Vanity's Mirage

This is a true story but the names and locations have been changed to protect identities...plus I don't have enough money to withstand a lawsuit lol!

Now this is my first attempt at blogging and I come from a background of constant online chatting and emailing so if u see 'nd' it means 'and', '4' is 'for'...u get the picture.

Okay it starts with a girl, we'll call her Rita, I never knew Rita personally but I always had this idea of the kind of girl she was in my head. In my own little world I saw Rita as a spoilt, slutty, Daddy's girl. She wore the designer clothes, the gleaming shades, the killer handbag nd the shoes to match. Rita could never be seen chatting with the Nerds or the socially impotent, Never! If it wasn't the guy with the biggest car it was the guy with the biggest pocket and these were only substituted by the guys with enough guts to initiate a conversation, I didn't have such guts. I'd never heard her voice and kept my distance I thought "Well, I no reach dem so why should I even bother". Sometimes I'd be chatting with a bunch of friends and her name would come up, automatically I'd tune the rest of the conversation out. I'd have my own lil' conevrsation in my head, "Rita is just a baaadddd girl!, I bet she sleeps with all those guys I see her with, plus she has to be an Aristo'. Just by looking at her you'll know, all dat money and you say it's her Popsy who gave her?...Rubbish!. I bet she'll do anything for an LV bag".

By the time I was done my friends would have changed the topic and it usually meant they were talking about another girl. One name always echoed in my head when they mentioned it and that was Pamela. Pamela was God's gift to mankind. Like Rita I didn't know Pamela personally but I saw her as what I call "Wifey material". Calm, composed, intelligent, sweet and a true lady, whever she walked by Guys never stared for too long, not because she was unsightly far from it but out of respect. I hated not knowing her and felt proud not being associated with Rita. "If all girls wer like Pamela we would still be in the graden of Eden" I said to my friends one day. They all agreed and bear in mind none of us knew any of these girls personally.

I remember one day I stood in a queue waiting for the evening bus and behind me stood Pamela, I felt numbed by her presence. Her hair spelt like vanilla and the gentle breeze that evening didn't help by blowing the scent towards me. We got on the bus and I sat behind her, a seat I thanked the lord for blessing me with. The bus drove past a group of parked cars and I spotted Rita, ostentatious as always locking her posh car and tossing the keys into her designer bag. I hissed, not to loud but loud enough for Pamela to hear. She turned, I bowed my head "Mugu she is looking at you, maybe na b'cos I hiss, dullin guy look at her jo!" I looked up and saw Pamela staring at me with a smile on her face. I smiled back and within 5 minutes we were sitting beside each other joking about trivial things and having a laugh. She said she was going down to the library, "What a serious girl" I thought. She asked me to join her, I said I had no books with me, she said it was a Library and we both laughed.

We'd been sitting beside each other for almost 30 minutes, an occasional comment would trigger a giggle between us but our silence said it all. She flipped through her notes and scribbled on a blank page, tore it out and handed it to me. I opened it and there, scribbled in blue ink, in the most beautiful hand writing I'd ever seen were the words "I kinda like you". It had taken me approximately 1 hour and 22minutes to get my future wife to tell me she liked me "another hr and we'll be walking down the aisle" I said to myself jokingly. She stood up and asked me to help her get a book she always used for her coursework but was always on the top shelf. We walked, her in front, to the back row of the book shelves and in between two shelves. She pointed at a red cover book and I stood on my toes to retrieve it....and then the most humble, homely girl on campus grabbed my nyash! The act was so sudden that I nearly screamed. I stared at her puzzled and she immediately grabbed my neck and planted the wettest most cherry flavoured thing I'd ever tasted on my lips. I wanted to continue, never stop, but this was Pamela, Wifey material, good girl Pamela. I pulled away confused and reluctant and then She whispered to me in the most angelic of voices "If your scared someone might hear us don't worry, nobody ever comes back here, trust me I know". I wanted to do this, she'd already left a sweet aftertaste in my mouth, "Don't dull o!..is it your first time? don't worry I'll be gentle" she said again but I couldn't, I was too confused to function in the way she wanted me to and so I ran. I ran out of the Library and straight to my room. I lay on my bed thinking, what had just happened? I asked myself. Pamela?....how can. I asked my self this question for 3 years and the words "trust me I know" echoed in my ears everytime.

Graduation day, I sat in my gown staring at my certificate. I'd done my best no doubt and now it was time to face the big bad world. We'd been making fun of a guy who fell down while climbing the stage to receive his certificate. It was time for the Merit awards and The Chancellor announced that a very special award was to be given. The award was for a student who had shown exceptional character and academic excellence while at the University. I wondered who it would be "so many names came to mind, even Pamela's" We all sat back waiting to hear who it was.

"We have decided to announce this first unlike our tradition because we feel this student has always been in the fore-front of all her colleagues...and ladies first"

The congregation laughed.

"And the award for Best student graduating set 08 is Miss Nkechi R. Tunde-Martins"

We all clapped, I turnerd to my friends and asked who it was but they couldn't hear me over the loud cheers coming from all present, I clapped nonetheless. From the aisle adjacent to ours I saw the recipient, she walked towards the stage and I clapped even harder as she got closer . I hadn't recognised her while she approached the stage and was a bit curious but the large videoscreen above turned my curiosity to confusion. "Nkechi R. Tunde-Martins?" I muttered to myself...."Rita!" I said as I stopped clapping and turned to my friends asking if it was he same person we all knew. They next 15 minutes saw me go from confused to amazed to foolish as my friends elaborated to me how Rita had been a First-class student from Year 1 and the Class represenaive of her course. She was the daughter of a widow whose husband and willed everything to her and her 4 brothers all of whom were students at the University. "Her brothers? The ones we see talking to her and driving around in those big cars?" I asked "of course" they replied, "Did u think they were her boyfriends?" They all laughed and I joined in not for the same reason but as a facade to cover my overwhelming guilt and foolishness. Vanity had played a trick on me, just like a mirage.