You Are Fired! (Written By Heromaniaa) - Season 1 - Episode 4

Episode 6 years ago

You Are Fired! (Written By Heromaniaa) - Season 1 - Episode 4

It’s been more than three months since the Prado Guy incident. I had moved out from my babe’s apartment into Biggie’s apartment. He has always been my bro since day 1. Sarah and I were still dating but the steam wasn’t there. We chatted once in a while but it was quite obvious that the whole thing was headed for the rocks. She claimed she cheated on me to help me get a job, that it was a sacrifice she was constrained to make.

Well, I listened to her but I wasn’t eating any of that ‘sacrifice ‘ bullshit. If she cheated to get me off my jobless situation, she might one day cheat with the landlord to foot the rent, or with the NEPA man to foot the bills. One can never tell. These ladies ain’t loyal.

I have always known that relationships involving fair and pretty ladies never lasted. If you doubt me check out the news about Tonto Dike and Oladunni Churchill, or Tonto Dike and Malivelihood, and Dbanj, and Wizkid etc. If you still need more proof also check out Toke Makinwa and Maje Ayida or Meek Mill and Nicki Minaj or Charly Boy and Bobrisky (in this one, it is your guess who the lady is). Are you convinced now?


Things were changing for the better the Nigerian way. In Nigeria, if you crossed from PDP to APC, that’s change: change in alphabets. The economy will remain the same or worsen. Biggie told me there was an opening at his workplace. He worked at a decrepit restaurant and chalet by the road side that was the lair of hoes and yahoo boys. I applied and got the job. I was to work as the doorman and the pay was #20,000 per month. I accepted the terms and conditions and started work at once.


I hadn’t worked for more than three days than I began to ask myself if it weren’t better to go back to the village and rear hens than stand for 12 hours a day sliding doors back and forth. The job was horrible. At the close of work my leg would feel as if the joints had knocked. I always walked home like a bicycle with a broken spindle. Then another problem was the monotony of the job. I mean, even if you were paid a six-figure salary, you’d definitely get bored standing 12 hours a day closing doors and opening them and saying “welcome” and “bye, have a nice day.” I had to speak to the boss about those issues.

So that Tuesday evening, everyone was in bad mood except the boss. We had a good number of customers that day. That meant more cooking for the chef, more serving by the waiters and waitresses, more door sliding for me but more money for the boss. So he was in good spirits as I walked into his office.

“Yes! Yes! What are you doing here? You should be at door.” He blared like a goat.

“Erm, good day sir. We haff almos finish for tonight. So I say that I should come and see you.” I was very tired.

“See me? For what? Is it the end of the month? Young man get back to work before I roll you up in dough and bake you!”

“It’s not like that sir, my meat dry, well well. Customers won’t be able to chew it!”

“Go straight to the point! What do you want? He was an impatient man.

“The door, sir. Standing there all the time. Is boring too much. I swear, is very boring.”

“That is why you were employed, to handle that very boring job.” He made a face like a Snapchat donkey. “There is nothing I can do about it. Besides, every one stands in here. From the cleaners to the waiters, to the chefs to me, the boss!”

“Ah oga, my own standing is different. I want another type of standing.”

“You are wasting my time. What kind of standing do you want?

“Erm, Sir, I don’t mean to insult you sir. But since you asked, I don’t mind standing as the boss, if you don’t mind.”

My boss made a face like he just sat his naked ynash on a pin. Then with as much strength as he could summon into his large mouth, he blared. “Get out!”

Shuo, person cannot ask a question again? Shebi na him say all standing na standing!
“I am sorry sir. Shebi I said if you don’t mind. I didn’t know that you would mind, but if I can’t stand as the boss, can I stand as the accountant, I promise I won’t ‘loss’ your money”

“Get out before I push you out.” He howled like a crossbreed of dangerous dogs.

He then stood up like a hangman and walked towards me. Brother, Usain Bolt no reach me for run. I tore out of the room like the EFCC was after me.



So that was how my plan failed and I kept on standing and sliding doors and helloing and goodaying customers both on good days and bad days.

Then something happened that would in the long run land me inside kirikiri. But the kirikiri part is a story for another day. You see, I needed money badly. I was living with Biggie. Biggie would never let you have a coin off him. He could drown you with alcohol till you threw your intestines out, but on all other matters involving money, he would make you split the bill in two.

So I was footing half the NEPA bill, house rent, food bill, fuel bill, and air freshner bill; the one we used when his girlfriend came over. I was broke like the economy, man. So I began to get creative. I soon figured out how I would make extra income. CHARITY! That was my mamma’s name by the way.

Your guess is as wrong as whatever comes out of the mouth of Lie Muhammed (Please, pardon the spelling of the first name, I kept spelling it correctly but my phone kept autocorrecting it, so I left it like that. My phone knows better) If you thought I was going to give to charity.

Don’t get me wrong. I totally support giving to charity but… but when your case don worse pass Charity own- you begin to wonder what the difference was; why people don’t give to you too. So at my place of work, in the third week since I started working there, a plan flashed through my mind like power supply at Oworonshoki. I thought about the plan. I turned it over this way and that way until it occurred to me that if I didn’t put it into action I’d go totally gaga.

