, who like the textbook psycho specimen, feels invincible enough to document his kills; and that I, who had read his diary instalment, mistaking it for fiction, would just happen to know someone who had seen his victim’s lifeless body on the road where he had dumped it? It all just seemed too convenient.

I picked up my phone and pinged Walter.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE: http://dkstan28390./2014/06/09/disturbia-episode-ii-the-lair-2/

A Story by Dike Chiedozié

NOTICE: This story is created from equal parts of fiction and real events. The characters are based on real people.
You, the reader, would have to decide for yourself what’s real, and what’s not.

***********************************

Court attachment: one-half of the compulsory “externship” program undertaken by law students in the Nigerian Law School just before their infamous bar-finals; is definitely not a walk in the park. At least not for me, since I have to wake up early in the morning and commute all the way to Wuse Zone 2 from Gwarimpa, in the green-and-white jalopies everyone else calls “cab” —we have a name for those in Lagos, and it’s “kabu-kabu”; in the front seat with my long legs up to my chin, if I’m lucky, and if not, in the back sandwiched alongside three other bodies.

And then usually when I arrive the High Court at Wuse Zone 2, which is actually the boys’ quarters —a last minute appendage, probably intended originally as utility rooms —to the Magistrate Court Complex next door, it’s to find that there is no space! The entire room —for what little room it actually has —is full, crowded with litigants, witnesses, journalists from NAN (News Agency of Nigeria), counsel, soon-to-be convicts, their prison-issue chaperones, and of course, the aspirants to the bar who are easily marked out by the newness of their suits —oh, and the fact that they don’t wear wigs and gowns, yet. And then I’d go through the motions of asking around if someone can “shift small” —for which I might as well ask the ladies to reduce their body mass by force of will, and the guys to asphyxiate their nuts —but I do it anyway, and most times I find just enough room to squeeze in. If not I go around the court complex(?), looking for some rundown swivel chair that no longer has a back, or anything at all I can sit down on (doing so comfortably is not in question here) and when I find a booby-trap to perch on, I return to court and take pride of place in the only spot that might not have been taken over: the tight 90 degree spot at the very rear of the court, behind the gallery, beside the air-conditioner. By now you should think my troubles are over; well, think again.

I usually get to court by a few minutes past nine or closer to ten than nine sometimes, and my time of arrival usually determines if I get to be a part of the few minutes of routine group conversation going amongst my colleagues before court sits at ten —or so soon thereafter; spanning everything from law to the “Dorobucci” fad, memes — “Diaris God ooo!” —and what good movies are showing at the cinemas. I usually look forward to these group discussions —about stuff other than Corporate Law for a change —not only because I have warmed to these colleagues of mine, some of whom, sadly, I might never see after our run in this post-stamp of a court, but also because as a writer I like to watch people, to pick on their nuances and imagine from them what their stories are; and having pieced together my version of those stories, create alternate realities for each of them or a combination of them in my imagination where I can source texture for the characters in my stories when I need to.

On the day in question —five days ago, actually —I arrived relatively early to court at about 9:20 AM —which ordinarily should have given me thirty to forty minutes of gist time —but as Sod’s Law would have it, so did the Judge. Hardly had I sat down when suddenly there came the report of three muffled intermittent raps against wood, followed simultaneously by the Court Clerk —who always speaks like she has tonsillitis —screeching “Court!”; and in came Justice V. Okpo with his raven-black robe, wig perched on his head like a bird’s nest, spectacles nestled precariously like though they were protesting their placement and didn’t feel at home hanging off the bridge of his nose.

He did his funny, half-hearted bow, which used to crack me up in the first week of court attachment, but which like everything else with the externship program now annoys me; and we all reciprocated, lawyers and students alike, then sat. Mrs. Tonsillitis stood up and announced the first case, and with her tiny, inaudible voice began another week-long nightmare.

The first thing to know about Justice Okpo is that he was a lecturer at the Nigerian Law School, and you know what they say about teachers: once a teacher always a teacher. His courtroom is more than that, a lecture hall —he counsels counsel, directs witnesses and students alike; to the effect that proceedings are dragged out and wind too long. In a nutshell, he goes on and on, and while there are moments when he proves that behind the deadpan expression and the dead-fish eyes is a man with an acerbic sense of humour (and a short fuse that spurs hilarious outbursts) there aren’t enough of those moments to make me forget that the other courts would have wound up for the day before he gets to the second case on an eleven-case cause-list.

Justice Okpo’s court usually rises i.e closes for the day at about three in the afternoon —two, if we are lucky —and in the five-hour margin in-between are a lot of moments that can make a person question his sanity. I was having one of those moments on the day in question, five days ago, when sitting in court I was overwhelmed by the sudden urge to scream, and hurl something across the room at the Judge where he sat on The Bench. I remember wondering if the suddenness of the attack would shut him up, and decided it most likely wouldn’t. With this certitude, I figured it would be best to take the high road: a much-needed break, and so rising, I gave a cursory bow and exited the court; walking away from all the droning and harebrained advocacy, out into the bright afternoon where the sun in sharp contrast to the air-conditioned courtroom was scorching, and refreshing —jolt-me-back-to-consciousness refreshing.

I found Jabbar and Dubem —both colleagues of mine —outside with a trio of uniformed young men in branded grey tees and black trousers (whose job description at the court is still something I’m yet to figure out: housekeeping or security?) And they were talking about Nigerian celebrities —mostly musicians —when I stepped up and joined the band of fellow truants and their new-found friends. Clearly, one of the housekeeping/security men was an artiste, or at least thought he was. He was boyish and looked sixteen, but I realised he was probably a lot older; when he spoke, it was with the conviction of hope, and the misty eyes of a dreamer as he recounted an event, which he had attended, organised for ABJ youths by the First Lady Dame Patience Jonathan a.k.a Mama Peace, at which KCee “Limpopo,” Terry G a.k.a “Akpako Master” and several other Nigerian artistes had been in attendance.

I ordinarily might not have been very attentive to Mr. Aspiring Artiste’s story —of how a girl in stilettos tried to use him as a launching ramp in order to get to Mr. “Limpopo” —but I’d been treated to a particularly boring and INFURIATING dose of Judge Okpo’s court: two very confused lawyers for whom I think a commission of inquiry should be set up, to determine exactly how they graduated Law School; and in my state of mind then, even the story of a cripple watching paint dry would probably have been interesting. That was why it ticked me off that Dubem kept interrupting with his jokes that were usually only funny because they weren’t.

He managed to make a funny joke that afternoon however, about his smartphone not being “all that smart.” Ok, it wasn’t very funny but at least it made me laugh —Kumbaya! Then again, it could just have been for the same reason I was listening to a story about a youth rally like it was expo to bar finals.

Irrespective, Dubem’s constant chip-ins saw to it that we didn’t stick on one topic for too long, flitting from one to another and seeing none to a conclusive end. Surprisingly, we all seemed to be getting a kick out of it, milking all the talk for all the humour it was worth. We started out talking about celebrities and then suddenly, with all the warning of a terrorist suicide-bombing, we were talking about a dead body that another one of our colleagues, Enkay, had seen lying curbside on the way to court, and about which she informed all the students in court on her arrival. I was probably still brushing my teeth at the time.

‘…She said the girl was lying on the ground, lifeless.’ It was Jabbar talking.

‘Where was that?’ I asked, curious.

‘Where was what?’

‘Where did Enkay say she saw the body?’

‘Somewhere around Kado Estate’—

‘Kado? That’s very close to where I stay in Gwarimpa. I even passed there this morning’ I said. ‘Didn’t notice anything unusual.’

‘Oh well’ Jabbar gave out non-committally and shrugged.

‘Did Enkay say what the dead girl was wearing?’ Dubem asked, and I did a double-take, impressed. That was a very good question.

‘A very short show-back gown’ Jabbar replied suggestively.

