Behind the Curtains

The Speech

He stood with the microphone in one hand and a drink in the other hand and watched the expectant crowd as they waited for him to begin. He did not know where to start.

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It was a hot afternoon in November. The skies were clear and rainless. The cab driver pulled up in front of Chez Nous, a bar/grill/restaurant/lounge in the better part of the town. Sheila paid the cab driver and stepped down from the cab. The hot air hit her like a fist as soon as she stepped on the cobblestones on the sidewalk.

Meanwhile, La Face took a sip of his cold beer. He was seated at his favourite bar with his friends Kenzy and Richie. There was something soothing about the way La Face drank his beer. Each time, he picked up the glass of beer with the care an old surgeon would accord his scalpel as he makes the first incision. It was not hard to see that he loved his beer.

The three friends were talking and laughing. La Face whose real name was Martins was telling his friends how unnatural romantic relationships were. "It is the most elaborate scam in the world." he said, laughing.

Sheila walked into the restaurant across a glass demarcation from the friends. She wore a cream lace gown with high-heeled shoes. She covered her eyes with wide sunshades. La Face stopped speaking and had eyes only for Sheila.

He dropped his glass of beer and grew quiet as his friends followed his stare to see the object of his admiration. The light of the sun from outside caught her brown hair and made it glitter. He thought he had never seen such a beautiful girl.

She wasn't like any of the girls he knew. She had everything they had and then a lot more. He watched her take a seat at one of the tables. He stood up tense, staring at her, forgetting his friends as he went after her. His friends called him back, "Face, don't go. She is probably meeting someone here." He did not listen.

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He had no idea what he was going to say to her. " Hello Miss. My friends said I should not talk to you," he blurted.

"I suppose this means you did not listen to them?" she smiled.

"No I did not. This is an auspicious moment. I have a feeling that I would regretted it for the rest of my life if I didn't come to introduce myself. I'm Martins but my friends call me La Face."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Sheila and my date just arrived."

La Face looked outside and saw a black Mercedes-Benz S-class pull in and a well dressed man stepped out of the back door.

"Please may I have your number? Let me have your digits and I shall leave you alone," He said hurriedly, undaunted.

She smiled and went for her purse. "No, just tell me," He said. She said the numbers and he smiled and thanked her. If he could only see behind the curtain, she thought.

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Neither of them believed he would remember the numbers but they were both wrong. To him, those were the most important numbers in the universe. He walked away back to his friends, smiling like a little boy.

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When they witnessed how he walked away and how the other man had taken his place, they laughed at him. He smiled. He did not care what they thought. La Face had never felt like this before. All he cared about now was to be next to her. He was afraid of how he felt about this total stranger he saw just minutes ago.

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He was alone with his thoughts for the rest of that hangout. He called Sheila as soon he left the bar. He expected to have gotten the number wrong or perhaps she gave him a wrong number but it rang. He listened to it ring until it clicked and her voice came in from the other end.

"Hello," she said.

He had never heard anything quite as beautiful. He was about to speak when he heard another voice from the other end, "Who are you speaking to?" the deep harsh voice asked. There was an unclear sound from the other end and some clatter of wood. The line went dead. He called again but the number was unreachable. He called many more times but the result was the same. He was restless.

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He could not sleep and could not think. What had happened? Where was she? Was she alive? Suddenly it occurred to him to use her cell phone number to do a reverse search on Facebook. He was lucky to find her on there and to find that her account did not have much privacy settings. He looked through her pictures and updates posted within the past one year and from these he determined that she worked with a PR and advertising company in the city.

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He called Bach, a friend of his who worked in the same firm and within five minutes he was in his car driving towards the general direction where Bach said she lived while expecting him to call back with a specific address. He thought how irrational he behaviour was but he didn't mind looking like a fool. He wanted nothing else but to ensure that no harm had come to her but he had a premonition that something horrible might come of his recklessness. His phone rang.

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"Hello, Bach. What do you have for me?"

Bach told him Sheila's address. "But what do you want with her that you suddenly want her address? How did you even meet her?" he asked.

"I think she may be a victim of domestic abuse. She needs help," Face replied.

"Shouldn't you report that to the police?"

