At a Conference

Guarded in one famous label or the other, down to their ballpoint pens. They all had their eyes fixed on the last speaker for the day. Christy knew that it would certainly be a long month, and it would be foolish to spend the entire month, staring at one person after the other. Such would do nothing but knock-out the entire energy in her. It was too difficult not to stare, her fellow young ladies were flashy in expensive money, and she looked the odd one out.

For the third time in the first week, she had worn the same woolen gown uncle Ben sent to her from Spain for her graduation; it then had a valley on the neck and around the armpit, but there was not much she could do? At least, he had the chance to remember her when she needed to wear something new for graduation, the same way she had to borrow her mum’s wedding shoes which her mum wore only on their wedding anniversary.

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She looked at her foot while the pair of silver shoes glittered with some age. Almost all of the cloths which accompanied her for the conference had a story to tell or brought pictures of funny memories to mind.

Christy took her mind back to the powerful man before all of them; he was the Chairman of Bulls and Claims oil and gas, she had to force her attention on him, because earlier before he was called to the mic, she noticed that the middle aged man was actually gawking at her in her tweed piece. It was impossible not to notice him, because he was not the only audience she had, but his seemed to be too obvious, and at a point it unnerved her.

At the end of Mr. Solomon’s presentation, it was as though the long hall went into what could be called a frenzy with a clapping ovation which left Christy wondering what he had actually said that provoked such attention, even as she made her way through the wide doors of the conference hall. Usually, she was not into drifting when something important went on before her, but she must have lost it, some place some how. Christy made her way through the foyer of the hotel and found herself waiting for the elevator while she withdrew into a deep thought.

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Christy

Christy’s parents met while living in Nigeria, and after their wedding, her father got an interesting job in Spain: to teach Igbo language in one of Spain’s most prestigious universities, and as a result, the newly weds packed their few gift items to their hometown and touched down on Spain’s soil. He got the work because he did his first degree in Spain, and when Uncle Ben’s letter arrived, he noticed that therein was enclosed some forms for application to a university.

Christy was born in Spain, lived there for the few years she could remember before her father decided that it was time to go home, because the new government meant well for Nigerians, and it did. Her father came home to head one of the first oil companies established by the Nigerian government, but unfortunately, along the line, everything turned topsy-turvy, some group of officials hijacked the system, and the government didn’t  flinch until they crumbled the lines of operation, leaving men like Christy’s father without a job.

The only source of their income came from the petty salary her mother earned as a teacher in a government secondary school. Not quite long, Christy came of age, and it was time to leave for the university. Fortunately, Uncle Ben came to the rescue; he saw her through an Oil and Gas university with just a little effort from Christy’s mother.

Uncle Ben was an uncle like no other; he came to live with her father’s family as a boi-boi at the tender age of twelve, learned how to fix cars in the evenings while he went to school in the day. Christy’s father never knew how they were related, but like every little boy, he was grateful to his father for a companion that didn’t only share a close semblance with his father, but bore the same surname with him.

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Christy graduated top of the class, and as a result, she was offered an automatic employment by one of the best Oil companies in the world, that it brought some rays of hope to the family and a change of mind --about the government-- to her father. The first thing the company did after one year was to send Christy to represent it at an international conference. Her mother helped her pack while she looked forward to travelling back to Spain, after a long while.

A Dinner Date

Christy came out of the bath, and noticed that a note lay idle in front of her door. She got that very often, but that one seemed different. She read the invitation to dinner and at the end, it was signed off by S.D, she frowned, because she knew that she left before everyone, and it would be very difficult to trace her room, she trashed the note like the rest and went to bed, but while Christy  fast fell asleep, she thought hard on what to do, because it was rude to refuse a dinner date from her overall boss.

The band busily led out some lines of sonorous sounds. Christy was too familiar with the music they played, because she had not gotten too rusty with her Spanish. The music was about two lovers that met misfortune on their way to the aisle, but they never discussed settling down with meeting in an interval of one month? Both danced to the rhythm of the music, just as they danced in between the sheets of her bed that night before they parted ways in the morning. Both promised to keep in touch with each other, and afterwards, Mr Solomon left for Brazil.

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And it came to light...

Patience was a virtue Christy shared with her mother. While in school, she learned patience, because her tuition and upkeep came in bits. Uncle Ben got old real fast and she didn’t want to push him too hard. So also as she waited in her car for school dismissal. A bell rang somewhere, and some teachers came out, each with a line of toddlers whose parents came for a pickup. A little girl ran straight to her, and as she did,  she shouted :

“Mummy!  Mummy!  Mummy!”

Christy at each point saw her father’s face, but what would she had done, when Mr. Solomon’s wife gave her a call two months to their wedding.

Written by Oluoma Udemezue.