‘Ah-han!’ chimed Dubem victoriously. ‘I talk am! If you been talk say she cover up well na there I for shock. I no know sha, but she for be all these ashi dem, or runs girl wey run jam something wey pass am…’

Someone said something in acquiescence, but I wasn’t really listening. Something was nagging at me; tugging at the periphery of my consciousness, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what it was.

‘Na wa o!’ Mr. Artiste Wannabe exclaimed, doing a good job of looking distraught at the death of a random girl he’ll never know. “E fit be ritual wey dem carry am do o.’

‘Wetin Enkay talk?’ Dubem asked, turning to Jabbar. ‘Dem been cut anything commot from the girl body?’

‘I no know o. But Enkay said the girl’s boobies were intact.’

I remember wondering how long Enkay had looked at the corpse to recall that the dead girl’s breasts hadn’t been excised, thinking also how funny Jabbar sounded when he spoke Pidgin English, and that just like me he couldn’t sustain a conversation in Pidgin for long. I was going to say something about this when it hit me, what it was I was trying to remember.

I moved away from Jabbar and the rest of them, rooting for my phone as I did, thinking to myself how I had a really wild imagination. The dead, faceless girl was to me at that point potential short story material for my blog —the very blog you’re reading now. Or at least that’s what I told myself. I wasn’t looking for trouble, not really, and I didn’t imagine as I scrolled through my BBM chat list, that I had stumbled upon something terrible, and worse than that, deadly. If anyone had told me as I searched and found the BBM contact icon for Walter —a friend, fellow writer and blogger that I would find myself in a life and death situation as a result of the BBM broadcast message Walter had sent me that morning, the link that I was then clicking for the second time that day, standing only a few feet away from a court of law where justice and law purportedly converge; I would have told them they had an even more avid imagination than me —and that is hardly a compliment.
READ THE COMPLETE STORY HERE: https://dkstan28390./2014/06/07/disturbia-a-s-a-r-t-production/

Chanice was on a scholarship. She was an orphan. And a Finance major.
She had vision, and was very intelligent and calculated, Samantha informed me sounding like a starstruck groupie. And she (Chanice) was going to make it big in the corporate world someday. Samantha seemed pretty sure of this.
And I was pretty sure Chanice had picked the means to that end. Only she had picked wrongly…
‘You really are going to go through with this, aren’t you?’ Samantha asked for the umpteenth time. I had told her I’d like a little tête-a-tête with Chanice and she was right to feel distrustful. My daughter knew enough to know I never rolled over on my back if there wasn’t higher ground to gain.
‘First you leave work to come see me in school. And then you let me drive your Jag. And now you want to speak with Chanice… You didn’t even comment on her being black. What’s going on with you dad?’
‘Hey hey! Where did that come from? About me not commenting on Chanice’s race. You think I’m prejudiced against people of colour? You think I’m racist?’
‘Well Mom thought so’ she said offhandedly with a shrug.
‘What!’
‘Well according to her none of the black employees at the company have been promoted in the ten years you’ve been Vice-President…’
‘Adrienne said that to you?’
She shrugged again.
I was dumbfounded. With every passing second it dawned on me how alienated Adrienne and I had been in marriage. More strangers than roommates.
I was no racist. I had no prejudice against black people or any other race. She should know that, right?
‘And you Samantha?’ I asked. ‘What do you think?’
She held my gaze for a moment and then said: ‘You’re a cynic dad. To the point of being sadistic sometimes. There’s something wrong with everything and everyone save yourself…
‘There are many ways to read into that. And there are many things people can perceive you to be, not necessarily because its who you are, but because its who they see…’ It was a deep answer, wise and knowing. And I ruminated over it.
‘You think I can change Sam?’
‘Well its never too late to try…’
And then I asked her: ‘Do you want me to change?’
She thought about that for an instant. ‘You’re not perfect dad, but I still find it in me to love you. The decision to change is a decision you’d have to make on your own…’
‘Well I did come here because I wanted to talk about your mother.’
‘I’ve managed to make it all about me, right?’
‘Nah, it’s fine. Believe it or not, I’m glad all of this happened.’
‘You are?’
I nodded.
‘And this convo you’re going to have with Chanice… Can I trust you to be civil dad?’
‘Can I trust you to trust me Samantha?’
She answered immediately: ‘Yes dad. I trust you.’
‘Okay’ I said and heaved a sigh. ‘I’m going to tell you something now Samantha. And its going to be something you wouldn’t want to hear, but I need to you to promise to at least give it a try.’
‘What is it dad?’
‘Promise?’
She held my gaze for a long time, muling over her options, puzzling over my request, and finally conceded: ‘I promise…’
‘Good’ I said and outlined the plan to her…

Chanice was all business as she walked into the restaurant. And she was a vision too, dressed in a yellow crêpe dress that showed off her long neck and shoulders. The hem hanging just above her thighs, high enough to highlight how far the shear butter of her skin rolled down to her long legs.
She wore her hair in a loose bun that went around her nape to hang off her left shoulder, framing her cameo of a face with its full lips, slightly-aquiline nose and light hazel-brown eyes that shone from across the room.
She spotted me and made her way over to my table, creating a ripple effect as she walked. The men did fall like dominoes. And she moved like she hadn’t a care in the world, her hair bopping to every click of her heels, an aura of practiced aloofness about her. Chanice was a performer who knew her stage. For people like her motivation and inspiration were one and the same thing. I know this because we are alike in that way.
She was here to broker a deal… Unfortunately for her, so was I.
We are business people.
‘Good morning Mr. Cohen’ she greeted as she slid in the sit opposite me.
‘Hey Chanice’ I hurled back goodnaturedly, smile in place.
‘You sleep well?’ She asked.
‘Hmmm…’ I was a bit puzzled by her inquiry.
‘Well I imagine after making the kind of discovery you had about your daughter that you probably would have been unsettled. Samantha tells me you are very traditional…’ Damn she was good! Sure wasted no time getting on the ice.
‘I see… What else did Samantha tell you about me?’ I asked.
‘Well nothing I hadn’t already read in Forbes magazine. You’re an excellent businessman. An over-achiever. You know what you want and you go for it… It’d be nice though to hear from the horse’s mouth who exactly Sam Cohen is…’
Samantha had always tried to distance herself from the Sam Cohen in Fortune 500 and on the cover of business magazines. Just like her mother, Samantha had always felt like she’d competed with my job for my attention, and that she’d lost. I don’t think she’d have ever discussed my business with Chanice or any one else for that matter. Chanice was lying. And I knew this because it was something I did often with investors and clients I needed to get off on good fitting with. Something I called the “ego massage.” It was oversight for Chanice not have considered that a con cannot con a con.
A waiter came and took our orders.
‘What else did Samantha tell you about me?’
‘Well you know, the usual family stuff…’ She replied noncomittally and shrugged. The lady stalled faster than a first-generation Chinese experiment car, but my determination matched her deflection.
‘So who is Chanice?’
‘I supposed you’d have asked that of Samantha…’ Her smile got so wide I imagined it’d be painful.
‘Well I’d like to learn about the lady who’s involved with my daughter from –as you put it –the horse’s mouth…’
‘I wish I could say I’d be returning the courtesy Sam, but you did refuse to tell me anything about yourself.’
‘I’m not the one on the spot Chanice’ I stated flatly, noting that she wasted no time in getting chummy. Apparently we were both now on a first-name acquaintance.
‘On the spot? I had no idea I was “on the spot”‘
I didn’t respond.
‘Listen Sam’ she continued, ‘I’m in love with your daughter, and though I can understand your misgivings and I can see why you don’t like me, shouldn’t you at least try to get to know me? For Samantha’s sake at least’ she finished, holding my gaze. Oh, she was a viper alright!
I thought about that for a moment and replied carefully: ‘You know since we are cutting to the chase, I’d like to state categorically that I like you, only just not for my daughter…’
She nodded absently.
‘You see Samantha has been through a lot and I don’t want to see her hurt.’
‘And I’m not going to hurt her Sam. I promise…’
I smiled at this. ‘You know we have a lot in common Chanice’ I continued. ‘And I feel like I know you…
‘Just like me, I believe you know what you want and you go for it. And I respect that. However I don’t believe Samantha is the prize here. For you she’s only a means to an end, so why don’t we cut the bullshit.’
‘I love your daughter Sam’ she reiterated.
‘And yet you still sit’ I observed with a wicked smile.
She became still. And just then the waiter arrived with our food.
I’d also ordered for red wine even though it was just ten in the morning. A $250 bottle of Batard Montrachet.
‘Isn’t it a bit too early for that?’ Chanice noted dryly.
I ignored the question and said to her instead: ‘I’m going to make you an offer you can’t refuse Chanice… Except of course you want to play coy, but I trust you are too smart and decisive to trifle with opportunity…’ I let my words linger and sink in.
‘So I’d like I to propose a toast… To friendship, new beginnings and new alliances…’
She watched me warily. ‘What is this “opportunity” you are offering…’ She demanded finally.
‘Patience…’ I said with a smile. ‘Now eat.’
After our plates were swiped and what was left of the bottle of wine was glinting ruby-red in our glasses, I said to Chanice: ‘I want to you to come work for me…’
‘Listen Sam–’
‘It’s Mr. Cohen!’ I corrected, reaching into the breast pocket of my shirt for a cheque, which I slid across the table to her. ‘Here’s a cheque of five hundred thousand dollars’ I said and she literally swooned at the figures.
She looked up from the cheque to me, her eyes mooned in shock. Disbelief etched on her face.
‘It’s a lot of money Chanice. And its yours… You’re only going to do one small thing for me in return… Stay away from my daughter.’
‘Mr. Cohen I–’
I held up my hand. ‘Don’t say a word. You either take the cheque and walk away or you leave it on the table…
‘The offer lasts for the next five seconds. Starting now… One, two, three, four…’
She rose. ‘The offer of a job still stands right?’ She asked.
I nodded.
‘Fine then. Goodbye Mr. Cohen’ she said, turned on her heels and walked away.
She had taken the cheque with her.
Samantha rose too from where she’d sat at the far end of the room, watching Chanice and I.
I could feel the intensity of her gaze from across the room, expectant, a question in the arch of her brow.
I shook my head slowly. And she got the message.
She sat back down and buried her face on the table where she sat.
She would cry now, but her broken heart would mend eventually.
Chanice on the other hand had no idea what was coming her way.
The second thing to know about Sam Cohen is this: when he hits he hits hard…

