LOVE AND SEX IN THE CITY (Episode 40)

“Wait o, how come none of us are in Jonathan’s groom’s train?” Eddie observed very belatedly as we filed into a pew toward the end of the church, very fashionably late for our friend’s wedding ceremony.

The bride wasn’t here yet, but the church was almost filled with wedding guests, everyone constituting a wide splash of vibrant colours in the innate somberness of the church’s interior. A standing fan burred close to the pew upon which we were settling, and a bevy of young women wearing headscarves that stretched stiffly skyward chattered with hushed exuberance on the seat in front of us.

“Well, I don’t know about you,” I said, “but he asked me.”

“And me,” said Adebola, as he secured his sunglasses above his forehead.

“Me too,” Biola said as he settled down and proceeded to look haughtily bored with his environment.

Eddie arched his brows in surprised question at us. “And you three are not up there because?”

“Well, I’m much too cynical about weddings and marriage to dress up and share the spotlight with the bride and groom,” I said matter-of-factly.

“You mean you didn’t want your spirit husband to spot you all suited up and mistake you for the groom, cheating on him with an earthly bride,” Yinka quipped.

“That too,” I concurred with a grin.

“What about you, Adebola?” Eddie asked. “What was your excuse?”

“I’m in fashion, darling,” Adebola drawled. “We don’t like being mandated to wear matching outfits to events.”

A ripple of laughter broke out amongst us, causing three of the girls in front of us to turn and stare momentarily at us. There was slight reproof in their stares.

When Eddie turned his questioning look to Biola, he answered, “Well, I was going to say yes. Then I asked Jonathan who the other groomsmen would be, and he said ‘my other friends.’”

“Ah, yes.” Ekene chortled as he turned to glance at the front of the church. “His other friends.”

“The straight gay club,” the rest of us said in amused unison.

Ahead of us, clustered around Jonathan and standing close to the altar, were five other young men, all somberly dressed in well-tailored dark suits, relieved with pink-coloured kerchiefs neatly folded and peeking out of their breast pockets.

“Pink,” Yinka observed with a chuckle. “Nice touch. Who came up with that one?”

“Jonathan,” Adebola answered. He’d been involved with the clothing arrangements of the groom’s department.

“Our dear boy truly is gay then,” Ekene gushed. “I was starting to fear for his homosexual soul.”

“The pocket squares and the colour is a projection of his fashion sense, not a statement of his gayness,” Adebola said primly.

“Yes, because fashion and gay are so not mutually exclusive,” I retorted with a smile, drawing laughs from the others.

“Hmm, but these his straight gay friends are sha not bad-looking at all,” Eddie said, still staring ahead.

His words drew our attention back to the front of the church. I could make out the lanky figure of Uzoma, the only one of Jonathan’s other friends that I was familiar with. He stood a head taller than the rest; his hair was coiffed into tiny dreadlocks that stood up like spikes.

“That one looks fuckable,” Paschal said, pointing at the light-skinned groomsman whose supple plumpness was evident in how snugly his outfit fit his body.

“I don’t think you’d be fucking anyone of them anytime soon,” I said with a chuckle.

“Why not?”

“Those faggots are so straight, they wouldn’t know how to bend over and spread their ass cheeks if their lives depended on it,” Biola answered caustically. As we laughed, he continued, “And that’s what annoys me about them – their internalized homophobia. The whole lot of them. When I realized they were the ones making up Jonathan’s groomsmen, I jejely declined. I don’t have the energy to be among them and be detesting them, when I should be wearing a smile and stealing the spotlight from the bride and groom.”

“They can’t be that bad,” Eddie said, sizing up the groomsmen with that familiar look of hunger that told me he’d be on the hunt the moment this ceremony was over.

“Oh they are,” I said to him. “Uzoma – that tall one with the craze-man hairstyle – one time awhile back, while I was with him and Jonathan, he was sneering up and down at your blog, all but saying that it is too gay to exist on the internet.”

“What!” Eddie instantly bridled.

This time, two of the girls in front turned to look reprovingly at us. I found myself thinking about how our conversation wasn’t exactly hushed. The minds of the girls must be churning with gossip about us that they’d dispense amongst themselves once they got a moment away from us. I chuckled at the thought, dismissing it and them as I refocused on Adebola, who was speaking.

“…that one started acting all pissy oh, when Jonathan suggested the pocket squares to be pink.” Adebola gestured fleetingly at another groomsman, handsome and dark, and standing closest to the one I supposed was Jonathan’s best man. “He suggested blue, said pink was too loud. Feeling confrontational, I asked him to say what he truly meant. He told me to mind my business. I told him the clothes he’d be wearing on the wedding day was my business. Jonathan intervened before I could scatter my weave-on at the fucker.”