Last week had been particularly dull for business. Customers walked-in in ones after three or four hour interval. As usual the boss jumped off his skin like boiled periwinkle when he saw the accounts. To cut the short story shorter, he said we were at fault and must recommend ways to move the business forward. Babe, if you see as people start to they google the internet for ideas, you go shock.

Funke, the receptionist, googled “Ow kan wi move hour otel 4ward” and waited for it to load. When she saw no related feedback she typed, “Habeg, hany otel walk vacansi haround Osodi hunder bridge?



It wasn’t funny. Everyone was under pressure except me. I had a plan.
The evil hour soon came and the boss called for the meeting. We all assembled in his office and stood like primary school children that bought akara with their school fees. I’ve done it before so I know what I am talking about. It wasn’t funny I say.

The boss adjusted uneasily in his chair like he sat on his scrotum and looked up at us.

“Who among you has been pulling my business down?”

The office was quiet. It was like Ibrahim Magu, EFCC chairman, telling the senate “If you can swear you are not corrupt say Aye!” Who wan talk, make thunder from Sango and Amadioha shrine join forces knack him left ynash.

“We have to get to the bottom of the matter, and the earlier someone starts saying something the better for all of you.”

We couldn’t say a word, though we knew one another’s secrets. For instance the master Chef was always packing food home. I couldn’t blame him though, when a man has eight kids at home plus a wife the size of Eniola Badmus, you’d learn to sympathize with him for no reason.




The other day I caught him red handed. It was just eight o’clock and the boss had gone home for the night. Customers wanting to grab a quick supper were all stranded in the restaurant. When I rushed in to find out what the problem was, I was told the whole food was finished. I went into the kitchen to see what the chef was doing about it, but alas alas, there he was pushing all the food inside a black polythene bag.

“Psalm.” he called me “My family never chop.” he said. “I do all this cooking and I don’t have food at home? Not possible. My wife… you know how she is.” He said mournfully. “I mean, where a baboon works, a baboon should also eat.”

“You mean your wife?” I asked finding it difficult to understand how a baboon got to into the conversation.

“My wife?” he asked. Then he seemed to understand. “Well, judging by her weight and her hairy backside, you may have a point.”

Eww, I had never seen her hairy backside. In fact, I would rather buy popcorn and beer (since coke and Fanta don cast) and watch Denrele and Bobrisky make out than see that woman’s hairy backside… eww.



“Take heart, Chef. God will give you the fortitude to bear the load.”

Well, that was just one long instance to prove to you we weren’t all saints like President Buhari’s cabinet members.

The other day, a wealthy man had come to the restaurant for lunch with a girl that dumped me three years ago. I told him point blank that no dish was ready (though it was past midday), that if his girlfriend couldn’t cook for him at home he should go and look for another one.

‘That’s correct.” The wealthy man said. “Sandra come home and cook for me.”

They turned back and drove away. Sandra was a bad cook. Years ago, she added water to some eggs she was frying for breakfast, explaining that it was too thick. I guess she is single again.

Back to the meeting, my boss was now pacing round the tiny office.

“Since you have no answer to my question, do you at least have a suggestion on how we can move the business forward?”

It was Biggie, my friend, that opened the floor.

“I think, you know, we all feel business isn’t going well because, you know, we are comparing this week’s sale with that of last week. I mean, you know, last week was the week of valentine and sales were high for obvious reasons. You know”

“We don’t know!?”The Boss fired like a pregnant woman whose water just broke. “Why were sales high during valentine, did Chef’s culinary skill get better or did Funke’s makeup get more attractive?

“Not really, during valentine, the rooms were cheaper because of the promo. And we had crowd of people wanting to lodge, and you know, do it… and they had to eat too. I mean, aside the girl, Stephanie, in room 4, who else does it on an empty stomach?” Biggie asked.

“I …” Boss started. We looked up at him in unison. He realized the awkwardness of what he just said.

“I don’t mean I as in I do it on an empty stomach, I mean I …” he looked at Biggie like a LASTMA official would look at a danfo driver picking a passenger on the express. “Next time you end a sentence like that, you are fired, what rubbish!”

“I am sorry sir.” Biggie said, unsure what he had done wrong.

“Biggie made a point, but stating what the problem is isn’t the same as solving it. If it were, Psalm’s mouth odour would be a thing of the past.” He took me by surprise, in fact I was so confused I had to quickly run my wet tongue across my palm and smell the residue. I won’t say it smelled as good as Passion perfume, but I can beat my chest and say my mouth has an edge over rotten egg.

“So I need solutions.” The boss said, his bulging eyes resting on me. For a second I thought we had been too harsh on Segun Arinze, it was because of my boss Oxford added “eyesore” to the dictionary, Segun had nothing to do with it.



“I have a solution.” I said, looking him eyeball to ‘eyeballs’.

“Solution for the mouth odour?” He asked.

“No, a solution that would move the business forward.”

Why should I suffer myself to solve my mouth odour problem, I mean when a man has mouth odour, who dey suffer am pass, no be the people wey surround the man? They should find the solution.

“Let me have the solution quickly.”