AUTHOR’s NOTE:

And it gets deeper and deeper…
Enjoy! And spread the word. Y’all don’t be selfish now, ok.
See y’all next episode! *wink*
D.K Stan



‘Dad you promised you wouldn’t freak out…’
‘Did I? I wonder what I was thinking… Oh! That you were being straight with me. Oops, my bad.’ I chuckled.
‘Well I didn’t lie to you.’ She ignored the innuendo.
‘And by God I wish you had!’ I bellowed and made for the door.
‘Dad please wait!’
I stopped, fingers gripping the door knob.
‘Please dad… Can we talk about this… You promised dad’ she said in a wounded voice that sounded a lot like her mother’s when she was holding back tears.
‘I’d be your little girl no matter what, right?’ She continued. ‘And you’d protect me–’
‘Fine!’ I sighed and released my death grip on the doorknob and turned around to face her.
She had on her poker face but her eyes shimmered and her hands were fisted at her side.
‘Fine we can talk… Alone.’
‘You know what I’ll just excuse you two–’ Chanice was saying when Samantha interrupted her: ‘No… You stay here. We’ll go.’ They shared a look that made me squirm on the inside.
‘You know what…’ I said, ‘don’t let me stop you’ –looking pointedly at Samantha– ‘Just get on with it and I’ll wait for you in the car.’ I opened the door.
‘It was nice to meet you sir!’ Chanice called after me.
‘Hmmm’ I grunted, and smiled at her more out of habit than intention.
I hadn’t liked that girl, and it wasn’t just because she was shagging my daughter.
There was something more. Something with her strained politesse. Something I recognized coming from privilege, having seen it in the eyes of a lot of people who wanted what I had and despised me for having it. A love-hate relationship with affluence.
What I saw in Chanice’s eyes was ambition. And I’d been in business long enough to recognize it, and fear it…

‘So are we going to talk in here?’ I asked as Samantha got in the car and shut the door. I didn’t understand how she could live in this sort of neighbourhood. I’d used my side and rearview mirrors more religiously in the few minutes it took me to wait than I had in my four decades plus of driving.
‘I’m hungry. Aren’t you?’
‘Would anyone blame me for losing my appetite…? But then again I think I’m up for eating up my emotions. Anywhere in mind?’
She sighed. ‘Just drive…’
We wound up at a small hole in the wall that served French fries and ketchup at all hours of the day, and a whole bunch of other stuff that weren’t good for the heart.
I had fries with deep-fried chicken and Samantha had the same, only she had beer while I had red wine. Cheap wine. The hole in the wall didn’t bother with a wine-list. It would have been pointless. Every bottle of wine went for $7.50.
We ate quietly and remained so even when our dinner had disappeared. I kept looking around aimlessly, gauging other diners, wondering about their secret lives and what scandals they hid from their families.
‘You know you’re going to have to talk to me at some point…’ Samantha muttered, her gaze fixed intently on the beer mug before her as though it was a crystal ball.
‘I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that you’re not pranking me with this lesbo nonsense.’
‘Well I’m not.’ She didn’t look up.
‘I guess I’m grieving. Still in denial, and you know its a long road to acceptance.’
‘Grieving… What did you lose?’
‘The daughter I thought I knew.’
It was then she looked up from her drink, watching me in that cool manner, appraisingly, before asking: ‘I played a role at the school play in fifth grade. You remember what role that was?’
I thought about it for a moment. I couldn’t remember. ‘No.’
She smiled. ‘I played Ophelia in the play Hamlet, and you can’t remember dad because you weren’t there… You never were.
‘Don’t assume you know me, because you don’t….’
I was silent. Ashamed. There was really nothing to say in my defense, but that didn’t keep me from trying: ‘Well you did date that Miller boy from down the street in high school. I caught you two kissing on the porch, remember?’
‘How can I forget. You grounded me for a month after that.’
I couldn’t recall doling out that punishment, but I pressed on: ‘So you see. I know you’ve been with guys before. You must have been attracted to that Miller guy, right?’
‘I was a teenager dad.’
‘But you kissed him! You liked that didn’t you?’
‘Dad I’m with Chanice now…’
‘But it doesn’t mean you’re gay…’
‘I am.’
‘But you admit you’ve been attracted to the opposite sex all your life…’ I whined in my salesman voice. I was making a sales pitch, selling an idea that seemed perfectly logical to me.
‘I admitted no such thing.’
‘Is this thing with Chanice an experiment Samantha? You know, you being curious and all…’
‘I love her dad.’
‘No honey, you’re just confused.’
‘I’m not dad. I know what I’m doing.’
‘Oh but you don’t! There was Tom Miller from down the street and I remember your mom mentioning once to me after I scolded you for something that you’d just broken up with your boyfriend and to take it easy on you.’
‘You were scolding me because the phone bills had just come in and most of the calls made were mine.’
‘That’s not the point Samantha.’
‘Well maybe I’m a little bi-sexual. So what?’
‘”Maybe”… You’re confused child.’
‘Maybe I was finding myself in all that time. I feel perfectly happy with Chanice.’
‘You know I think its the grief of your mom’s passing–’
‘Don’t you dare bring Mom into this!’ She snapped.
‘Well think how she’d feel if she knew Samantha!’
‘She did dad…’ That shut me up instantly.
‘Mom knew about me and Chanice…’
I had been stunned into confused silence. Adrienne knew our daughter was shacking up some unknown girl; playing house with someone we knew little to nothing about. And she never bothered to mention it?
‘I don’t believe you’ I blurted out. ‘Adrienne would have told me.’
‘You really think so dad?’
In all honesty I didn’t. We really didn’t communicate much, Adrienne and I. And it was frightening to think what else she’d hidden from me all these years. Much more frightening was the realization that I didn’t know my family, and that this knowledge made me question if even I knew me.
Who am I? Who is Sam Cohen? A man who was discovering how he’d been living blind? A man lost beyond hope of finding himself?
The answers were probably more scary than the questions…
For all my questions though, I knew one thing for certain. Sam Cohen is a businessman. And one who always got what he wanted.
The first thing to know about business is that its warfare. Only the strong survive, and the winner takes it all…
I made my decision.
Samantha was my child, and I’d do anything I thought necessary to protect her.
‘Tell me about Chanice…’ I said.
She was taken aback by this. ‘Really?’
I put on my business face: a mask that hid all emotions and lies, and I replied: ‘Really… If you’re going to be with this person, I think I need to know exactly who she is.’
‘Oh dad!’ She cried and came across the table to hug me. ‘Thank you so much!’
‘I’d do anything for you Samantha’ I muttered in her hair.
‘I know daddy’ she replied and squeezed tighter.
The first thing to know about warfare is this: Know Thy Enemy.
And the businessman, Sam Cohen knows this too well…