“Well, they’re a bunch of good-looking men,” Eddie said, back to admiration. “I don’t want to marry them. I just want to shag one of them.”

“Hoe,” Ekene said, grinning.

“Well, a guy’s gotta hoe around to find his prince,” Eddie rejoined. “That best man, for example –”

“Hey, remove your predatory eyes from the best man,” Ekene interjected. “I’ve been eyeing him for Declan.”

“For me?” I lifted my brows at him.

“Yes. He’s gorgeous. And you need a gorgeous pikin to get over Bryson. It’s been a week since your breakup. It’s time for you to get back on the saddle.”

“If the saddle is of the ‘wham, bam, thanks dick’ variety, then yea, giddyup,” I replied.

“Oh my God.” Yinka gave an exaggerated gasp. “What has happened to my dear, dear friend who didn’t subscribe to random hook-ups?”

“He went and got his heart broken,” I returned.

“And your solution is to go on a fucking spree?”

“Why settle for one unreliable dick when it could be raining men for you?”

“Preach, sister!” Biola hollered in a low tone. “Preach!”

“Oh this is sad,” Ekene groaned. “The day Declan said something to make Biola his disciple is that day Jesus talked about as the beginning of the end.”

Just then, there was stir at the entrance of the church. A number of people seated on the outmost pews turned to take in the bustle of the bridal procession, as the females prepared to start their trip down the aisle. I spotted Chidimma, radiant in white, amidst the flurry; she was standing next to a stately, gray-haired man who I suspected was the uncle her family had asked to give her away. Her father was long since deceased.

A hush tided down the church as more of those inside realized that the bride had arrived. I glanced quickly at the front to see Jonathan and his crew straightening out into position. Somewhere out of sight, an organist began working the keys of his instrument, and the soulful strains of ‘Here Comes The Bride’ rose and filled the entire church, prompting everyone to their feet.

I watched as two, fresh-faced little girls with gap-toothed grins pattered down with that lack of grace that was inherent in children in a restrained hurry to get to their destination; their chubby hands fluttered about, scattering petals on the aisle.

“Aww, they look so adorable.” Ekene was misty-eyed.

“Does Moses know that your biological clock has started ticking?” I sniped.

He smacked my arm.

The bridesmaids sashayed past us next, with the Maid of Honour bringing up the rear.

“Chidimma had mercy on her bridal train sha,” Adebola said as he swept a critical look over the stylish and filmy pink-and-blue creations the bridesmaids were clad in. “She didn’t make them wear hideous punishments every bride is expected to visit on her girls.”

And then, the bride, with one hand tucked into the crook of her uncle’s arm, started down the aisle. She looked beautiful. Her gown cascaded down her supple figure with an undertone of silver in the full skirts which made it shimmer as she moved. There was soft tulle to frame her neck, cover her shoulders and drop down over her face. Her uncle beamed next to her, evidently pleased to be part of this moment.

The music accompanied them to the front of the church, where it ceased as the priest drew close and the guests proceeded to get seated.

“Dearly beloved,” the rich solemnity of the priest’s voice was magnified by the mic in his hand, “we are gathered here to celebrate the union between Chidimma Irene Anene and Chidiebere Jonathan Kechere…”

***

One of Flavour’s generic hit tracks was pounding through the loudspeakers in the vast reception hall, its highlife beat heightening the tempo of the gyrating bodies of the bride and groom on the makeshift dance floor at the forefront of the hall, and that of the guests milling around them. The cheers rose and fell as Chidimma shimmied this way and that, clearly beating her lead-footed new husband in the dance-off. Naira notes dribbled down on the couple from hands stretched out over their heads, dropping to the ground to disappear moments later into the nylons that a couple of ushers had in their hands as they worked feverishly through the crush of bodies and stomping legs.

“This one na serious ebe ngwori,” Ekene smirked.

“This is so typical and tasteless,” Biola sneered. “If I do get married, there won’t be any of this nonsense where people would be throwing money about like it’s going out of style.”

“You’re considering marriage too?” Eddie queried.

“I said ‘if’, Edidiong. Don’t get on my case please.”

Four of us had taken a quick walk out of the reception premises for some air outside minutes earlier, leaving Adebola, Paschal and Yinka behind at our table. We were back now, standing at one of the hall’s entrances and taking in the ongoing hubbub inside.

“Besides, Eddie,” Ekene said, “Biola could easily be talking about his wedding to his fellow man.” The smirk was still on his face.

“People won’t be throwing money at him and his newlywed husband in that case,” Eddie replied. “They’d be throwing stones.”

We laughed.

Biola and Eddie continued into the hall, just as Ekene spotted someone and began enthusiastically waving him over. I watched a stockily-built man with a buttoned-up appearance detach himself from the crowd and make for us.

