"That is the end of the will, Sir Michael. You can only have access to these properties when you give birth to your first child with a legal wife," The lawyer clarified getting Michael all worked up.
Before his father's demise,he had always envisioned how he would be in charge of all of his father's properties until certain barriers introduced themselves.
His eyes turned evidently red than that of a ripe scotch bonnet as he took steps closer to the lawyer, with no clear intentions as to what to do to him.
His tightened grip sent the wrong message to the Lawyer in the tiny office, getting the lawyer's eyes dilated while he staggered. "Ehm… Sir… what are you about to do to me? There is CCTV everywhere and it will reveal your true self to all the workers who already find you strange in this office"
The Lawyer found a way to convince him to leave before he hurts him and also reveal his identity. "I am…." Allowing his eyes to complete his unhinged heartbeat, Michael rushed out of his office letting the door slam without relaying explicitly.
While he walked down the sixth floor's corridor of the building, people avoided him such that they made for him a long line of passage with no hindrance.
Oblivious to what workers in the biggest law firm in the country owned by his father did, Michael had different thoughts running through his mind, "what do I do now? I am not about to be married to a stranger all for the sake of properties. What step should I take next? If I abandon this for too long, it goes to that cousin of mine? Nooo….. Never.
He will squander it all and still not give me ease of access to my mother's whereabouts. This is the only access to where my mother is. I need to speak with Tyler, he is the only one who will be willing to sacrifice his time for this," That conclusion made him calm as he sat inside his car.
He drove home with the mindset that Tyler would help find just about anyone good to carry a child for him and he can have access to all his father's properties in due time.
He suddenly craved cake and wine, contriving him to go down to the nearest store, he reminisced on the times that he had to learn to let go of his freedom based on his father's inferences.
His father had called him in the past "Michael, all of this will be yours if you grow up to be strong enough to not let anyone stand in your way and go against you. You can not afford to be weak and vulnerable. No one must have the power to overcome you through any weaknesses. Always cover that loophole, never let anything slide" His father's direction was encapsulated in those sentences repeatedly.
Michael grew up to be fearless, inaccessible and uncommunicative delivering a succinct expression to anyone who comes across him both in his father's world and his. His father's death took a toll on him. He wanted to forgive his father but he couldn't after a very discriminatory incident between his father and him.
He had caught his father with his fiance in his office two years ago, Before which he had been told by his father, the information at a very young age that his mother left to be with her lover. He had to live like she never existed, and he had to never allow his cousins to have access to his thoughts, flaws, worries and heart.
Although he seemed lonely, he placed his trust on only his childhood friend,Tyler and his father in the whole world. He never could accept the torment that came with his father's betrayal.
He still remembers her laps wrapped around his waist with his father's arm locking her from behind, the brittle knees of his father leaning against his curvy woman on red heels, and the condescending look his father's glance threw at him to leave.
He vowed to never fall in love, give his being to anyone else and entertain his father's advice until his life ends. The news of his father's death got to him two years after he left. Although he was sad about it, he almost celebrated his permanent freedom until the lawyer displayed a hint of clearance about his mother's whereabouts that had been hidden by his father for 17 whole years through the letter In a brown envelope. Only to rush back to his father's city to be given an ultimatum to get a lady pregnant to get the whole information he needs about his mother.
"I wish I could just suck the living information out of that lawyer. Just how can he be loyal to that kind of monster?" Michael felt he had that in mind while he parked his car in front of the supermarket but Tyler had picked his call and listened to those words. "What happened with the lawyer? Which monster is he loyal to? Your father?" Tyler's voice through the car's speaker made Michael shudder back to reality.
"Oh my! I forgot I have been dialing yours all these while. I kept my mind occupied." Michael responded. "I am sure wherever you are parked is exactly a place you mostly frequent, else there is no way you wouldn't have missed with all the absence of mind you have proven" Tyler sighed and continued whilst contacting his house help to prepare a cold bath for Michael.
"So answer my question, who is the monster? What happened at the lawyer's office today?" "I am at the supermarket close to yours. I just want to get my usual after which i will head down to yours, bear with me till then" Michael cut the call without allowing a response. He knows Tyler won't let him off that easily without an extra instigation.
Michael had a frown on his face when he saw the queue at the supermarket. He rushed down the store to order his favorite "Angel food cake" and picked 10 of his favorite wines in the store rack designed for only wines and gins. He placed 10 different wines he wanted into his cart before waiting back for his cake.