Yeah. I'm sorry about the inconsistency in updates. I'll keep it at two days between each post henceforth

Author’s Note:

First of all I’d like to thank all my readers and everyone who’s been following the FAAD series. Y’all have been awesome. Sure does make writing these stories easier.
We’re already five episodes deep. And there’s still more to come.
Codename: SCANDAL *wink*

Y’all don’t forget to spread the word: quote this post, share... Whatever gets the work done. XOXO

I let Samantha drive. I was distracted. And more than that I was wary.
She remained cool, stealing occasional glances at me. She was like her mother that way: solid, unnaturally calm and secretive.
I missed Adrienne. And I thought about our life together as Samantha steered my $250,000 Jaguar XJR Supercharged sedan to God knows where, wondering if I made her happy. Deciding I probably didn’t.
All that time lost…
‘We are here’ Samantha announced as she pulled into a cul-de-sac and ground the Jag to an abrupt halt kerbside, before a small one-storey house that even in the semi-darkness looked to be falling apart.
‘Is this where you live?’
‘Yeah dad. This is it.’
‘Its a good…’ –I checked my watch, ‘–twenty-minutes from school.’
‘I know. I make the trip every day.’ She got out. I sighed and did the same.
‘So what are we doing here Sam? What is it you want to show me?’
She held my gaze for a long time, then asked: ‘Can I trust that you won’t freak out?’
I thought about that for a moment, and asked her: ‘Did you kill someone?’
‘No.’
‘Rob a bank?’
‘No.’
‘Fraud?’
‘No.’
‘Join the church of Satan?’ She laughed at this and said no.
‘Then there’s a very good chance I can live with whatever it is you want to show me.’
She nodded. ‘Okay. This way…’ She led the way up to the front steps. They creaked. Wood.
I tried to make out as much of the house as I could as she opened the front door into a dimly-hit hallway with a circular stairway sans banisters that wormed upward to the top floor. The paint was peeling. The hall smelt of mildew and bad cooking.
The front door was apparently always left unlocked.
A decrepit house on a poorly-lit street. An ancient building that was slowly crumbling in on itself, with poorly-lit hallways, termite-made booby-traps for staircases and age-worn doors no one even bothered to lock. A father’s nightmare.
‘An impenetrable security system you have here’ I stated with due emphasis.
‘Oh you did notice’ she replied, matching my tone. ‘Its no Ritz, but we try…’
‘Don’t be sarcastic!’ I snapped.
‘Asking me to deny a family heirloom, are you?’
‘Well you do know what I mean.’
‘I probably would if you’d just say what you mean’ she chided, rooting in her purse for her keys.
Her apartment was the last on the left down the hall. By positioning she had one of the two safest apartments on the event of a burglary, but then there were windows to consider, the semi-dark hallway, and all the shadows between the front door and the wash of the nearest streetlamp at night.
‘I always thought of moving out of school accomodation into one’s own apartment as an upgrade.’
‘Well you’ve always been presumptuous dad’ she replied as she found her keys and opened the door.
Apparently Samantha was in rare form. I decided to let the issue rest, but only momentarily. We were definitely going to revisit it.
Through the door was a small living room done in warm feminine colours: pink walls skirted with baby-blue, one canary-yellow leather loveseat, white bean bags with polka dot patterns of red, yellow, blue and pink. And a dwarf wicker-work and glass center stool. The jumble of colours took the warm colours and made it into something feisty. An assault on the senses.
‘Hippie’ I noted dryly, looking around the room.
‘This isn’t a board meeting dad. Your opinion carries no weight here.’
‘You been honing your skills for a showdown or are you really tense?’
She looked at me in a way that told me all I needed to know, and then said: ‘I’ll be right back dad.’
‘C’mon Samantha. Cut all the crap and tell me what’s happening with you. This suspense thing is wearing thin.’
‘I. Will. Be. Right. Back.’ She glared at me. ‘Have your seat and make yourself comfortable.’
‘Do I have a choice…’ I shrugged and flopped into the loveseat with its yellow leather throw pillows. Strangely the colour made me think of vomit.
I was wondering what Samantha had been thinking while scouting for upholstery and what Bohemian market she found them at, when I noticed the dog ears of a magazine peeking out from beneath one of the throw pillows.
I pulled out the magazine and was immediately assaulted by the sight of pink, perky nipples on a pair of very large breasts. Lots of white pearls in the picture too. The face went largely unnoticed by me, but the headlines on the magazine cover identified the model to be a Kim Kardashian. I’d never heard the name before that day, and would possibly never forget it.
I scanned the issue of Playboy. I’d never come across one before, and I felt like a schoolboy going through the pages, wondering why Samantha would have interest in such magazines, or if even it was hers.
Oh dear lord! She has a live-in boyfriend, I thought. A boyfriend who subscribed to porn magazines…
Were they having sex?
I felt anger heat up my belly at the thought, hurriedly shoving the magazine under the pillow and crossing my legs as Samantha emerged with a tall black beautiful girl in tow who looked like a model. Not that I knew a lot about models but shoulder-length hair, a sculptured face, and a rail-thinness that bordered on anorexic was a mix that usually took the title.
‘Dad this is Chanice’ Samantha made introductions ‘my roommate… Chanice this is my father, Sam Cohen.’
Chanice came over and shook my hand. ‘Its a pleasure sir. I’ve heard so much about you.’ She seemed shaky.
‘If only I could say as much about you’ I replied, smile in place.
She stepped back to Samantha’s side like a soldier who’d been caught breaking rank at parade.
‘So?’ I looked at Samantha with a cocked brow.
Chanice gave a nervous cough and concentrated on her feet.
‘Well dad…’ Samantha began ‘Chanice and I moved in together last semester.’
‘I noticed…’
Chanice was now looking at Samantha who seemed to be struggling with her words.
‘Well we’ve lived together ever since then… And…’
‘And what Samantha!’ I snapped.
‘We’re dating Mr. Cohen…’ It was Chanice who spoke up.
‘Excuse me…’
Samantha let out a rush of air, physically deflating, and now it was her turn to inspect her pedicure.
‘Samantha and I…’ Chanice continued. ‘We’re in love.’ She swallowed audibly.
‘We’ve been dating for a while now…’
I wasn’t sure what I was hearing, but I just laughed. It didn’t seem like there was anything more to do.
‘So let me get this straight…’ I began. ‘You two are in love, like in love love?’
There was no answer.
‘So you’re telling me you are a lesbian Sam?’ I asked, incredulous, thinking what I wouldn’t give for a live-in boyfriend. And realizing instantly how wrong the thought now seemed to me.
She looked up from her feet and nodded. ‘Yes dad. I’m gay…’
Gay? What the hell did that mean.
I sighed, feeling more than a little confused.
‘Well that sure explains this’ I muttered reflectively, producing the Playboy magazine with Kim Kardashian on its cover from under the pillow and waving it like a lawyer’s exhibit.
I dumped the magazine on the center stool with a loud smack that made Chanice jump. And with nothing else to say, I rose to take my leave.
‘I think I’m done here…’

Oh I'm sorry. My mistake. I'll upload the next one now. But you can check out the other episodes up to episode 10 on my blog: www.dkstan28390.

