"Now someone got to talk to me before a spark of my anger. I said who put this love card on my table this morning" Cleo sputtered out like brimstone in front of he employees holding and brandishing a card gift Kenny put on her table.
Cleo, a 22 years old beautiful lady and the only daughter of her father. Being the daughter of a rich man had given her a straightaway ticket of being the CEO of her father's company. A position that doled out for her with inscrutable wealth and power even at her puerile age of 22.
"Are you guys deaf ? I said who has the effrontery to drop this thing on my table this morning" her voice ramped out more throwing into drizzling cyclone all of her suit and tie employees. The ladies were in plum certitude that Cleo would see them as saint in the matter. Leastways, only guys could have approached effrontery to embark on such a dauntless task. Yes, a very dauntless task was trying to woo your prissy pansy employer. The one and only Cleopatra.
"I'm the one Cleopatra. I put the card gift on your table this morning just thinking is the best way to approach you and tell you how i felt" Those words kept threatening to erupt from Kenny's vocal cord but he dared not. That would be his bungle. He would turn to a laughing stock if he discovered to everyone right there he was the who put the card on Cleo's table. That he had helplessly fallen in love with the pansy queen that stole his heart. He was just and ordinary cypher. Her personal driver. He realised he only had the paltry qualification to fall for such kind of girl but who was he going to blame ? Because he never intended to fall for her boss. He never chose to. But his heart wants what it wants.
It had been his 3rd year of working with Cleo as her driver, the 3 years had been rife with deep scathe and pain of seeing the one he loved but couldn't be with her. Lacking enough gritrock to face her and tell her how he felt was his prima problem. Kenny lacked the confidence to approach her. And his trauma triggered when he couldn't slake his emotion around her. He loved Cleopatra, but he thought dudes like him dont always get to love a special type of woman.
"Kenny ..ar ar you the one ? Did you put this on my table ? Cleo's hazel primed eyeballs pierced through him and for some milliseconds the connection between them was palpable. The softness she imbibed on throwing the questions at him got him thinking if there could be possibility of Cleo having the same feelings towards her. But he doubted it. Besides she already had a kind of deranged guy she passed as his boyfriend.
"Kenny tell me are you the one ?" A cloy impressive smile appeared on her angelic face. The smile almost got Kenny nodded affirmative but he couldn't stand the shame of aftermath. The Cleo he was staring at right now could for all he cared baste him with her normal acerbic words. He wouldn't be deceived by her lambent face.
"No no madam. I'm not the one" he stuttered out with deep guiltiness of how he blew the chances he had.
"OK then" Cleo retorted. While everybody noticed the look of disappointment on her face immediately Kenny denied.
"You people can go back to resume your work. But let this be the first and the last warning" she warned as she dispersed her horde of employees.
"Kenny. You can stay back i want to see you for a moment"
"Aiit ma" Kenny felt hot icicle as he waited to have a moment with her boss. Hope today wont be the day she would dash him his sack letter? Probably she knew she was the unserious element that put the wooing card on his table.
"So why don't you just skim the"ma" for now and lets be informal to each other" Cleo said with a smile beaming the "green light" --perhaps the "green chance" to squeal out his undying love for her.
"Ook" he stuttered.
"Good. Actually i asked you to waite so i can ask you a question that has been bothering my mind. You should expect the question to sound dumb but trust me i need you to see the iota of reality in it."
"Ook"
"I watched a movie yesterday and the end was very disheartening. It wws a story of a boy who fell in love with his boss but couldn't voice out. Perhaps the thought of loosing his job or something more had shuttered his mouth. But then there was this question that was asked at the end of the movie but i haven't found the answer, reason I'm asking you to help me out" Cleo paused a little while allowing Kenny to have enough time to passed out enough fog into the air and sit right. He couldn't believe how his "Life drama" was being played right in front of him intensifying the "green light" he needed to squeal out his love. Could Cleo also be nurturing the same feelings for him ? Definitely Yes! Her countenance, demeanour, her impressive smile had screamed out a Yes to him. And he wouldn't dare miss the chance.
"So tell me Kenny, if you were in the position of that boy would you forfeit the love you have for your boss over your job or you would rather cling to the love of your life at detriment of your job and any other negative circumstances?"
"Booom!" Kenny's heart imploded with joy. As the opportunity to profess his love kept glaring. So this love was reciprocal after all. He needed no soothsayer to confirm that.
"If i was the one," Kenny started noticing how Cleo, his prissy pansy boss becoming shy and slinking back to timidity like a very teenage girl on her first date.
"You this animal! So you have the gut to chit-chat with my fiancée ? Oh don't you know that broke ass dude like you can't get a taste of good thing like her in your life" A voiced boomed out staunching Kenny's mouth and polluting the peaceful plus romantic atmosphere in the office.