“Who is that?”

“Jackson,” Ekene answered. “He’s a colleague of Moses. I had no idea he’s connected to this wedding.”

“Is he…”

“Yes, he is,” Ekene answered the unfinished question. “A late bloomer though, according to Moses. A little staid, but an okay guy.” Suddenly he turned his bright eyes to me. “And he’s perfect for you.”

“You mean as the first guy on my rebound fuckfest list?”

“Come on, Dee, don’t be sounding like that.”

“I’m sorry, Ekene. But I just don’t think I’m cut out for any more steady relationships.”

“It’s just your grief talking. Give it some time. Let a good man heal you. A good man like – Oh, hey! Jackson – hi!”

The man had come to stand before us, and the three of us promptly exchanged handshakes as Ekene made the introductions.

“Are you here for the bride or groom?” he asked, speaking to Ekene after a flashing a quick look of interest my way.

“The groom,” Ekene said. “What about you?”

“The bride. We’re related.”

“Awesome. So you and I are now twice in-laws of sorts.”

“Are you related to the groom?”

“No, we’re friends. Best friends actually.”

“And what is the other way you two are in-laws of sorts?” I asked.

Ekene chuckled. Jackson ducked his head as though embarrassed by the potential answer.

Such abashedness, I thought. It made him look gauche. He seemed like the kind of guy whose pants you’d have to unzip and dick you’d have in your mouth before he’d get around to understanding that this was sex and it was happening. My interest in him waned.

“Well?” I urged.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Ekene said. “Jackson’s very close to Moses, and whenever we meet at Moses’ place, he teasingly calls me ‘my brother’s wife’.”

“Ah,” I said simply.

“So, Jackson,” Ekene began, his matchmaker mode on full throttle, “my friend here is single. You’re single too. You two should totally get together and set off some sparks.”

The only sparks anyone would be setting off with this guy would be the one from the quick getaway he’d be making, I thought uncharitably as I turned on a smile at the man.

“Oh really?” he said, his eyes shining. “Well, nice to meet you again, Declan.”

“Same here.”

“Perhaps we can meet up sometime this week and get to know each other better…”

The temptation was too strong, and I simply couldn’t resist. I didn’t want to. My smile widened, and the devilry that sparked in my eyes made Ekene eye me with sudden wariness, as though he suspected my response was going to be bad.

It was.

“Sure, Jackson,” I said with as much sultriness as I could muster. “And after that, it’d be your place or mine, where we’d proceed to rip our clothes off each other, and you’d slap my ass open, and stick your rock-hard dick inside and fuck me till the trumpet sounds.”

A moment elapsed as the man’s eyes bugged at me, astonishment replete on his face. I’d earlier pegged him for a prude, and he reacted the way I knew he would to my obscenity. His eyes grew stormy, and his awkwardness vanished, to be replaced by affront.

“How dare you talk to me like that!” he sputtered. “What kind of ashawo are you? Ekene” – he jerked his fulminating glare at my friend – “you really should watch the kind of company you keep!”

And he pivoted and stomped off.

“Wait, Jackson!” Ekene shot me a very exasperated ‘What am I going to do with you’ look, before hurrying off to placate his in-law-of-sorts.

I gave out a quiet laugh as I watched their retreating backs, and shook my head slightly. Ekene was my dear, sweet friend, but he’d be wise to stay out of my love life. Especially now, not so soon after Bryson. The memory of my ex-boyfriend wasn’t even a scar yet; the bleeding had stopped, but the bruise was still there, angry and red.

“Does your offer still stand?” a baritone voice intruded from behind me.

I turned, and my breath caught.

Ekene had called him gorgeous when we watched him from afar. Up close, he was still gorgeous, with a slightly-expansive, compact body, a narrow face, eyes that ended in a Chinese-like squint, and pink, pillowy lips that reminded me of the Hollywood actor, Tom Hardy.

“Excuse me?” I breathed out.

“Your offer – the one that sent that fuddy-duddy running, I’d like to know if it still stands. I’d like to take you up on it.”

My mouth opened and closed wordlessly. Where was the sultry Declan of seconds ago? “Uh, you want to…”

“Take you to my place or yours, rip your clothes off you, slap your ass open, stick my rock-hard dick inside and fuck you till the trumpet sounds. Even then, I may not stop.”

Suddenly I had an idea, as I gaped at this man, that I looked somewhat like Jackson when I made the same delivery to him moments ago.

“Wow,” I finally managed. “You were eavesdropping.”

“I was interested.”

“Who are you again?”

“I’m Kema, the groom’s best man.” He stretched out a hand.

I shook it. “Declan, the groom’s best friend.”

“A pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure, it would seem, will soon be all mine.”

Written by Pink Panther