I drove back to the hotel and indeed Samantha was waiting for me in the lobby. She hadn’t lied about that. Refreshing, I thought, on the backdrop of the last hour.
I thought to lead her upstairs to my room and skip the entire act up to the curtain call, but then years in business had taught me a few valuable lessons about patience. And so I decided to bid my time and be subtle.
We’d go out and have dinner or whatever else she was in the mood for. And I’d catch her off guard when she least expects, hit her smack in the face with her lies like a sac of nickels. That was the plan.
I just needed to control the tremor that started from my left foot and radiated upward to my arms.
She hugged and kissed me. ‘Hey dad. You look good.’
I grunted.
‘How was your day?’ She asked, hands resting on my arms.
‘Revealing…’ I drawled ominously. The import went right over her head.
‘So? Where are we going?’
‘Urm, I don’t know. Your decison…’
She regarded me somewhat suspiciously for a moment, a look that was somewhere in the neighbourhood between curious and unnerved.
‘Oh-kay’ she intoned carefully. ‘I guess we could hang out over a few drinks.’
‘Drinks?’
‘Yes. I know a nice bar not far from here.’
‘Samantha I’m your dad not your study-group buddy.’ I turned and headed for the exit and she followed.
‘Well you did say it was my decision.’
‘I did think you’d make a sensible choice. Wonder what I was thinking…’
‘Is there something you are not telling me?’ She stopped.
I paused long enough to look at her over my shoulder. ‘I don’t know Samantha. You tell me…’
I went to the car and yanked open the driver’s door.
‘Are you coming?’
She remained stationary a moment longer, regarding me coolly before walking to the other side of the car and getting in.
I followed suit.
‘So where are we going?’ She asked.
‘Which way is that bar you mentioned? I think I need a drink.’

“Steve’s Bar” was housed in a building that might have been a department store at some point in history. The patrons consisted mostly of coeds and the odd trucker who’d probably been lured by the huge, blazing red neon sign outside. Who could resist the colour of sin?
Sport buffs on parade I realized as I stepped into the buzz. A football match was showing live on a small central TV to competing levels of egging and booing.
The patrons looked to be in high spirits (no pun intended). The bartender and waiters looked happy. Beer was flowing endlessly, and as my daughter and I found a spot in the far corner where the smell of sweaty armpits wasn’t as strong, I remember thinking how the scene around me was a potent mix for trouble.
I don’t watch football and so I had no idea what the festivities were for. I just didn’t get what the fuss was about.
I like golf. Play at the country club back home every once in a while. A mature, clean, un-fussy game, golf. But football? I suppose there’s something savage and primal about the game, which I find unsettling.
Samantha motioned for a waiter. ‘A glass of vodka please. No ice. And you dad…?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What would you have?’
‘Oh! A beer would be just fine, thank you very much.’
The waiter disappeared.
‘Vodka huh?’ I began by way of an opening line.
‘I’m legal. Want to see some ID?’
‘Yeah maybe… A student’s ID if you may.’ I cocked a brow.
‘Are you okay dad?’
‘Trust me its not me I’m worried about?’
‘I’m not telepathic Mr. Sam Cohen. If you’re going to communicate you’d have to drop the innuendos and speak English. Remember it?
‘Frankly I’ve had enough jargon for one day. Can I please have a non-wiseass uncomplicated conversation with my father. Thank you very much.’
Our drinks arrived and she threw the glass of vodka back in one swallow. ‘Another please’ she snapped at the waiter, slamming her empty glass back onto the table.
She had tears in her eyes.
‘Did you drive four hours to come here and piss me off dad?’
I didn’t respond for a long time. I’ve never really been one to be moved by tears.
‘You said something about having had enough jargon for one day. I suppose you were making reference to lectures today, right?’
‘Your point being?’
Her second drink arrived.
‘Take it easy with that’ I said with unmistakable emphasis. The look in my eyes must have been steely.
She sighed and demanded for some nuts from the waiter.
‘I’m going to see the Dean of Student Affairs at your school first thing tomorrow morning Samantha…’
‘Why? What happened?’
I was incredulous, besides myself with disbelief. I felt my hands start to shake again.
Who was this girl sitting in front of me, I wondered. Remorseless. Cold. Narcissistic enough to think she could have gotten away with deception of this magnitude.
I took a deep breath, but it was pointless trying to keep my tone even: ‘I saw the matron at the girl’s dorm today Samantha… There’s no record of you on their student list!’
She heaved a sigh and covered her face with her left palm.
‘Did you really think I wouldn’t find out about this Samantha? Did you really think you could get away with this –this –this–’
‘What exactly dad!’ She snapped at me.
I felt a vein pop in my temple. I couldn’t believe her nerve. Definitely not Dutch courage, I knew. It’d only been one glass of vodka.
‘Are you insane!’ I couldn’t keep myself from yelling. And in that instant I couldn’t care less that other bar patrons suddenly found my daughter and I a whole lot more interesting than live football.
‘I burst my…behind all these years to give you a good life! I sent you to the best schools. Made sure you’ve had the best education possible. And then you suddenly decide to throw all of it away, and think that’s okay?!
‘Do you know how bloody much your tuition’s set me back? And when did you even drop out?’
Samantha just looked at me in that same cool manner. And then did the most infuriating thing possible: she laughed. But there was nothing humourous about the sound.
‘Okay’ she said, ‘let me get this straight: you think I dropped out of med school?’
‘I checked with the matron at the girl’s dorm!’ I thundered.
She laughed again and then her countenance changed swiftly to one of stony seriousness, and beyond that to vicious anger.
‘The matron doesn’t have the comprehensive list of students. Only for female boarders at the dorm.’ She rose.
‘Check with the Dean tomorrow Einstein!’ She yelled, drawling the last bit and stomping off.
‘Samantha! Samantha!’ I hurried after her.
‘You haven’t paid for your drinks Sir’ said the waiter who’d served our drinks, appearing out of nowhere and blocking my path.
I gave him enough money to pay for our drinks and what might have been the sum-total of his tips on a regular week.
It sure wasn’t a regular day for me.
‘Samantha! Samantha!’ She’d gone across the road by the time I’d exited the bar, making her way in very long strides.
I ran after her. ‘Samantha! Get back here!
‘Samantha! Don’t you dare walk out on me!’
‘News flash dad: I am!’ She hurled back without looking back at me. Her voice broken with tears.
I felt tired already. I wasn’t cut out for this sort of drama.
I stopped in my tracks and called out after her: ‘Samantha! Samantha! Stop!’ She kept on walking.
‘Please! Please Samantha…’
Her pace slowed till she stopped altogether and braced herself against a streetlamp, her back to me.
I could tell she was crying by the way her shoulders heaved, up and down.
I took my time closing the distance between us.
‘Sam…’ I touched her shoulder. ‘Can we talk? I need you to be honest with me… What’s going on?’
She turned to face me, her face tear-stained, and I saw nothing of the indignation that had twisted her face into an angry mask only moments before. Now she was Sam, my child. Daddy’s little girl…
‘The matron couldn’t possibly have had my name on her register. That register is for boarders only, and I haven’t stayed at the dorm since last semester…’
‘But today on the phone, you said–’
‘I lied dad.’
‘Why?’
She paused for a moment, then said: ‘I got an apartment.’
‘Well that’s hardly a crime. Why all the cloak and dagger?’
Her eyes fell to her feet.
‘There’s more Samantha, isn’t it?’
She nodded, then fixed me with doe-eyes cored by an intensity that surprised me. She was struggling.
‘You do love me dad, don’t you?’
Alarms were going off in my head. ‘Yes honey. You know I do.’
‘And you’d love me no matter what, right?’
I cradled her face in my hands, becoming frightened. Worried that my daughter had done something terrible and was way in over her head.
I was going to do anything to protect my child, irrespective of whatever it was she’d done.
‘I know I should have told you about this earlier dad, but I didn’t know how you’d take it. I still don’t know how you’d take it or if I should tell you at all.’
‘Samantha I am your father, the only family you have left in this world, and we shouldn’t keep things from each other.
‘What’s this secret you’ve been hiding…?’
She regarded me coolly for another moment, and then holding me by the hand and leading the way back to Steve’s where my car was packed, said: ‘Come with me. Let me show you…’

