CHRONICLES OF TONIO LAWREX (EPISODE 3) [IRRESISTIBLE TEMPTATION]

CHRONICLES OF TONIO LAWREX

Episode 3 – [IRRESISTIBLE TEMPTATION]

However, before I could utter a word, Helen’s lips found mine. This time I held her hair running my fingers through her weaving. It soon became very frantic, as though she wanted to bit up my lower lips. Her heart was throbbing very fast and I could feel the pounds. I felt heavy below me, it was like when a lizard jumps down from the fence and starts nodding its head, again and again.

"Touch me" she whispered softly into my ears. I was terrified on hearing that. I was more surprised in the next thing I did.

To be sincere, on hearing her say that, the same feeling I had when I got admission came to me at once. That kind of feeling you have when you've missed a particular type of food like abacha (African salad) for a long time and you eventually stumbled on it, prepared with dry fish and lots of crayfish. Those were the kind of feelings I had.

I went for her bosom anyway, they were like soft balls in my hands; it was barely my first time. It was as if my head swelled a bit, and my legs became sweaty. While our lips fought, I went deep but she was far away. Our hips heaved against each other - up and down, and although we've stood for a long time we didn't feel pains. With our fingers we walked miles; I walked a few miles and then a thought suddenly came to me.

I thought we were doing the wrong thing, because I barely knew her and even if I did, it was the wrong time for a year-one student to start keeping erotic escapades. My GP, my up-keep, my religious life, my destiny and my ever quest to change the world in no sooner time were all lying in wait for me. Women tarnish one’s future, mum used to say. Mum was a woman herself, but for her to keep hammering those words into the ears of her male children meant it was as serious as cancer.

I wanted to stop, but the pleasure wouldn’t let me, devil even made it more exciting, in fact that was when her tongue tasted like strawberry. I was about reaching for her bum-short before she said something.

"Stop... Let's stop please..." She stammered, breathing fast, with her mouth agape and her eyes closed.

"Al...Alright" I stuttered, positioning my sky-blue shirt. I noticed that one of its buttons had fallen as a result of the romantic exercise.

"Oh, sorry" she picked up the silver coloured button and handing it over to me.

"Don't worry, it's alright" I said, burying the button into my breast pocket, as I watched her flatten her tummy to enable her to zip-up her bum-short. I wondered when her bum-short unzipped, and who did unzip it.

I furrowed, raised my eyebrows and said: "So?"

She did the same and said: "So what?" opening her hands in a manner that suggested what’s-the-matter?

I dried my lips and said, "It was cool though"

She chuckled and asked me what was cool, but I didn’t answer. I was lost for words.

We were now sitting down on her bed and she drew close to me and made a long statement that got me baffled. "Tonio, I'm not a whore, neither am I bad. But when a girl is desperate, she becomes a whore for that particular person she wants; and even if she was good she becomes bad for that person" she paused a bit and added "maybe for a while or something."  Then, she looked straight into my eyes and I didn't take my eyes off hers.

But to be sincere, those lines she made still remain with me now – ‘..even if she was good, she becomes bad for that person...’. It sounded like the lines of Nicki Minaj in the song, ‘Bad for You’ featuring Meekmill.

I was still in thoughts before I heard: "Errm... I know you long before now" she broke the silence.

"Where and whe..." I managed to ask before she cut me short.

"Matric Night, at Fayrouz Club, with your friends" she said, smiling from the corner of her mouth.

"Oh, oh, Helen, yeah, Helen. That was the name"

"You see, you guys forget a lot, I know you've forgotten"

"Yeah I forgot. But you showed more or less interest that night, and you refused to give me your number. I'm not used to going to clubs. I attended that of Matric Night for the sake of Freshers' Night. I just wanted to drink and flex myself" I said, holding her hands as though we just met.

Then I added: "Your expression that night made me think maybe you didn't like me or something, so I didn't hesitate to give up the wild-goose chase"

"Hmmm. Maybe you should’ve tried hard enough" she scoffed. I frowned and playfully pinched her arm so hard that she felt the pain.

"Aaah! My hand. You'll wound me ooo" she took away her hand from me. "Bad boy, I'll tell my mummy for you." She pointed at me like a seven-year-old girl.

"Hahaha, I'm as bad as you" that was the only thing I could say before she started talking again.

"Well, after that day I thought we'd see again, and maybe when you see me you might recognise me and ask for my number again, then I shall give you. I liked you but I was just trying to be a bit tough" she winked.

"I never knew I'd see you again, and when I did saw you, I couldn't recognise you" I replied.

She went further to telling me that she had seen me up to four times since our Matriculation Night, but I couldn't recognise her and after a long time she didn't see me till I stumbled on her in the shuttle. She said she didn't want to miss the opportunity again, so she decided to talk to me in the shuttle.

"It’s not like you're so much a cool guy oo, make your head no blow" she finally said, jokingly pointing her finger on my nose.

