Must Read: Paradox Of Abel - Season 1 - Episode 9

7 years ago

Must Read: Paradox Of Abel - Season 1 - Episode 9

If you mistakenly stepped on his foot, he would let drive at you with such alarming emphasis that you’d wish you were deaf; if kids annoyed him in any way by chattering around where he was, David’s language became totally unfit for juvenile ears. Once young Emeka, a champion among his peers where fisticuffs were concerned, had the temerity to hurl a small pebble at David’s back. He had wanted to stone his bolting friend who had mocked him and skunked away, but his stone swerved off its target and made contact with David’s back. David liked little children and babies, but when they begin to grow up and acquire adult habits of thought and adult abilities to lie and cheat and be dirty and wicked, like the young Emeka, he treated them with strong hands. He, however, did not inflict any beating on the boy, but Emeka had slunked home afterwards, his face carried an expression of being humiliated severely and utterly cowed with the torrent of David Malik’s lurid remark. David had learnt the language of the East, so he easily cursed the unlucky Emeka as much as he could.

He was also usually successful at everything that he tried; the valedictorian of his secondary school and polytechnic graduating classes, a football hero whom many ladies swarmed over, a shrewd table-tennis player who seldom lost.

A guy at whom all the prettiest girls in school looked with doe-eyed interest. Anuli was hated among her peers because she was the one David picked among them all. Truly, before she became David’s wife, she gave him some really tough times during his wooing acts. Her intelligence and strong refusal at his first approach was what had made him cherish her.

In addition, Anuli had the most spectacular rack, and she didn’t always wear a bra during those times in the higher institution. That fine pair would always be bouncing and swaying so sweet that David couldn’t catch his breath until he had them, had her. Their first kiss was a passion which swept him awhole, and he became totally in love with her. Men set such a store by kisses, though heaven alone knew why. And lots of times, after one kiss they fell completely in love with a girl and made the most entertaining spectacles of themselves, provided the girl was clever and withheld her kisses after the first one. That was exactly what Anuli had done; she had withheld for months after the first kiss and made his love for her grow so much almost to the point of bursting that he publicly and unashamedly confessed his love for her. Her beauty and wholesomeness were a combination so erotic that he could not imagine another man having her, so he fully made her his by marriage. David knew about this manipulation made of him by Anuli, he knew she had done that out of the sheer love she had for him, but the fact still remained that she manipulated him nonetheless. So he swore never to be manipulated by any woman, or any man for that matter. Hence, his rough manner of speech. His theory was that hostility was a way of life, speak softly and you’re dead.

Couple with his skills in sports, David was highly intelligent too, yet self-effacing for reasons known only to him. Handsome yet free of vanity, acerbically witty and at the same time quite mean. He could be whomever he wanted to be, in character-wise. His abusive utterance were his shell; his armour. A salvo of expletives with which he protected himself from the hordes of manipulative nitwits in the world.
His phone rang.

David rarely received or made phone calls. The last one he had received was six days earlier, from an official of the bank he used. The man had told him that there was an error in David’s banking transactions. He had insulted the man so much that the official had to hang up. The last one he made was five minutes thereafter; he had called the man and insulted him some more. His temper was so hot that steam was almost being released.

Now, for the first time in six days, his phone rang again. His signature tone the familiar bleep of Nokia tri-band. Everyone with highly sophisticated mobile phone systems had his signature sound for his line, so that whenever the phone rang, one would not have to pick someone else’s phone and answer another person’s call. David’s wife’s, Anuli’s, signature was Resonance’s Lele Remix.

But David simply stuck with tan-ran-ran-ran-ran. David’s Nokia phone could produce about fifteen originally different signature tones, and twelve of them were standard in which his current ringtone belonged. Others could produce series of musical chimes. And if an SD memory card was inserted, any song whatsoever could be used as signature. But David would not hear of that; he considered that very silly in the first place. If you wish to listen to music, use the media player. Whenever any call came in, your phone should ring, and not sing. One man’s trash was another’s treasure. To Anuli, the Nokia Classic ringtone which David favoured immensely was a cheerful child-pleasing sound suitable only for the nursery or bedroom of young children. But she dare not say that to her husbands face.

Tan-ran-ran-ran-ran, said the Nokia.

