Being a Man 2

I kept walking towards the bend in the passage when I heard her raised voice and that of a young man two doors behind me. I peeked through the keyhole and saw my wife pointing my pistol at a relatively younger man not more than twenty-nine years of age; I could not believe my eyes. I hesitated before entering the room; I hid myself in a small crevice between what seemed like a sitting room and the bedroom to listen to their conversation.

“So what if the vice-president happens to be my husband” screamed Victoria in a tone I had never known with her finger still around the trigger.

“You’re married to a very powerful man and this could be really dangerous for me...” replied the young man who was sweating profusely.

“... Besides, I met someone and I can’t do this anymore; we have to stop.”

“I knew it; you want me to go so you can bring in your little sluts.” Vicky was visibly angry.

“You men are all the same; making all sorts of excuses every time. I can’t come home tonight darling; I have so much work to do. I can’t get involved honey; I’ll appear to be condoning corruption. I’m tired baby; I had a stressful day and I have to be up early. I can’t stay home all day grieving with you; I have to get back to work.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about my husband and all of you.”

Standing there and listening to her, I wanted to bury my head in shame. But I had to do something; she still had the gun pointed at the naive young man who still could not make a head or tail of her disgruntlement. I imagined what the story would be if the press ever get their foraging hands on this sort of information. I imagined the various captions the print media will entitle it, the stories and speculations that will follow; the reasons why the vice-president's wife would have an affair and that with a much younger man.

I slowly walked to the young man and stood beside him facing the lady I made my matrimonial vows to on the 4^th of June twenty years ago. I watched in silence completely oblivious of everything else including whatever rubbish the young fellow was mumbling as the tears flooded her eyes, tears I was solely responsible for. I had not noticed that the safety of the pistol was turned off; as the first drop of tear left the beautiful almond shaped left eye so did a bullet leave the perfectly carved nozzle of the 1967 Dimitri Markov pistol gifted me by the president of Cuba.

I clutched my right chest and shut my eyes as the sweat that had formed on my forehead began trickling down. The room fell into about three seconds of silence which was only interrupted by a loud thud as the muscular body fell by my left side; then the tears rained. I leaned over the body and found it was hollowed on the left chest; felt for pulse and got none. “He’s dead” I said with as much calmness as I could manage.

I held my wife for the first time in six months there was a certain satisfaction to having her head rest on my chest, something I had not felt in a while. I took a quick look at the clock hanging beside a good looking picture of the now cold, lifeless body lying at my feet; it was ten forty-five. I stared at the cadaver unsure what to do with it; politics has thought me to think fast.

I rolled up my sleeves; the task at hand demanded it. I dragged the heavy body to the far end of the room, searched the entire room for anything that puts Vicky on the scene, there was nothing except a song titled “Vicky” which the young man had written her. I gathered a few valuables, all the things that had traces of my wife including the song into a plastic bag I found by the door. I had to stage a messy robbery.

By the time I took a second look at the clock, I was eleven twenty-five. I had done a satisfactory job, one I would have been proud of if there was not a dead body involved. I put the plastic bag in the trunk of the car and headed to the dump site where I set the contents ablaze. As the fire died down, right there at the dump site I wept bitterly. I imagine all sorts of things but in all, none was as dreadful as losing my family and I would do anything to prevent that from happening. So on that day the 11^th of December I, Dr. Olusegun Adebayo vice-president of the federal republic of Nigeria covered up a murder committed by my wife.

I returned home to find my wife on the floor of our bedroom fast asleep still clutching a bottle of scotch with the only evidence of its liquid content left at the bottom. Her tears had dried with the mascara, giving her cheeks a swollen and very dark shade. I managed to rescue the empty bottle from her without waking her, took her shoes off and carried her to the bed. As I washed off the blood in the shower, I felt guilty both for the murder and the preceding events.

When she woke up in the morning, I gave her a steaming cup of coffee and some aspirin for the inevitable hangover. I tried not to bother her with the night’s events until it was convenient for her; I called the office to reschedule all my appointments to the next week. I had not seen my daughter all through yesterday and at 11:33 she had not come down from her room. As I looked through Trustlyn’s door, I was stunned by what I saw; an unmistakably younger version of my wife just the same way I met her in the night. I could not understand what her grieve was about.