I drove back to the hotel and indeed Samantha was waiting for me in the lobby. She hadn’t lied about that. Refreshing, I thought, on the backdrop of the last hour.
I thought to lead her upstairs to my room and skip the entire act up to the curtain call, but then years in business had taught me a few valuable lessons about patience. And so I decided to bid my time and be subtle.
We’d go out and have dinner or whatever else she was in the mood for. And I’d catch her off guard when she least expects, hit her smack in the face with her lies like a sac of nickels. That was the plan.
I just needed to control the tremor that started from my left foot and radiated upward to my arms.
She hugged and kissed me. ‘Hey dad. You look good.’
I grunted.
‘How was your day?’ She asked, hands resting on my arms.
‘Revealing…’ I drawled ominously. The import went right over her head.
‘So? Where are we going?’
‘Urm, I don’t know. Your decison…’
She regarded me somewhat suspiciously for a moment, a look that was somewhere in the neighbourhood between curious and unnerved.
‘Oh-kay’ she intoned carefully. ‘I guess we could hang out over a few drinks.’
‘Drinks?’
‘Yes. I know a nice bar not far from here.’
‘Samantha I’m your dad not your study-group buddy.’ I turned and headed for the exit and she followed.
‘Well you did say it was my decision.’
‘I did think you’d make a sensible choice. Wonder what I was thinking…’
‘Is there something you are not telling me?’ She stopped.
I paused long enough to look at her over my shoulder. ‘I don’t know Samantha. You tell me…’
I went to the car and yanked open the driver’s door.
‘Are you coming?’
She remained stationary a moment longer, regarding me coolly before walking to the other side of the car and getting in.
I followed suit.
‘So where are we going?’ She asked.
‘Which way is that bar you mentioned? I think I need a drink.’

“Steve’s Bar” was housed in a building that might have been a department store at some point in history. The patrons consisted mostly of coeds and the odd trucker who’d probably been lured by the huge, blazing red neon sign outside. Who could resist the colour of sin?
Sport buffs on parade I realized as I stepped into the buzz. A football match was showing live on a small central TV to competing levels of egging and booing.
The patrons looked to be in high spirits (no pun intended). The bartender and waiters looked happy. Beer was flowing endlessly, and as my daughter and I found a spot in the far corner where the smell of sweaty armpits wasn’t as strong, I remember thinking how the scene around me was a potent mix for trouble.
I don’t watch football and so I had no idea what the festivities were for. I just didn’t get what the fuss was about.
I like golf. Play at the country club back home every once in a while. A mature, clean, un-fussy game, golf. But football? I suppose there’s something savage and primal about the game, which I find unsettling.
Samantha motioned for a waiter. ‘A glass of vodka please. No ice. And you dad…?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What would you have?’
‘Oh! A beer would be just fine, thank you very much.’
The waiter disappeared.
‘Vodka huh?’ I began by way of an opening line.
‘I’m legal. Want to see some ID?’
‘Yeah maybe… A student’s ID if you may.’ I cocked a brow.
‘Are you okay dad?’
‘Trust me its not me I’m worried about?’
‘I’m not telepathic Mr. Sam Cohen. If you’re going to communicate you’d have to drop the innuendos and speak English. Remember it?
‘Frankly I’ve had enough jargon for one day. Can I please have a non-wiseass uncomplicated conversation with my father. Thank you very much.’
Our drinks arrived and she threw the glass of vodka back in one swallow. ‘Another please’ she snapped at the waiter, slamming her empty glass back onto the table.
She had tears in her eyes.
‘Did you drive four hours to come here and piss me off dad?’
I didn’t respond for a long time. I’ve never really been one to be moved by tears.
‘You said something about having had enough jargon for one day. I suppose you were making reference to lectures today, right?’
‘Your point being?’
Her second drink arrived.
‘Take it easy with that’ I said with unmistakable emphasis. The look in my eyes must have been steely.
She sighed and demanded for some nuts from the waiter.
‘I’m going to see the Dean of Student Affairs at your school first thing tomorrow morning Samantha…’
‘Why? What happened?’
I was incredulous, besides myself with disbelief. I felt my hands start to shake again.
Who was this girl sitting in front of me, I wondered. Remorseless. Cold. Narcissistic enough to think she could have gotten away with deception of this magnitude.
I took a deep breath, but it was pointless trying to keep my tone even: ‘I saw the matron at the girl’s dorm today Samantha… There’s no record of you on their student list!’
She heaved a sigh and covered her face with her left palm.
‘Did you really think I wouldn’t find out about this Samantha? Did you really think you could get away with this –this –this–’
‘What exactly dad!’ She snapped at me.
I felt a vein pop in my temple. I couldn’t believe her nerve. Definitely not Dutch courage, I knew. It’d only been one glass of vodka.
‘Are you insane!’ I couldn’t keep myself from yelling. And in that instant I couldn’t care less that other bar patrons suddenly found my daughter and I a whole lot more interesting than live football.
‘I burst my…behind all these years to give you a good life! I sent you to the best schools. Made sure you’ve had the best education possible. And then you suddenly decide to throw all of it away, and think that’s okay?!
‘Do you know how bloody much your tuition’s set me back? And when did you even drop out?’
Samantha just looked at me in that same cool manner. And then did the most infuriating thing possible: she laughed. But there was nothing humourous about the sound.
‘Okay’ she said, ‘let me get this straight: you think I dropped out of med school?’
‘I checked with the matron at the girl’s dorm!’ I thundered.
She laughed again and then her countenance changed swiftly to one of stony seriousness, and beyond that to vicious anger.
‘The matron doesn’t have the comprehensive list of students. Only for female boarders at the dorm.’ She rose.
‘Check with the Dean tomorrow Einstein!’ She yelled, drawling the last bit and stomping off.
‘Samantha! Samantha!’ I hurried after her.
‘You haven’t paid for your drinks Sir’ said the waiter who’d served our drinks, appearing out of nowhere and blocking my path.
I gave him enough money to pay for our drinks and what might have been the sum-total of his tips on a regular week.
It sure wasn’t a regular day for me.
‘Samantha! Samantha!’ She’d gone across the road by the time I’d exited the bar, making her way in very long strides.
I ran after her. ‘Samantha! Get back here!
‘Samantha! Don’t you dare walk out on me!’
‘News flash dad: I am!’ She hurled back without looking back at me. Her voice broken with tears.
I felt tired already. I wasn’t cut out for this sort of drama.
I stopped in my tracks and called out after her: ‘Samantha! Samantha! Stop!’ She kept on walking.
‘Please! Please Samantha…’
Her pace slowed till she stopped altogether and braced herself against a streetlamp, her back to me.
I could tell she was crying by the way her shoulders heaved, up and down.
I took my time closing the distance between us.
‘Sam…’ I touched her shoulder. ‘Can we talk? I need you to be honest with me… What’s going on?’
She turned to face me, her face tear-stained, and I saw nothing of the indignation that had twisted her face into an angry mask only moments before. Now she was Sam, my child. Daddy’s little girl…
‘The matron couldn’t possibly have had my name on her register. That register is for boarders only, and I haven’t stayed at the dorm since last semester…’
‘But today on the phone, you said–’
‘I lied dad.’
‘Why?’
She paused for a moment, then said: ‘I got an apartment.’
‘Well that’s hardly a crime. Why all the cloak and dagger?’
Her eyes fell to her feet.
‘There’s more Samantha, isn’t it?’
She nodded, then fixed me with doe-eyes cored by an intensity that surprised me. She was struggling.
‘You do love me dad, don’t you?’
Alarms were going off in my head. ‘Yes honey. You know I do.’
‘And you’d love me no matter what, right?’
I cradled her face in my hands, becoming frightened. Worried that my daughter had done something terrible and was way in over her head.
I was going to do anything to protect my child, irrespective of whatever it was she’d done.
‘I know I should have told you about this earlier dad, but I didn’t know how you’d take it. I still don’t know how you’d take it or if I should tell you at all.’
‘Samantha I am your father, the only family you have left in this world, and we shouldn’t keep things from each other.
‘What’s this secret you’ve been hiding…?’
She regarded me coolly for another moment, and then holding me by the hand and leading the way back to Steve’s where my car was packed, said: ‘Come with me. Let me show you…’

