"Like I said, it's all about blending with the Nigerian accent and intonation because it's a Nigerian language. Now, to say 'I am tired,' in Pidgin English, you say, 'I don tire.'"
"I don tire,"Arthur, Jasmine, and Emlyn chorused in an American accent and we all laughed.
Within few minutes, we heard the sound of the door bell and I got up to find out who it was. I opened the door and it was Marz O'Neil! I couldn't breathe and I was greatly taken aback.
I meant to jam the door at his face being that I assumed he was around on behalf of Nicole and he was going to punish me for what I did, but the bodyguards all over him seemed like they would kill me if I tried anything funny.
"Are you Stephanie?"
"Yes-yes sir, I am."
"Well, can I come in so we can have a chat?"
I had no idea based on what was going on but I let him in.
Arthur, Jasmine, and Emlyn froze then screamed aloud in excitement on setting their eyes on the celebrity.
Jasmine made a faint charade and Arthur immediately pulled her back up. "Be cool Jas."
"Hey kids."
"What is he doing here?! OMG! I am going to explode!" Emlyn said.
Marz O'Neil smiled at his biggest fan, Emlyn and he sat on the sofa while the four of us whispered words of confusion to ourselves.
"What is he doing in your house?! I'm freaking out!" Said Jasmine
"Guys, do I need to offer him anything?"
"Well ask him," Arthur suggested.
I walked up to him and asked of him, what he would like to eat or drink 𝙡𝙞𝙠𝙚 𝙄 𝙝𝙖𝙙 𝙖𝙣𝙮𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙞𝙣 𝙢𝙮 𝙝𝙤𝙪𝙨𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙘𝙤𝙪𝙡𝙙 𝙨𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙨𝙛𝙮 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙊𝙡𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙑𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙮'𝙨 𝙩𝙤𝙥 𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙧, and he replied, "nothing, I'm good. I came here to talk to you. Are your parents home?"
"No, my Dad left for work."
"Okay. Sit down."
I sat down and gave the rest a sign to excuse us. "If you wanted to talk to me, why didn't you just send for me? Who am I that you should sit in my living room? Oh my gosh, I can't believe one of America's greatest celebrity is sitted with me in my living room!!!"
He smiled, "I just thought it would be much better if I visited you. So about Nicole... I am so sorry for all she did to you. I did my best raising her but she decided to go her own way. My sincere apologies for all the pain and misery she caused you and I'm glad that she's getting to feel the same way now now.She's learnt a valuable lesson.
I'm not here to dwell much on my daughter, everything that's happened doesn't even concern me. I just feel this urge in my spirit to help you."
"He-help me?" I adjusted forward on the couch.
"Yeah. I watched your videos, all of your videos online on how you re-created some movie scenes and all I saw was a great talent."
He took out his phone and pressed few buttons on it. "Come here, look at this," he said and I stared into his phone's screen and saw that most of the videos I and Arthur had made a long time ago, on account of the incident between I and Nicole, reached twenty million views on YouTube and more, not less than millions; and the video clip of our play in the school show day already reached ten million views. The videos kept going viral and the fight between I and Nicole was trending intensely.
It was a juicy drama so it had every reason to trend.
I couldn't think straight anymore or utter a single word; Marz O'Neil smiled at me. "Are you ready? Are you ready to become a movie star?"
"Yes! Oh my God, YES!!!"
"Due to how much your videos are trending, anything you wanna do now to execute your aspirations will be very easy. How would you like to hang out with Marz O'Neil?" He smiled again.
"Are you serious?!"
"Yeah. Get prepared and I'll give you a ride around the city." He arose
"A ride?! Can we come with? Please, please, please"
"Emlyn!"
"What? I could not have been able to avoid eavesdropping."
Arthur and Jasmine as well came out of hiding, grinning and waving.
"Alright. You and your friends can come along."
"Oh no! Why today? Why oh why? Why this day I decided to pick the worst of my clothes!" Jasmine lamented.
"Kids relax, we can go shopping and you'll get to change your clothes."
"It's Dy-no-mite!" Said Arthur
In almost no time, we were out and forthwith, we got surrounded by the press and paparazzi.
"Marz O'Neil, how do you feel about your daughter's misbehaviour?"
Marz O'Neil prevented the guards from stopping them as he stood to answer their persistent questions.
"Well, I feel a lot disappointed but I'm glad that things have turned out well and that this will teach her a very good lesson once and for all."
