A play by Emmanuella Nduonofit
CHARACTERS
BOYO
NATASHA
BIMBO
(In a large dining room of a bungalow. The dining table has three pairs of chairs facing each other and another pair at the head and tail ends of the table. A lady probably in her late twenties is found busy setting the table up for a meal. A clock facing the audience strikes ten. This lady is clad with an over-tight outfit: a very tight, tiger-coloured body-hug blouse, a tight pair of white jeans shorts with a huge black belt, and a pair of black platform shoes intended to heighten her. She stops momentarily to look up slightly in thought. Then, she goes to a gate-leg table and lights a Benson & Hedges.)
lady: What could be taking him so long? His coming-home hour is nine, not ten. I hope nothing went wrong though. (pauses and glances proudly at herself) Yes! I bought this (indicates the body-hug blouse) for two thousand naira. And I bought this (indicates the white jeans shorts) for one thousand naira, and these (indicates the black belt and platform shoes) were five hundred naira and five thousand naira respectively. (sighs happily) Freshly bought! That is what I like. Freshly bought things. (smokes for a while) Yes! I know that I am a woman of great substance. When people see me, they will all nod their individual heads in approval of me. All shall whisper of my goodness. (smiles excitedly) God, see what appearances can do! Women will be envious. Men will be lecherous. (finishes smoking and becomes over-scrupulous when setting the table) I just hope there is no mistake. I can’t afford to make a mistake. This would be the first time we’ll be eating at home. I am happy I had enough money for that. This wet evening will be special. This dinner will be super. I have worked hard for this. (rubs her hands excitedly) Wow! I had a great feeling when I entered my kitchen for the very first time. I was getting bored eating out. (runs her eyes over the dinner table once more. Then, she calls out) Bimbo! (Silence) Bimbo!!
BIMBO: (answers from the kitchen) Yes, ma!! (appears on stage)
lady: Please, heat up the food.
BIMBO: But it was just freshly cooked, ma.
lady: (nods slowly) OK, I almost forgot. Well then, do not come out and serve the food until Oga says so, you hear?
BIMBO: (curtseys) OK, ma.
lady: So, you can go.
BIMBO: (curtseys a second time) Yes, ma. (exits)
lady: (watches her departure) She was an angel in my kitchen. She practically did all the cooking. Such a fine, multitalented girl! I would have been lost in the market. But she knew her way around, knew all the prices and where to get them. She is priceless! I cannot afford to lose her. (anxiously looks up at the clock) What is taking him so long? What could be keeping him? I just hope he didn’t say the wrong things or do the wrong things. It could be nothing more than either of these two things. He sure is wasting my precious time. (goes over to light another Benson & Hedges and picks up a novel by Hearts Magazine entitled “42nd Avenue: THE ADVENTURES OF PAMELA”) This Pamela is a wonderful person, o! She has taught me a lot of lessons about men, different types of men. (adjusts her dress) I am not as hot as she is, but I know how to go about things the hard way. The decent way. Well, it is never too late to learn more. (puts the cigarette in her mouth and starts to read the novel sitting on one of the dining chairs. After a while, a man walks into the dining room with a briefcase, tired and irritated, also with a Benson & Hedges in his lips. He is dressed in an office suit with his blazer hanging over his shoulder and his tie undone. He sees her and hisses.)
man: Nonsense! What a wife! She must always smoke anytime I smoke. Just look at her! And see! She cannot leave Pamela alone. Every minute of the day, it is Pamela. Pamela ought to be her new husband. (sighs tiredly, pulls a dining chair out and sits down) Em, how are you doing, sugar-pie?
lady: (looks up and eyes him viciously) I know you only too well. You hate sugar-pies.
man: Oh, I forgot. (removes his shoes and flexes his toes)
lady: (drops the book and stands up) What the hell took you so long? I prepared us dinner for Heaven’s sake.
man: Oh! I didn’t know that. I thought we were eating out as usual. You know that used to be your speciality. (The lady opens her mouth to speak in retaliation but on a second thought, closes it.) So, what’s up for grubs?
lady: Jollof rice with goat meat and carrots and green peas. (looks up dreamily) Utterly delicious!
man: (squeezes his face in disgust and hisses) Imagine that! I thought you would cook me akpu with afang soup, or eba with proper edikang-ikong soup decorated with cleaned crayfish, and you’re here telling me jollof rice. (hisses again) Beans and yam would have been better off.
lady: (pulls out another dining chair and sits beside him) Please, don’t be angry. Just eat what I’ve cooked. This dinner is very special to me. You hear? (pauses. The man flexes his neck.) Em, Boyd darling…
man: (angrily) Natasha! Natasha, how many times have I told you that I am no longer Boyd but Boyo Ekpang of Ikom town? Listen! We have left that country of yours, that continent of yours and we are now in Africa, Nigeria. Do you understand? I have dropped that name Boyd five good years ago. You hear? Then, I badly needed to establish myself somewhere. And, thanks to you, I did. Now, I am fulfilling my part of the bargain: to marry you and take you home with me. And that was what I just did. I’m yet to know if I am to regret my actions.
