BELLA'S MEMOIRS (ENTRY #31)

EMOTIONAL OUTBURST

It was now a full-fledged war. After the Vice President’s exit, we had all retreated to The Duchess’s home in Park View. Yinka and Toni had also left our hideout. Yinka’s primary concern was ensuring that Toni was safe because he was sure his father was about to launch a full frontal attack on my family and he did not want Toni to get caught in the crossfires. He was going to take her to the UK to be with her mother who also happened to be my grandfather’s mistress. My stepmom had also called her father Chief Badmus who was also pretty powerful with the hope that he could help and I had taken the initiative to call Aunt Linda who turned up with her husband Senator Okonkwo, Okechukwu’s older brother.

The Duchess: Who invited this man to my home?

The Duchess asked as soon as she spotted Senator Okonkwo.

Me: I did grandma.

The Duchess: You are not welcome here please leave!

She said to Senator Okonkwo with so much venom I was embarrassed. I was about to speak but my stepmom took the initiative

Ms. A: With all due respect ma, I suggest we all put aside our differences and face the issue before us.

The Duchess: What do you mean by that? This man threatened me and my family and he was invited into my home without my consent. If not for him and his good for nothing brother, we would not be in this mess in the first place.

Senator Okonkwo: Are you going to blame me and my brother for the poison in your family? You are a brood of vipers and had Okechukwu listened to me, he would be walking about as a free man instead of being locked up in jail for a crime I know he never committed.

The Duchess: I don’t blame you, I blame Anjola who brought you into our lives in the first place.

My Daddy: Please leave my wife out of this mother! It’s not her fault that Bella took a liking to Okechukwu.

I couldn’t bear it anymore all the anger buried inside me came pouring out.

Me: So in short it is my fault isn’t it? It is all my fault because like every other young woman in the world, I met a young man and fell in love with him but because I belong to a family of liars, pretenders and greedy schemers what should have been an innocent love story has become a national crisis! Just look at yourselves all of you! Starting from the person that should be the patriarch of this family! Grandpa! You couldn’t control your wife or put your family in order so you found a means of escape in the arms of another woman for decades and then when the same wife found out about this woman you shipped her off to the UK to hide her and then decades later when you finally didn’t need the money and power that came with being with The Duchess you left her and ran away with your tail between your legs to meet your lover in the UK. Now you are back in the middle of a crisis and you have not proffered one single solution all you do is show up with no game up your sleeves.

And you grandma! AKA The Duchess! You have just revealed that you can take a beggar off the streets and dress him like a king but he will still behave like a beggar. You may have grown up in affluence and abundance but you are always so scared of being poor and irrelevant that you would sacrifice anything to remain powerful. You would trade your marriage, your children’s happiness…anything for people to continue to validate you as The Duchess of Park View how pathetic you are! I wonder what you would be remembered for and what legacy you intend to leave behind.

And as for you…. Daddy! You came into my life when I needed you the most and I was so happy that I had a family again but it has been such a disappointing ride quite frankly. I look to you for direction and protection but every time all you do is echo grandma’s words and wait for her to fix everything for you. The only time you stand up to her is when it comes to your wife and that is because you feel a compelling need to continue to show your wife you are the man for her. She is the daughter of a billionaire and after the Vice President does whatever he intends to do, she may very well become wealthier than you by virtue of her background so admit that you have once again let her down and fix it instead of running around like a lost puppy.

And dear Stepmom, you have been like an older sister to me and I appreciate all you have done for me but come on when will you learn to do what makes you happy? Do you even want to be first lady of Lagos State? Your husband was instructed by his mother to run for office and you jumped on the bandwagon and resumed at his side campaigning like the good wife when you know fully well that this appointment is the beginning of the end of the man you married. He will never be your TK again after his first day in office and you know this but you will never speak up. You would rather stay by his side and watch him ruin himself than stand up to him or his mother. You only speak up when it doesn’t matter. You have the same rights in this marriage as him, if you love him be his partner not just his wife!

And for you Senator Okonkwo and Aunt Linda, I am sorry you have been dragged into this toxic situation but frankly speaking you have no moral justification to talk down on my family. You used your younger brother to clean up a mess you created, you robbed him of so many opportunities by that singular act and everything you have done to help him since he was arrested has been more to appease your conscience than to help him. If you really loved him, you would have made sure he had stayed in school and gotten a degree instead of sending him on criminal missions. You will address my family with courtesy and if you cannot do so, I am afraid I would have no choice but to ask you to leave.

Let this be a note of warning to all of you that if anyone stands in the way of getting Okechukwu acquainted, I will make it my personal responsibility to ensure that the person is taken care of. This is so shameful! We are all here bickering when a young man’s life and future is about to be cut short because of stupid mistakes that all of us here…myself inclusive have made. I will get him out of there in forty-eight hours with or without your help. Mark my words!