Thanks

It was a ten minute drive -fifteen minutes tops -from my hotel to campus, and I was pointed to the girl’s dorm by a pair of love birds who had been smooching and kissing under the wash of a butane lamp.
In all honesty I could have asked directions from some other person or persons less…busy, but I have to admit I’d taken great pleasure in breaking those two up. I don’t approve of such lurid behaviour and strongly believe people should comport themselves with the utmost decorum when in public.
‘Its the building over there’ the girl said, pointing in the general direction of a terraced row of dormitories. ‘The one with the brick archway…’ She looked like a fresher. You can always tell them by the way they dress. And there was still something naïve and impressionable about her: the way her face flushed, the look in her eyes. There must have been something about my demeanour that made her uncomfortable.
I thanked them and drove towards the building with the brick archway, watching them in the rearview and wondering if Samantha would do something like that.
No, I decided. She’s after all my daughter, and an apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
I wondered about the younger generation and their many troubles. And I came to the same conclusion I had reached several times before.
Television! That is the problem. The MTVs and rap music and all that drive-by language. The shows get dumber; ratings get higher. Then suddenly Marijuana is a lot fancier; sex a lot cheaper. R.I.P Morals.
Becoming a retard becomes cool. Prison-yard adaptations become top-rate fashion. Tattoos. Piercing, even in the most cringe-worthy places.
I pulled up before the central building on the terraced row of dormitories that consisted the female hostel and walked in through Plexiglas doors.
I was shown to the matron’s office by a bespectacled young lady who wore braces and looked like she was scared of her shadow. The matron was a corpulent Oriental woman –maybe Chinese or Korean –who looked like the hardest thing she had to do at work was get into her chair –which seemed rather small and uncomfortable for her –and wiggle out of it at the end of a work day. She was fortyish and her face still clinged onto its baby-fat, as did the rest of her body: stomach fat, arm fat, neck fat, jowls… I wondered how much income tax Mc Donalds doled out to Uncle Sam every fiscal year on just her input.
‘Hello Sir… Come in… Do have a seat.’ She had perfect white teeth.
‘Thank you’ I said goodnaturedly and sat in one of the pair of chairs that fronted her desk.
‘So how may I help you… Mr…?’
‘Cohen. Sam Cohen’ I offered. ‘I’d like to see my daughter. She’s a student here.’
‘Well you know what dorm she’s at?’
‘No.’
‘Well why don’t you call her?’
‘Her cell phone’s switched off’ I lied.
‘Oh!’ She turned to a computer monitor that dominated her desk, punched out a few keystrokes on a keyboard out of sight.
‘Name?’ She demanded.
‘Huh?’ I’d been looking at her jowls, watching them quiver with every keystroke.
‘Your daughter’s name…’
‘Oh. Samantha Cohen.’ Keystrokes.
‘Department?’
‘Medicine and Surgery.’ Keystrokes.
‘Urm, there’s nobody by that name in any of our hostels who’s a medical student.’
Ding-ding! The alarms went off in my head. I was right! She had dropped out!
‘However there’s a Samantha Cohen in Journalism. And another in Physical Education…’
Journalism? Physical Education?!
A lot better than a drop out, I thought and latched onto that iota of hope.
‘May I–’
‘Samantha Cohen.’ She cut me off. ‘Journalism… Brown eyes… Nineteen–’
‘No. That’s not my daughter.’
‘Samantha Cohen. Physical Education. Blue eyes–’
‘Her eyes are green. That’s not my daughter either.’
She stared at her monitor a moment longer before facing me. ‘Well I’m afraid that’s all I’ve got here’ she said, watching me warily.
‘Are you sure you–’
‘I need to speak with the Dean of Student Affairs!’ I snapped.
‘Sir–’
‘I’ve been paying her tuition. She’s in school! She’s got to be in school!’
‘Well I’m sorry sir, but the Dean of Student Affairs must have closed for the day. Look at the time’ she said motioning to a wall clock. ‘Its way past my office hours as it is. So I suggest you relax and return tomorrow and this whole thing can be sorted out, but I assure you there’s no Samantha Cohen who fits your description in any of our dorms.’ She looked at her monitor again.
I sat there, not sure what I was supposed to do. I felt stupid, amongst other things
I finally gathered myself up and biding the matron farewell and thanking her for her time, exited the office. Gracefully.
I’d just gotten in my car when my cell phone started to ring. Samantha.
I took a deep breath and answered the call.
‘Hey dad.’
‘Hey.’
‘I’m at your hotel and the clerk at the front desk informs me you are out.’
‘Yeah honey. I’m just around the corner. I’ll be right there.’
‘Okay then. I’d just wait for you in the lobby.’
‘See you in a bit.’
‘Yeah. See you…’ The call ended with a click.
I took in a deep breath and slammed my head into the steering wheel. The horn honked, startling a female student who’d been walking by my car at that exact same time, causing her to jump.
She gave me a nasty look, mouthed some obscenity and walked on.
I muled over what I’d just learnt about Samantha… My daughter… And I always thought the apple didn’t fall far from the tree…
I willed myself to be calm. I took in deep breaths till the tremor in my hands stopped. Maybe I’d go through the rest of the day without throttling anybody.
My only child had lied to me, and in doing so had toyed with her future.
I wondered how long she thought she could keep up the deception.
What other lies had she told? What other secrets did she have?
I started the ignition and sighed.
There was only one way to find out…

The titles go with the theme and plot of each new episode. However, it doesn't take away from the element of continuity. Stay tuned for more...

‘Hey dad…’ My daughter Samantha came on the phone.
Dad. Not Sam. Maybe she had outgrown her rebellious phase.
I think one of the best parenting decisions I’d made was naming her Samantha — “Sam” for short. That way I could pretend she was talking to herself whenever she referred to me in that disrespectful manner.
More than bringing her into the world, I’d catered for her from the cradle and deserved a lot of respect for that. And calling me by my first name just didn’t cut it.
Adrienne always thought I was hard on her, but how else does one beat a child into shape? She had attended exclusive private schools run by nuns. And now was in her sophomore year at an Ivy League Medical School. I paid her tuition. I got her a sleek pink Volkswagen Bug for Matriculation. By my books I was a darn good father!
‘Hello dear… How’s school?’
‘Fine. How are you holding up dad?’
‘I’m fine’ I gave out instantly. ‘I’m doing very well, thank you.’
‘Are you sure dad?’
‘Well under the circumstances I’d say I’m as fine as I can possibly be.’
‘You want me to come over dad? Its only a four-hour drive.’
‘No. That’s fine. I was just…urm, checking up on you.’
She paused for a moment, and I could imagine her staring absently into space. ‘Okay then’ she said finally. ‘Bye…’
‘Samantha..?’
‘Yes dad.’
‘What was your mother’s favourite colour?’
‘Red… She’s always liked red. The colour of her nails and lipstick. Never changed. And blue too. She did like blue, but red was her favourite… Why do you ask?’
I was quiet.
‘Dad? Are you there?’
‘Yes Sam. I’m here.’
‘Is everything okay?’
‘Yes’ I said at first, then on a second thought: ‘No… Nothing is okay. I never knew Adrienne liked red. I don’t like red. I hate it!’
‘Dad–’
‘I didn’t know she liked blue either. No wonder all the coffee mugs are blue.’
‘Dad–’
‘She wanted to wear a red dress to the company’s end of the year dinner party last year. And I’d convinced her –forced her to wear that ugly, black mourning dress I’d bought February 14th last year when I’d realized it was Valentine’s on the way back from work.’
‘Dad–’
‘They were the only cloth store open Sam… Okay, I admit I didn’t really go out of my way!’ My voice started to break. I wanted to shut up, but it was like a tidal wave I could no longer shut in.
‘Dad listen to me–’
‘And I’d made her wear that ugly black dress. Oh God!’
‘Okay that’s it I’m coming over!’
I tried to put myself together. It was ten o’ clock at night. There was no way I was letting my only child drive out that late on a four-hour journey. I ordered her to stay put.
‘Okay. But I’d get on the intersate first thing in the morning, okay. Just hold yourself together dad.’
I nodded absently to the phone, and then made a spur of the moment decision.
‘You know what Sam… Why don’t I come to you instead. I’m sure you have lectures you need to attend… I could leave in the morning and be there by lunch.’
‘Really?’ She seemed genuinely surprised. ‘You would do that…? I mean, what about work?’
I thought about that for a second, and replied: ‘You’d help me draft my resignation letter.’
She was quiet for a moment, and then said okay.
‘See you tomorrow then?’
‘Yeah. Tomorrow…’
‘Goodnight dad. I love you.’
‘I love you too hun’.’
I replaced the receiver and listened to the silence.