NATASHA: (shakes her head sadly) You just called our blissful marriage a mere business.
BOYO: Listen here, Natasha. No matter where you are, so far as you are black, you are an African, you hear me? Nonsense! Nonsensical nonsense!! Imagine! I will not see peace in my own house. And now, for the fifth time, I am once again jobless…
NATASHA: (shocked) What? Say that again. You are what?
BOYO: Your lady friend whom you made me work for has fired me just a few hours ago.
NATASHA: For what?
BOYO: Not succumbing to her lecherous desires.
NATASHA: (unmoved) Why?
BOYO: Because I am a faithful husband.
NATASHA: (rudely) Faithful my foot, Boyd!!
BOYO: Oh God, how many times will I tell you that I am not Boyd any longer but…
NATASHA: You are very, very stupid. Stupid and ungrateful. Even I that came down to your country from England five years ago, I know this country better than you do yourself. I helped you to get a job like a good wife should. Instead of sticking to it at all costs, you were busy being the faithful husband. Nonsense! You did not even comment on my dressing. (gets up and displays her clothes)
BOYO: (looks at her from head to toe) Now that you’ve mentioned it, you look very pre-Chaucerian.
NATASHA: You are mad, very mad, Boyd!
BOYO: Look here, I am not Boyd!
NATASHA: You are very mental upstairs! How dare you call me pre-Chaucerian!
BOYO: Ehe! You see? Truth is bitter! And look! (points to her platform shoes) You even want to make sure that you become taller than me by all means. Humph! That completes it.
NATASHA: Me, pre-Chaucerian? Imagine! Where do you think I get us our eating-out money? How do you think I got us a roof over our heads? So, you thought I was just folding my arms and being as faithful as you are, shebi? One has to make a name before the world comes to an end.
BOYO: (gets up, looks at her with his jaw dropped and holds his head in utter astonishment) Chei! This is real mbombom opener, o! Totally cock-and-bull! (attacks her with slaps, which she unsuccessfully dodges) So I brought you to Nigeria for you to mess around with men. Kai! You’ve just crippled my manhood. (backs away from her) Not even boiled unripe pawpaw leaves can cure the sickness I now have for you, Natasha. (shakes his head) It hurts like brand new shoes. You are as useless as NEPA. I now regret marrying you.
NATASHA: (sobs) I cannot stand this arid life anymore! I just cannot!! (storms to the bedroom, almost tripping on the way with her platform shoes. She straightens herself, eyes him viciously and goes to the bedroom)
BOYO: (sarcastically) Goodbye, then. (sits down and stretches his tired body and yawns)
NATASHA: (comes out of the bedroom a while later with a suitcase and handbag and sobs) God! This is no home. This is merely a house I’m living in. Boyd, let me tell you something. This house and everything in it are my property. I have every right to sue for a divorce, which I intend to do once I get to my girlfriend’s place. I cannot bear to live under this roof with you. And also, I was pitying you because if I had driven you out of this house, you would have had no home to stay in. So when the divorce is going on, you had better sort out your property.
BOYO: (yawns again and laughs a little) Unfortunately, you happen to be the only property I have. (NATASHA eyes him and storms off. She trips and falls.) Eh, safe journey, you hear? (NATASHA ignores him, gets up, straightens herself and, with a high face, exits. BOYO yawns again and calls.) Bimbo! Bring my food! (BIMBO appears with a glass bowl of food, a plate and spoon all on top of an iron tray. She gently removes the contents off the tray unto the dining table and starts to serve him. BOYO’S attention gradually focuses on her as she serves. He sweeps his eyes over her. BIMBO finishes serving and turns to go.) Bimbo.
BIMBO: (turns) Yes, sir?
BOYO: (sweeps his eyes over her again) When you have finished with your duties for today, come and see me in my bedroom.
BIMBO: (curtseys) Yes, sir. (She goes to the kitchen in wonderment. BOYO starts to eat his food.)
BOYO: (muses) If the desirable is not available, make the available desirable. (gradually smiles)
CURTAINS
Emmanuella Nduonofit, an ecrituralist, is an indigene of Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. She presently lives in Asaba and has previously been published in the Sentinel Nigeria Magazine.