"My head don burst already naa" I held my head, then we laughed.

"I'm not a flirt, I just wanted to..."

"I understand, it doesn't matter. I know you were acting out of your own feelings" I cut in.

"So, what would you say about a girl like me?"

"Nothing. You're just an expressionist, you don't fail to express your feelings, that's it"

"Aside from that, don't you have any other thing in mind? Open up Tonio"

I smiled, saying: "You don't wanna know what I have in mind"

"Alright keep it to yourself" she stood. I drew her back and she slumped onto the bed and bounced making her bosom to joggle.

"You're too sensitive, I like you the way you're. The truth is that ever since we met, I've been trying to meet you again not knowing that you nursed the same feeling. I even asked a friend about you and he told me you don't give guys a chance, I was surprised on what happened today" I concluded, as she looked away not saying anything.

"Helen" I called her but she kept silent. "Alright, I think I should start going, maybe I've upset you, but I'm so sorry if I really did" I stood on my feet.

"No, no, I'm Ok. I was just thinking. Please stay a little more with me. Maybe if I finish bathing I'll see you off" she said in a somewhat pleading manner.

"Ok. If you say so" I mumbled and brought my phone from my pocket and started pressing. I logged onto whatsapp to check messages. I got a message from my guy, Pyt - 'Guy how far u naa, u no come SVI lecture.'

From Jane - 'Tonio we'll have PHY-108 practical on Friday, come with your lab coat and manual oo.'  And then finally from Emma my course mate - 'Guy, I saw u 2day 4rm window, who be dat babe u carry comot?'

I smiled and replied Emma's chat first, typing thus - 'Idiot, you no go mind your biz, others been dey class dey listen, you been dey shook eye comot window, dey look me and girl. Omo I hope say you sign attendance for me?'

I'd given Emma my Reg Number, so that he'd sign on my behalf in case I failed to attend lectures. It was a favour we returned to ourselves on daily bases, I knew he wouldn't turn me down. I got an immediate reply from him right away, and it went thus - 'Cow, answer me first, who be dat babe u & am dey dat time? 4get attendance, dat one dey.'

I looked down on my phone and made a snigger. Helen noticed I was smiling and asked who was making me show my whitish dentition.

"Is it your girl" she added. I smiled and told her it was one of my crazy guys. She dragged down her lower lip in a manner that entailed there was lesser tendency of me saying the truth.

"You don't believe me, do you?" I asked with a pretentious frown on my face.

"Well, it doesn't matter whether or not I believe you, I have no right to interrogate you, cos you aren’t my boyfriend" she finalised with her lips clattering quickly at each other till she finished, it was as though she memorised those statement.

"You're amazing, in fact you make me think" I said.

But my smile turned into a frown on the next thing that happened. In fact after everything got settled, I regretted ever following her to her lodge, I regretted coming to her room, having anything to do with her, I regretted everything. The comic part of it was that I wanted to vomit the whole noodles and milk which she gave me the very moment the huge stranger held my throat.

It all started after I told her she was amazing and that she made me think. Then, she went over her wrack and brought a photo album for us to watch. We watched and scoffed together before we heard a knock on her door.

She asked who it was but there was no reply, she soon got tired of asking and went to peep to know who it was. She tip-toed back and asked me to hide. At first I wanted to hide but the big-boy spirit came into me at once and I told her I wouldn’t hide; besides we weren’t doing anything bad.

We argued a bit in silent talks though, and I insisted I wasn’t gonna hide anywhere. I knew how it would seem for a guy like me to hide because someone knocked; but what I didn’t know was who that person really was, and what he was capable of doing to me or rather to us, if he found us inside that room.

The university is so much a free world that even if a boy and a girl were caught doing something bad, they won’t be punished, so far as none of them was forced to do it. But even at that known philosophy, I was still wrong on whom the stranger might be, Helen refused to tell me and I refused to hide.

The knock became alarming and she rushed to open the door. My eyes were hooked on the photos, because on a normal day, if a guy-man enters a room where his fellow guy-man dey, na im suppose say: ‘Chairman how far’, before the other guy-man (me) wey don dey already, go look at him and they would greet. That was the custom, or so I thought. But I was all wrong. It wasn’t a guy-man thing, it was another thing all together.

I turned quickly to look at the stranger the moment he roared: "Nnenna, who is this?"

I figured out that it might be Helen`s Igbo name, but the mood was too serious to think about that, so all I did was turn to see the person. Lo and behold a huge scar-faced bulk of a man; his chest danced and his nostrils could contain two of my fingers. I didn’t answer him and he approached me in a flash. I flinched.

.

...To be continued

We are passengers of life, who came naked from dust and shall return to dust. Beyond HERE is a Paradise for saints and Doom for sinners, but before this train of life transits us, there`s still little time to decide.

© Nwoye T. Anthony 2017

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