"Marz O'Neil, does Nicole's misbehaviour affect you in any way?"
"Well, she's my daughter so I've gotta be affected by what she does. Order than that, there's nothing else. I'm still the same ol' Marz O'Neil and her crime hasn't changed that."
"Marz, is this gonna put an end to your daughter's career?"
"If she wants it to. I mean, she could easily apologize to the little girl and everyone else and gain their approval then things might go back to normal. But it won't put an end to her career, I'm very sure of that."
"Mr Martin..."
I waved at the camera, childishly grinning, as the body guards blocked the way of the press and led us to the car. It was a black and classy Rolls-Royce.
All four of sat close to Marz O'Neil. It felt like we were going to explode in excitement!!! Emlyn was so close to losing his breath. 𝙊𝙛 𝙘𝙤𝙪𝙧𝙨𝙚.
We stopped at the biggest Mall in the city and we got some nice things and as well changed our outfit.
He then took us, me especially, to meet some of his friends; some of which were celebrities as well. I was more than honoured. It made me feel like I was having a long dream but I wasn't willing to wake up.
Each time I tried to respond to Marz O'Neil or his friends, I ended up stuttering or speaking childishly; I was too nervous to be cool.
The servants served mostly Chinese dishes-lo mien, sweet and sour pork fillet, yangzhou fried rice, and fish-flavoured shredded pork.
We ate to our satisfaction and had dessert.
Marz O'Neil notified me about his acting and music career and gave all four of us some of his published books for free.
He talked about how life was for him as an actor and a star; he told me the things I would need to head down that path.
"And mostly, it takes hardwork and practice. Keep building yourself, keep training, keep trying out new things, never relent."
It felt like my dreams were already coming true. I could not explain the rush of thrill inside of me.
I couldn't believe I spent the whole of my day with a big celebrity!
"Where is Nicole?" I finally asked.
"She's with her mother. Is something wrong?"
I hung a leg, "no."
"The bad part about being a celebrity, especially as a child is the pressure and the exposure. You'll get exposed to a lot of things that'll make you wanna misbehave and you'll feel the pressure to compromise. Nicole wasn't always like this... Though a broken home added to it."
"I know. I just... I wanna inspire the world. I'm so glad I went through what I went through, I learnt so much and I feel stronger. I feel it was all a process God was making me go through to teach me a remarkable lesson and equip me for my career, my purpose."
"You're such a smart young lady. Nice to see that you love God."
"Do you?"
"Oh yeah, sure. Okay don't make this an awkward sermon," he said and we both laughed.
✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆✮☆
"Goodnight kids"
"Goodnight Marz O'Neil. And thank you for your basketball, boots, green diamond, computer, hoodie, your books..."
He didn't let Emlyn finish, he replied, "Okay bye," and the guards shut the door.
"Heyyy, how come you get all the nice stuff?" Arthur asked.
"I'm his number one fan, duh."
"Well, at least I got some cool cash," Arthur took out some dollars from his back pocket and rubbed it all over Emlyn's face.
We were led to one of his cars and one of his drivers drove us home.
While the rest chattered loudly, I turned to the side window, leaned on it, and watched the view as the car moved with speed.
I felt a warm hand on mine and Emlyn asked, "What's wrong Steph?"
"Nothing. Just... I feel different, I feel totally different. Like what happened to me? All of this is just happening too fast. Suddenly, I turn bad, next thing I know, I'm getting into a fight with my celebrity bestie, next thing I know I'm having a meeting with a top celebrity and discussing my career, soon I'm to attend auditions and before you know it, I star in a movie and I'm out there."
"You sound like you're not pleased with all of this."
"I am... It's just happening so fast and I guess I'm nervous. I was so eager and desperate, now all I wanna do is just take things slow and wait."
"I don't give the best advice and I can't say for sure that I understand how you feel, all I can ask you to do is pour out your feelings to God in prayers"
"Thanks buddy" I reached out to him and we hugged. I then felt the warmth of more people; Arthur and Jasmine joined in.
"Oh we love you," said Jasmine.
"I love you guys so much."
"BFFs," said Emlyn.
"Don't worry, it's your story—whatever you want to happen will happen, just let God direct you and His will shall be done," said Arthur.
"It's literally her story," Said Jasmine. We all laughed and I wiped the tears in my eyes.