Anuli hated the sound. She had hated it the first time she had heard it, and hated it even worse now.Tan-ran-ran-ran-ran.
This was the kind of annoying tone that might be made by half-bear, half-dog, half-wit character in a song made for nursery school rhymes and even adults who thought that ridiculous shows like Teletubbies and Papa Ajasco were the pinnacle of humour and sophistication. Anuli and David were watching the week’s episode of the family soap when the phone rang. She picked the phone from the three-seater and extended it to her husband.
David looked on the screen of the phone.

Private Number.
“Hello?” David spoke into his phone.
“David Malik?”
“Speaking.”
“Merry Christmas in advance.”
“Who is this?”
“What are you still doing in Aba? Your parents await you, Mr. Malik.”
“Who is speaking?”
“Do not worry about me.”
David was worried.
“How is the show? Are you enjoying the antics of Boy Alinco?”
“How did you know that I’m watching that?”
“I know you enjoy watching it. I’m watching it over here too. Isn’t Pa James a clown?”
“Listen to me, you dirtbag…” The baby was crying, he motioned to his wife to attend to it.
“Now, that is a language I don’t approve, Mr. Malik, calling me a dirtbag.” The caller’s voice hardened, and this scared David.

The caller continued, “Your parents want you to join them in Lagos. Your father misses you, Mr. Malik. You must come to Lagos now. Every member of your family will be there, do not be left out.”
“Did my father send you to call me? What is your name, mister?”
“Nobody sent me, Mr. Malik. I just want you to be with your parents this Christmas, that’s all.”
“What is your name, dirt…sorry, who are you?”
“You don’t want to make me angry, do you? My name will make no difference whatsoever to you now. Just be with your family on Christmas Day, it’s very important.”
“Why is my spending Christmas with my parents so important to you?”
The caller paused for some seconds before replying, “Because, Mr. Malik, that is the last Christmas you’ll ever be spending with them.”
The call was terminated.
David stared at the phone aghastly, as if a hand had suddenly materialized from the entrails of the phone and slapped him.
“Who was that?” Anuli asked him. She was carrying the baby on her left hip. The toddler gave a hiccup and spittle ran down its mouth. She wiped him up with a rag she was holding in her right hand.
“I don’t know,” said David, “An anonymous caller. He said something very strange, something very strange it is.”
“What did he say?”Tan-ran-ran-ran-ran.
He quickly picked the call.
“Dad?”
“Yes, son?”
“Are you alright?”
“Shouldn’t I be?”
“Someone called me just recently, he was telling me that I must come and spend Christmas with you. Are you having a Christmas party, Dad?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, that is why I’m calling you now. I want to spend this year’s Christmas with all my children.”
“But why the sudden decision? Why is this Christmas so important? We didn’t have any gathering last year, not even since 2009. Did you tell that caller to call me?”
“Which caller?”
“I told you that someone called me recently. He seemed particularly more concerned about this Christmas than anybody else.”
He thought he heard his father sigh, but he was not sure. Nothing could be trusted on phones these days; it could be a flunctuation in the network reception, or a hum in the breeze.
“Listen son, I didn’t ask anybody to call you, it could be nothing but a prank call. Anyway, when will you be coming, Dave?”
David took a deep breath before replying,
“Immediately.”
“Okay, I shall be expecting you. Come with your wife, what’s her name?” Although his dad’s favourite David was, he had not seen his father since the past three years.
“Anuli.”
“Will you bring her?”
“Is that necessary, father?”
“Please bring my daughter-in-law, I want to know what she looks like. Is she pretty?”
“Beautiful.” He intentionally kept the news of their baby from his father, he wanted to surprise him when they arrive in Lagos.
“Good.”
The call was terminated.
David turned to his wife, “Go and pack our bags, Ann. We’re leaving.”
“Leaving for where?”
“Lagos.”
Anuli stared at him in astonishment.
“Don’t stare at me like a goggle-eyed frog, I said we’re going to Lagos.” David thundered.
Anuli turned crimson under the insult, “You talk as if Lagos is the next street, Dave.”
He turned sharply and solemnly said, “Are you insane?”
Anuli quickly went into the inner room.
She knew the man she had married too well to question his order.