"Banji! How dare you call my employee an animal ? And come to think of it who promised a marriage will take place between us that gives you audacity to call me your fiancée?"
"Of course your dad did! Your dad, my dad want us married and so shall it be. Now kindly tell this animal to leave here now before i pounce on him and treat him like one" Banji's voice glistened with ire making Kenny coward as he decided to walk out of Cleo's life for good.
"Kenny please stay. Answer my question before you go. Please!" Cleo begged with teary-eyed as she watched him walk away from her for good. It was then it became palpable how much love she had for him and she had since concealed it out of her pride.
"And where do you think you are going ? You are going after that animal ?" Banji threw more snide at him.
"Yes! That boy you called an animal is the man i love and i want to be with" Cleo whispered amidst tears while each drop of her words fell on Kenny's ear. It was true she loved him too but it was too late for him to stay back. If Banji could call him an animal all because he was a broke dude and even mocked on how impossible it was for him to be with his dream girl then he swore to settle scores with his penury then come back for her, just later in the future.
"I love you so much Cleo" He murmured to himself as he dropped his resignation letter on his desk and turfed out of the building.
[b]AFTER 4 YEARS[/b]
Exactly 4 years after his exit, Kenny was back from exile to claim his long love. He was now rich and wealthy. He felt that was the right time for him to be with Cleo. On his way to her house, Kenny had memorized all the sweetest lines he will use to capture the heart of the woman he loved. But on reaching her house, he went numb when he was told that was the day Cleo was getting married to Banji. Like raging cheetah, he sped down to the venue of the matrimony of Cleo and Banji hoping to stop Cleo decision of marrying a deranged person like Banji. But by the time he got there, it was crystal clear there was nothing he could. He waited in his car from afar off as he gawped at the newest couple in town. Kenny was sure Cleo was bereft. Her countenance was bland and lacklustre but there was nothing he could do to salvage her. Cleo had slipped away from her. Another man had claimed her for good
Life had been worthless to him after then. Because to him the reason to live had been snatched away from him while he was cursory. He couldn't bring himself to love another woman when Cleo still exists. His life had been thorn into shreds by reality of never ever coming back with Cleo.
On one evening, he went to a club house to drink to stupor -something he had routinized to wash away the pain lurking inside him. He was in his high state of his stupor when he heard screams from clubbers, as he scrammed to have a look, he heard how everyone was talking about how a husband was beating his wife to pulp all because of new girl. On getting to the spot, Kenny couldn't believe his eyes as he saw the berserk husband was no other person than Banji and the victim wife who was no other person than Cleo.
[b]It was then it dawned on him that a broke dude isn't the animal after all. Instead an animal is the man that raises his hands up to beat up a woman[/b]
Immediately Banji finished beating his wife after raining abuses on her he left her on the floor and scrammed off with the new girl he just met at the club. Kenny however came closer to where Cleo was and offered her his hankie. Cleo collected the hankie without seeing the samaritan. But after wiping her eyes, she made to thank him, it was then she saw Kenny for the first time in 4 years. That alone triggered another sluice of tears.
"Kenny Kenny Kenny .. You ?" She stuttered as emotions snatched away the ecstasy of the moment.
"You see Cleo. I'm sorry. Now i know the answer to the question you asked me back then. Please can i answer it now ? Kenny begged with tears
"Kenny it's too late. Many thing has changed. I'm now married."
"I know dear. I know but i still love you. I still do"
Cleo smiled wanly. "And i love you too. But i can't do this. Four years ago, have always watched your lips everyday praying inwardly to play the love duet to me. Have yearned to hear you tell me you love me. Have always dreamt of being your wife after you might have approached me but you never did. I knew you were the one who dropped the card on my table and i gave you enough chance to tell me face to face but you disappointed me. Even after you resigned,i had to look for you all over the places, because by then i was ready to drop my pride and let you know how i felt but i didn't see. After i waited for you for 3 years and u didn't come back i had to succumb to my father wish to marry the real animal which is Banji. Kenny, you did this to me. You loved me and you couldn't even muster up to tell me. This is so unfair. You turned me to punching bag in Banji's house. You made me a laughing stock in his house. This is so unfair. You should have told me how you felt. I would have accepted you irrespective of who you were then because i loved you. But now I'm going to live in pain and languish for the rest of my life and thanks to you Kenny. Thanks thanks" Cleo finally squealed out as she glared at Kenny for the very last time and lumbered away into the hunting dark agony that awaited her in her husband's house.
The End.
"If you love somebody walk up to that person and tell him or her that you love them. Because there is no crime in that"
•. • African China
