Adaobi Nwaubani - I Do Not Come to You by Chance

‘A relationship!’ He screamed louder than ever. ‘Your head is not correct! Are you trying to tell me that you don’t have regular servicing from women? Are you normal at all?’

‘Cash Daddy, it doesn’t really matter to me. I believe that true love is more important than sex in a relationship. After all, sex isn’t one of the basic physiological-’

‘Come on will you shut up your mouth! I don’t believe it. How can I have somebody on my staff who is not being taken care of? Please leave off that your big grammar and just shut up. Your head is not correct.’

He paused thoughtfully. Then looked up with face aglow, as if he had just discovered fire.

‘Kings, when is your birthday?’

What had that got to do with the price of fish?

‘Am I not talking to you? I said, when is your birthday?’

‘It’s on the sixth of November.’

‘Good. I know what to do. I’m going to give you an early birthday present.’

He brought out his phone and ordered someone at the other end to meet us in the VIP section of his hotel bar later that night. I marvelled at this man who had just been smashed by his wife, and who was now trying to vivify my sex life.

The Bon Bonny Hotel was a popular hangout for people in our line of business. The car park was jammed with all manner of exotic cars and the lobby was equally jammed. Men in dark glasses and dark suits waited as their masters dined or womanised. There were also yellow-skinned, scantily clad ladies who had probably come to see if they could get their hands on some of the International Cake.

On my way to the bar, I spied Azuka disappearing into the elevator with a luscious lady entwined around his arms. Her bright yellow back was bare. Clearly, his newfound good luck was still a-flowing.

The writer of an opinion editorial I read recently in This Day had blamed the proliferation of bleached skin amongst young ladies on the average 419er’s preference for yellow women who went hand-in-hand with his flashy lifestyle. Another editorial, written by a Roman Catholic priest, blamed the 419ers and their ‘promiscuous lifestyles’ on the recent ‘rise in materialism’ amongst young girls and their tendency to dress in ‘Babylonian apparel’. Yet another writer blamed the 419ers for importing the AIDS virus to Nigeria.

Blaming problems on 419ers had turned into a national pastime, but then, it all depended on which part of the elephant you could feel.

I knew, for example, that Cash Daddy was personally responsible for the upkeep of the 221 orphans in the Daughters of St Jacinta Orphanage, Aba. He tarred all the roads in my mother’s local community. He dug boreholes, installed streetlights, built a primary health care centre. Just two days ago, I received a letter from the Old Boys’ Association of my secondary school requesting my contribution towards a new classroom block. I replied immediately to say I would fund the whole project. I knew what it felt like to endure classrooms that had no windows, no doors, and no tiles on the floors, just because the complete funds pledged towards the project had not yet been collected.

So, no matter what the media proclaimed, we were not villains, and the good people of Eastern Nigeria knew it.

In the bar, I sat at an inconspicuous table and waited. Cash Daddy was the Patron Saint of ‘African Time’; he would be at least an hour late as usual.

A waitress strutted over with a priceless smile.

‘Good evening, Oga,’ she beamed, and jiggled her waist to one side.

‘Good eve-’

‘What of Oga Cash Daddy?’ she beamed, and jiggled her waist to the other side.

‘He’s coming later,’ I replied.

I asked for a bottle of Coke and tipped her enough to compensate for the beaming and jiggling. As I sipped, I peered around the room.

There was Kanu Sterling. Both he and Cash Daddy had worked under Money Magnet. I had heard that Kanu lit his cigarettes with one-dollar bills.

There was Smooth. A chromosomal criminal, unlike some of us. Well educated, extremely cultured, he had been familiar with the good things of life since birth. But while he was schooling in Stanford, USA, the sweet lure of illegal money had been like a siren to him.

There was Amarachamiheuwa. He was personally responsible for the death-by-cardiac-arrest of one of the most prominent businessmen in Brazil, after duping the man out of 115 polo horses.

Cash Daddy arrived exactly two and a half hours after the time he had given me – without Protocol Officer, which meant that he probably had a high-maintenance adulteress waiting in one of the rooms and would spend the night at the hotel. He went from table to table, slapping hands and exchanging wild laughter. These men were not necessarily his friends, but they were all united in the brotherhood of cool cash.

‘Pound Sterling!’ Cash Daddy said to Kanu. ‘The only currency with a surname! I haven’t seen you in a long time. I was wondering if the white people had carried you away.’

‘Me?’ the man replied and beat his chest repeatedly. ‘Cash Daddy, me? How? They no afraid to carried me away? O bu na ujo adighi atu fa? Does they knows who I am?’

Amarachamiheuwa’s subsequent phone conversation eclipsed every other sound in the building.

‘Go to my house right now!’ he screamed. ‘No, not the one on Azikiwe Road! Go to the one on Michael Opara Crescent! Ask my gateman to show you where I parked my Mazda! It’s inside my garage, the one that’s very close to my swimming pool! Between my Volvo and my Navigator! Inside the boot, you’ll find three briefcases! One contains pounds! One contains dollars! One contains naira! Bring the briefcase with naira for me! Hurry up and come back now!’

Finally, Cash Daddy finished his rounds, sat at a table of his choice and beckoned me to join.

‘The usual,’ he said to the waitress who sauntered across. She was different from the one who had attended to me earlier.

I ordered oxtail pepper soup to go with another bottle of Coke. Our orders arrived in a jiffy.

‘Kings,’ Cash Daddy said after jawing the first chunk from a piece of fried meat in his saucer, ‘have you noticed that I never fall sick? Even if I go to a place where mosquitoes drink blood with straws, I can never catch malaria.’

He leaned closer and whispered.

‘Have you also noticed that my women are always coming back for more? No matter how many times they’re with me, they still want more. It’s because there’s nobody who satisfies them the way I do.’

He laughed.

‘This is my secret.’ He pointed at the meat he was chomping on. ‘404 works wonders in the body. You see all those funny diseases that women carry around in their bodies? With 404 you won’t catch anything.’

I was aghast. 404 was dog meat. I had heard of certain parts of Nigeria where dog meat was a delicacy, but this was my first time watching someone eating it.

‘And another thing…’ he continued, ‘404 protects you from your enemies. No one of them can touch me if I keep eating it regularly.’

He took a sip from the wine in his glass.

‘Should I tell them to bring some for you?’ He grinned. ‘You’ll need it against tonight. You know you have to sharpen your machete very well before you set off for the farm.’

‘No, thank you,’ I replied quickly.

Recently, I had done several things of which I had never thought myself capable, but eating the body parts of a dog was way beyond my league.

‘OK, don’t say I didn’t warn you,’ Cash Daddy said. ‘Camille is a very dangerous girl.’

While we were eating, an enchantress stiletto-ed over to our table in a short red dress that clung dangerously to her derriere. Her knees and knuckles were black where the bleaching cream had refused to work. Her hair extensions went all the way down to her waist and curled at the tips. Cash Daddy patted her behind and introduced us.