The room was so silent; I could hear my own heartbeat. I was surprised at my own outburst but considering all that was going on I knew someone had to take charge of the situation and so far no one was showing they had any intentions of doing so.

Chief Badmus my stepmom’s father broke the silence

Chief Badmus: Well you all heard the lady! Let’s get to work. We have forty-eight hours to free Okechukwu what’s the plan?

The room remained quiet. Obviously, I had hurt a lot of feelings with my words. I had to apologize.

Me: I am sorry if I was rude. I…

My grandfather interrupted my apology as if to say it wasn’t necessary.

 I have direct access to the Chief Justice of the federation. We need to go to him and make a formal accusation against the Vice President.

My Daddy: Dad, no one will touch the Vice President and you know it. If anything, I may be picked up by the police very soon for questioning. We don’t have time.

Chief Badmus: But the Vice President has not made any move. Let’s wait and see what he does first or we may start something we cannot finish.

The Duchess: When you know your city walls are not strong enough, you cannot wait for the war to be brought to you. You have to take the war to the enemy’s camp otherwise they come into your territory and destroy everything. When you take the war to them, even if you lose, you destroy their land not yours.

Me: What are you trying to say grandma?

The Duchess: We take the war to the Vice President. We draw the first blood, push him, and make him mad. We have to force a reaction, waiting for him to react makes us sitting ducks.

My Daddy: You do realize that for now I am still a member of his political party and the Governor elect of Lagos state. Anything I do will affect not only me but the entire party.

The Duchess: My point exactly, a house divided against itself cannot stand. I knew this would happen someday. I knew the Vice President would require something of me that I could not give and so I have been gathering my own ammunition. He has enemies, people he has double crossed, betrayed, cheated. I will use them one by one to take him on the journey of his life.

My grandfather spoke…

You know what this means for you Adenike? Don’t you?

The Duchess: I lose everything. I know but so would he. We have agreed to go to war and so we must all be ready to face what comes with war. There are prices to be paid and some people would be casualties of the war. Starting with you Adetokunboh, you will not wait for the police to come and get you. You will call a press release and you will validate the claims made by the gossip blog about your past and you will force your party to react.

Ms. A: He would be arrested!

The Duchess: That’s the same fate that Okechukwu endured on account of this family and to the best of our knowledge he is still alive. So I am sure Adetokunboh can handle incarceration for a while if it comes to that. Besides do you honestly think the party would watch you go down and ruin their credibility with the electorate? If there is a rerun because of this, the opposition would definitely win. So trust me as soon as you conclude that press release you will be buying yourself immunity because there would be people waiting to clean up your mess.

Chief Badmus: I’m afraid your mother is right Adetokunboh. You have to make a public declaration on this issue. Either to validate or refute the claims.

Ms. A: We have to have a damage control plan. Immediately he makes the statement we have to start fixing it.

Me: I have an idea. Okechukwu’s business partner. He is a PR guru and we can trust him. I can let him know what we are planning and get him to talk to all his media contacts to get the issue trending. That way it would get attention and we can start influencing people to see that a governor elect admitting to his past indiscretions is actually a sign of good leadership especially because he has made amends.

The Duchess: Are you sure you can trust this guy?

Me: Yes, we can. He would do anything for Okechukwu.

The Duchess: Great! Then get him on board.

My Daddy: What happens next? After my confession what next?

The Duchess: We light a bigger fire. We make the confession recording get to the president and threaten to leak it if he doesn’t order the immediate release of Okechukwu. Your public statement to the would make them know we are not bluffing and are ready to fight dirty.

Me: If that recording leaks immediately after Daddy’s confession, it would ruin the party.

The Duchess: That’s the point of this whole thing. We have to get the President’s attention and we can’t do that unless the entire party is in jeopardy.

Senator Okonkwo: You know I am a member of the opposition party and my brother is a major player in all of this, the president may not be willing to let him go, he may see it as conceding to the opposition.

The Duchess: I am well aware that you are a member of the opposition party Senator Okonkwo. That is why this is a major threat to the presidency. If anything happens to Okechukwu while he is in detention, he would have given your party enough ammunition to cause him bad press that he doesn’t need.

My Daddy: I think this sounds like a plan.

The Duchess: Can we set the ball rolling so we can have Bella’s Okechukwu out in forty-eight hours?

The general consensus around the room was yes. For the first time in so long, things were looking up and I was going to see my Okechukwu again. Yes, we had a plan, but I have come to realize things never turn out exactly the way you planned. I knew there would be casualties in the war as The Duchess had said and I could only wonder who exactly those causalities would be.