Adaobi Nwaubani - I Do Not Come to You by Chance

And Cash Daddy would have been good for Abia State. After all was said and done, my uncle loved his people. He might have pocketed a billion or two in the process, but in the long run, our lot would have been better. We would have had better roads. We would have had running water. We would have had a public officer who could not bear to watch his brothers and sisters in distress. Abia had just lost the best governor we could ever have had. I wailed even louder.

Eventually, an elderly man who could have been a morgue attendant or a fellow-mourner or a ghost, tapped my shoulders firmly.

‘Be a man,’ he said sternly. ‘It’s enough. Be a man and dry your tears.’

He waited beside me until I wiped my eyes and got up. I realised that I was barefooted, in boxer shorts and T-shirt.

I did not feel like going home. I drove to the office and was startled. There were two giant black padlocks on the main gates and on the front door.

Could it be the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission who had barricaded our office? Could it be the FBI? Had our friends in the police abandoned us so quickly after Cash Daddy’s death? With panic, I rang Protocol Officer.

‘I’m the one that locked it,’ he said, in a teary but firm tone. ‘I don’t want anybody to tamper with any of Cash Daddy’s things. Nobody should go inside. ’

Amazing that he could function so effectively even at a time like this. He must have dashed out to lock the office immediately after learning of his master’s death. But then, no one could blame me for having been paranoid. First Azuka, then Cash Daddy. Who knew where the lightning was planning to strike next?

Perhaps, we were being punished for all the mugus. I pushed away the thought. The only offences I had committed were against the people I loved. I replayed my misbehaviour towards Godfrey and my mother. I was consumed with shame. Truly, I was becoming a devil.

Nay, I was a devil.

Back at home, I rang Merit.

‘Merit is busy,’ her brother said calmly.

She was still busy the fifth time I rang.

I got dressed, drove to her house and waited outside, hoping to see someone whom I could send inside to call her. To my relief, after about two hours, the gates opened and her skinny brother appeared. He was dressed casually in singlet, jeans and bathroom slippers, as if he was just taking a stroll.

‘Hello,’ I called out to him.

He froze when he saw me, then scurried back inside like a mouse caught in full view on the kitchen floor when the lights were turned on suddenly in the middle of the night. I waited for another hour without anybody going in or coming out. Finally, I left.

I changed my mind about driving to Umuahia to see my mother. What would I even say to her? I locked myself in my bedroom and stared at the ceiling till dark. With the assistance of two tiny tablets, I had been managing about three hours of sleep per night ever since Cash Daddy’s death.

But my deep sorrow could certainly be nothing compared to whatever Protocol Officer was feeling. I had always thought of him as the real McCoy Graveyard, but today, he talked and talked and talked. In between, he sobbed. At some point, I reached out and placed my hand on his shoulder. My own eyes had no more tears left to shed.

He talked about how some wicked people were spreading the rumour that Cash Daddy had expired in the throes of orgasm. He talked about how the people that really mattered were being left out of the planning for Cash Daddy’s funeral. The National Advancement Party, in collaboration with the Abia State government, had announced plans to honour ‘our great man of peace, who has left a great example of politics without bitterness’ with a befitting state burial. He talked about how poorly the crime scene had been managed. Cash Daddy’s hotel room had not been cordoned off for several hours after his body was discovered, and the British police had gathered more than 5,000 fingerprints. He talked about how Cash Daddy had been a peace-loving man; if not, he would have got his opponents before they got him.

Finally he stopped. I removed my hand from his shoulder. We were quiet, then I chortled. Protocol Officer looked at me askance.

‘Knowing Cash Daddy,’ I smiled, ‘I won’t be surprised if he rises up from the coffin while all of us are gathered round during the funeral.’

He thought about it briefly. To my relief, he giggled.

‘Cash Daddy, Cash Daddy,’ he said. ‘There are no two like him in this world.’

We went back to quiet again. Suddenly, he dipped his hand inside the inner pocket of his jacket, brought out a sheaf of papers and placed them on my lap.

‘What is this?’ I asked.

At the same time, I looked at them and gasped. Sheet after sheet of foreign bank account details. Cash Daddy’s holiest of holies.

‘What is this?’ I asked again. This time, my question meant something different.

‘Kings, Cash Daddy thought very highly of you. You’re the only one who can take over the work.’

He also brought out two large, shiny keys from his socks and stretched them towards me.

‘The keys to the Unity Road office,’ he said. ‘You can reopen it whenever you want.’

I stared at the keys and at the documents.

‘Why did you bring them to me?’

‘Kings, if Cash Daddy knew that anything was going to happen to him, he would have handed them over to you.’ He paused. ‘I’m sure.’

I continued staring at the keys. A wave of emotions flooded my heart. Unlike my natural father, who had left me nothing but grand ideals and textbooks, Cash Daddy had left me a flourishing business. I was touched. And proud.

I reached out for the keys in Protocol Officer’s outstretched hand.

I remembered my mother. I remembered Merit.

My mind changed gear.

Perhaps this was my opportunity to gather my takings and leave the CIA. Going cold turkey would certainly not be easy, but with the millions I had stashed away in the bank, I could gradually start my life afresh. My father had steered me to engineeing, my uncle had persuaded me to 419. For a change, I would decide what I wanted to do with my own life. I retrieved my hand without touching the keys.

‘No,’ I said to Protocol Officer. I gathered up the sheets and transferred them to his lap. ‘No, I don’t want them.’

‘Kings?’ Protocol Officer gaped.

I continued shaking my head. He continued staring with mouth agape. For the very first time in my life, I felt in control. I was the master of my destiny.

Good mothers know all about patience. They know about lugging the promise of a baby around for nine whole months, about the effort of pushing and puffing until a head pops; they know about being pinned to a spot, wincing as gums make contact with sore nipples; they know about keeping vigil over a cot all night, praying that the doctor’s medicine will work; they know that even when patience seems to be at an end, more is required. Always more. That is why Augustina could hardly believe that the day had finally come.

The forty-five minute journey from Umuahia to Aba felt more like three hours. Throughout, Augustina hummed the first two stanzas of ‘How Great Thou Art’. All the plants seemed to have an unusual splendour, despite having leaves caked in Harmattan dust. A wrinkled man in the owner’s corner of an oncoming V-Boot winked, mistaking her smile as being directed at him. Augustina looked away and sighed. If only Paulinus had lived to make the trip with her. Quickly, she pushed away the greedy thought. Today was what she had and she was grateful. She could be happy enough for both of them.

The car veered off the expressway and onto a dirt road. An okada zoomed past carrying a woman with two toddlers straddled between her and the driver, and a baby strapped to her back with an ankara cloth. Augustina was saying a silent prayer for the baby’s safety when her own head bumped against the Mercedes S-Class roof. But the second and the third and the fourth potholes did not catch her unawares. Her arms were already wrapped firmly around the headrest of the front passenger seat. All this excitement about democracy. Yet so much was left undone.