I had breakfast at a diner off the interstate the next morning, sipping my latté while poring over the local newspaper, and having croissant after croissant till I was certain I had food up to my chest.
I discovered there wasn’t a better way to kill time than listen to truckers gossip their way through breakfast and white-collar types discuss politics or headline news. Doing so while munching multi-cereal croissants and watching pick-up trucks and small sedans flit past through the window.
It was ten by the time I got back on the interstate and lunch break was over by the time I arrived my destination.
Samantha must have been in class I thought, and decided I’d wait till evening before I called.
I found a small hotel two blocks away from Samantha’s school and I thought maybe I’d enjoy my daughter’s company a few more days. It wasn’t like I had anything else to go back home to.
‘What’s the name sir?’ The brunette behind the receptionist’s desk asked. Her name tag read “Mallory”.
‘Sam’ I replied. ‘Sam Cohen.’
‘Cash or credit card?’
I passed her my credit card.
CNN and ESPN kept me company till evening when I called Samantha’s cell phone. I’d sent her an sms earlier informing her I was in town and what hotel I was at.
The phone rang but was left unanswered.
She called back twenty minutes later: 4:35 pm. I checked.
‘Hey dad. Sorry. I just got off from class.’
‘Long day huh?’
‘You have no idea. So what’s up? I need to get back to the dorm and wash up. And I’d meet you…where?’
‘Why don’t I come over and pick you up…’ I suggested.
‘Urm, dad its a girl’s dorm.’
‘And? I said I’d come pick you up. Not climb in a shower with your dorm mates.’ My tone climbed an octave.
‘You know what… I’d just rush and wash up then come meet you at the hotel, okay.’
‘Samantha–’
‘I’ve got to go now dad. Love you.’
‘Samantha–’
Dial tone. She had hung up on me.
I watched the phone in my hand for a long time before replacing it.
That was strange if anything was. Why did I feel like my daughter was stone-walling me…
Had she dropped out of school? Had she been in class all day like she claimed?
All that money for tuition… Could it have been trumped up? And if she’d dropped out, when might this have been…
The last time she was home was for her mother’s funeral, and I’d been too preoccupied to notice if anything was amiss.
Adrienne always said I didn’t spend enough time with our daughter. That I didn’t know her. Well, I think I knew her better than anyone else, and I’m sure I might have been able to discern something if the darn Ray Bans hadn’t been so dark.
I was curious, and more than that, suspicious. Something just wasn’t right with the way Sam had hurriedly gotten off the phone. And if she was being guarded about something, I had to find out exactly what it was.
I snapped my car keys up from the bedside bureau and headed out.
I was going to pay Sam a surprise visit.

I woke with a headache in the middle of the night and was going to ask Adrienne to pass me my bottle of aspirin. And then I remembered.
I turned on the bedside lamp and rolled over to the other side of the bed. Adrienne’s side. The empty side.
The aspirin bottle was in the bedside drawer and as I shook out two tablets and dry-swallowed them I wondered why I’d always kept my medication in the bedside drawer on Adrienne’s side of the bed when I could easily have kept them on my side without occasionally having to wake Adrienne up in the middle of the night when I had my headache spells.
I flopped back in bed, lying on Adrienne’s side and inhaling the faint scent of her cologne. The fragrance of summer oranges so faint sometimes I believed I imagined it. And to think I had hated the scent all these years, wrinkling my nose when Adrienne would hug me before I left for work or when I would play the role of the dutiful husband at my company’s annual end of the year party and lean in intermittently to whisper some nonsense in her ear and make her feel like she was a part of the party.
I never even asked her the name of the fragrance she wore. Or her favourite colour. I’d always assumed it was green, the colour of her eyes.
There was a whole lot I didn’t know about my wife.
I inhaled deeply and willed myself to sleep.
I woke up late at about ten in the morning. The sun was already bright outside but the curtains were still drawn in my bedroom, putting it in a state of semi-darkness.
I remained in bed a while longer. I was already too late for the company’s quarterly board meeting so why hurry?
Adrienne would have woken me up, I thought. She’d have opened the curtains and let in the day and tapped me awake.
I sighed and reached across to my side for my cell phone. The battery was out. I’d forgotten to plug it in before going to bed last night. It was Adrienne who usually remembered that sort of thing.
Several people from work would have tried to reach me on my telephone this morning, and some of them might hope I’d died in my sleep after the operator repeatedly informed them my phone was switched off. My phone was usually never switched off much less this early in the morning. Maybe it was my subconscious tapping out morse code to my ego…
I discarded my cell phone on the bedside drawer where it had been all night and got out of bed. Halfway through a shave I just stopped and watched my reflection. Really looking and seeing beyond the laugh wrinkles, the studied expression, the stubborn jaw line and square chin that wouldn’t give in to sixty-three years of aging; the confident way in which I held my head.
In the mirror was a face half-covered with shaving mousse, but through my eyes was a sad, broken person. An acknowledgment I was letting myself make for the first time.
I got dressed but couldn’t find my red and blue polka dot tie. So I changed into a tee-shirt and jeans instead.
Adrienne would have known where to find that tie.
I had bread with cheese and fruit juice for breakfast. I kept forgetting to get coffee.
I missed the smell of waffles or frying bacon or eggs. I missed the scent of summer oranges…
I remember this day exactly four weeks ago. I’d woken at the crack of dawn, showered and come downstairs to the sweet aroma of frying bacon. I’d thought nothing of it. It had been nothing special.
I remember Adrienne pouring me fruit juice from a pitcher while she yapped away with our neighbour Mrs. Simmons on the phone. She hadn’t realized it when the glass was full and poured orange juice all over my black pants.
I had been more than a little irritated at her clumsiness. She always seemed to trip over herself.
I particularly remember one uncharitable thought: What had I seen in this woman? Why had I married her?
Now I knew…
I got in my Jag and drove around town for a while, not really having a direction in mind, until I found myself at the town’s only cemetery.
I remained in the car for a very long time. It was an unplanned visit so I hadn’t brought flowers.
I got out of the car finally and walked down rows and rows of bleached marble headstones, head down, hands stashed deep in my pockets till I found her where she lay, watched over by a small cement cherub.

IN LOVING MEMORY
Adrienne Cohen

1954 – 2013

Wife, Mother, Friend

I got on my knees and was quiet for a very long time. And then I cried and cried.
‘I’m sorry Adrienne…’ I wailed over and over again.
The winds stayed still…