......…...............................
Michelle woke up from a painful sleep. Still lying on her bed, she kept staring at the ceiling and trying to choose between getting up to wash her clothes since there is power or just lying still on her bed.
A cry from her street came at her so disturbing that she had to crane her neck moving her eyes back and forth with her fingers placed at the tip of the window to see if the cry was nearby and if the kid could be identified.
"Was it all in my head? Why did I hear it so clearly yet I didn't see a thing?" Michelle wondered when she saw nothing but a street so dry with no single human strolling like it had just been swept by a machine with a sign post warning commuters to not go through that route to observe strict cleanliness."
She ignored the subliminal matter, placing focus on her craving for something cold and "water" was the cheapest thing she could afford as she has loads of that in her refrigerator and wouldn't have to get that with extra expenses.
Going down the stairs, she recalled how much she hated the stairs when her parents were still alive for fear of walking into arguments by her parents in their former house. She watched her parents who were so lovey-dovey fall out of love day after day as they struggled with the impending financial crisis which finally hit them and led to their untimely death. They died from heart attack and depression.
She figured they left her this old mansion after a will filled with their incurring debts to console her and also relay why they couldn't help further her education to the master's level and give her the life they had always promised to give her.
Michelle took an iced bottled water, tried to dissolve it when a message from her ex, Darius came in. To her, it was one of the least expected things that came to her so shockingly. His message was filled with intentions to do right by her if given another chance but she denied him that immediately hoping to never need to revisit the situation or set things straight face-to-face.
Michelle took a seat, stared at the antique design of artworks with the white cloth used to preserve it slightly from coverage giving out what painting it might be. She gulped down the cold water after successfully dissolving while the vivid picture of her mother painting across the room while she ran around with Darius as a kid flashed through her mind.
She thought Darius to be her one and only match forever bearing in mind that they chose each other from a very young age in
Primary School. Notwithstanding the fact that their parents were never best of friends, they still never opposed her and Darius' relationship.
The sole and clear factor as to why they broke up three years ago and never got back together was evidently based on the fact that her parents died leaving her with no substantial inheritance and Darius feels he should be with a person who could boost his financial stance not a person who will drag him down his accrued finances embodying his status.
Darius took that as an augur to end their five years long relationship and moved in with his present fiancee. Michelle stopped sipping from the untenanted bottle. She rapidly shook back to reality after getting his second message:
"I am sorry for not standing by you during times you needed me. I just could not ignore the fact that I needed extra help with my parents other than someone extra to help. I should have told you this earlier when your parents fell into a financial crisis and it became evident to outsiders but I pretended to not know hoping it would be fixed soon. I really want you back in my life and will be coming down to visit you in six days. XOXO." Half of Michelle's upper lip tightened up, her head tilted back, she dropped her phone on the table in disgust failing to further entertain his shenanigans.
She went straight to her room to arrange her suit for the second stage of the interview she would be undergoing in a few days. She had only those interviews as her hope for future survival. She figured she needed to get some other accessories at the supermarket downtown. She combed through her bag for her purse then finally set out in a pair of jeans and hoodie.
Knowing how far the supermarket is to her place, she was worried about not getting the hair accessory she would be needing to look more professional at the interview. At the supermarket, she almost turned back because of the queue filled with both the old and the young but stayed when she spotted from afar the hair accessory she came all the way for.
She walked down with her hands in the front kangaroo pocket of her hoodie and her head covered with the hood. She sighted a young man with an attractive side profile and milky brown skin in short sleeve suits Two piece with half of his lower left arm tattooed picking different wines with so much clarity. She found only his side profile and tattooed arms attractive that she gulped down saliva a few times at how uncomfortable and uncontrollably affected she was at him in sight.
Just about to turn her face away from him, Michelle saw his wallet drop on the floor while he removed a key from his pocket. Not knowing how to call for him, Michelle rushed to help him pick up his wallet and followed him quietly around the store to get a quick view of how cute she surprisingly finds him before giving back his wallet.
To her, anyone who had followed him from the wine rack to the cake's could see clearly that the wine was his congenial company. Although his eyes are fixated on what he is about in the store, Michael could sense a person in a hoodie following him but he chose to let the person be whilst he zero in on how he wants his cake to be carefully and neatly packed.