"When have they ever helped in such a case in this country? Thank you Bach," he said. "Why don't you give your mouth a break?"

Bach gave up but warned him that she lived with her boyfriend. The thought of her boyfriend did not worry him. He would just drop in and see how she was doing then be gone if she is alright or whatever. He really had no idea what he was going for.

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He arrived at the address. It was on a stretch of bungalows with a single point of entry at the outskirts of town. He parked his car and walked in through the unmanned gate. He knocked on the door of the house marked 4C. An agitated voice of a girl called out from within, "Who is it?"

"Face," he answered. Sheila remembered meeting him but she could not imagine him there. She opened the door. He did not know what he was expecting but the black patch around her eyes were more than he could have seen.

"You shouldn't be here," she said, physically shaken. Almost immediately, the silhouette of a man appeared behind the door. Before he could reach it, Face pulled the girl away from the door way out on the porch and stood face to face with Bassey.

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He was at least six-feet-two. "Who are you," he asked.

"I am a friend of Sheila's"

"I don't want you being friends with her. She got all the friends she needs."

Bassey commanded Sheila to get back inside the house but she was now afraid of what he would do to her so instead of going back in, she took a step away from him. Face saw this and realized she was afraid of him, so he gave her a counter instruction to go to the car and wait for him. Something about Bassey reminded him of Oliver Goldsmith's Mad Dog.

The dog and man at first were friends but when a pique began, the dog to gain some private ends, went mad and bit the man...

Bassey tried to stop her but Face stood in his way. Judging from the wrath written on his face, Face expected that Bassey was going to sucker punch him so he braced himself for it. The punch never came. Instead he went after Sheila as she ran to the car. He had left the car key in the ignition so he shouted for her to go with the car and not worry about him. She got to the car and drove away.

Bassey went to his car parked inside the premises of the house but before he could open the gate, Sheila was long gone and so was Face. Face had not had time to consider his actions. Now he realized he did not know where she was going with his car and he had no way of reaching her but he did not care.

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He wanted to call a cab when he realized he had left his cell phone in the car. So he walked to a nearby shop where he bought water and asked if he could use their phone. They allowed him and he called his number. After two rings, Sheila answered. "Where are you?"

"I thought about how to see you so I went where we met this afternoon," she said. He was worried that Bassey would find her there. Was it not him she met there in the afternoon? He hurried there and found her seated at the bar, her head in her hands, looking nothing like she did in the afternoon.

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They drank in silence. Before they left the bar, he learned a great deal about the violence she had suffered in Bassey's hand. Face could not understand why she put up with it but he was determined to put a stop to it. He told her that he was not going to allow her to go back there. Maybe she was overwhelmed by the events of the evening or she was just too drunk to resist so she agreed and went home with Face.

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In the days that followed, Face helped her get a transfer from her place of work and within one week, arrangement for her to work from home was concluded. She did not visit the apartment he shared with Bassey ever again. Three months later, her landlord wrote where she worked informing her that her rent was due and he was set to evict her. She was required to move her things or pay.

When Face heard this he went to the house only to discover that Bassey had moved out a month before that time. He hired a U-haul and had Sheila's belonging moved to his place.

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Face became a contented man from the day he met Sheila. He did not need anything else other than to breath the same air with her. He feared that he might die of happiness if she did anything to please him and she did.

Far sweeter are caresses unsolicited, unspoiled by the harsh sound of command.

She did everything to please him. It took two months before Face asked her out. He was afraid she might say no but he could not bear it any longer and neither could she.

They were not bothered about societal standards or formalities but they wanted to stand on rooftops and proclaim their love so six months after their families were introduced.

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Ever After

Looking at them at their wedding reception, Kenzy, the best man, did not know which story to tell. So he simply said:

"I have known Face since our first year in the University. In case you didn't know, Martins was called La Face, not because he was the most handsome (No that was me) but because of the amount of time he dedicated to keeping his face free of spots!

The day he met Sheila, he was telling me and a couple of friends how relationships are scam. Then she walked in and he became a changed man. I have since waited for him to snap out of it but I wait no more. As you can see, our boy and our girl are a picture of perfection and happiness so I implore all you beautiful people to raise your glasses and drink to their happily ever after"

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Authored by @churchboy