UNEXPECTED VISITOR

Two events came up that evening and complicated our plans and threw it in jeopardy. Eric's phone rang at about eleven that night.

'Tolu,' Eric said into the phone. 'What's up?'

He listened. 

My heart began to beat faster and I felt something had gone wrong. Did Tolu have an accident? Was his uncle taking the car from him and it won't be available tomorrow?

'What are you saying, Tolu?' Eric said, his voice rising. 'Are you saying you won't be able to come?' 

I swallowed. My heart galloped faster and I sat on the bed.

Eric listened to Tolu's reply and I waited for him to make a reply to give me a clue on what's going on.

 'Tolu, don't kill this plan,' Eric said. 'Did you hear me? Don't kill this plan! The target is coming tomorrow, what do you want us to do now that you are coming up with this? What in the world—'

He listened some more and my heart ran faster.

'Tolu,' Eric said at last. 'This is unacceptable. Find another malarial drug and take. Take ten tablets if you have to, but get well this night. You are the link with the target; how can we pick him up if you are not there?'

My heart sank deeper. If Tolu will not be at the airport, the plan will fail. The target—as Eric called him—would get suspicious the moment Tolu isn't there to welcome him. He will not agree to leave the airport without a familiar face and that can attract the airport police.

Eric hissed. 'Tolu, your behavior is inexcusable and I don't understand what you are saying. Go take an injection or whatever you need to kill the fever, but make sure you show up tomorrow morning. Did you hear me?' Then he cut off the call. 

'What's Tolu saying? Is he ill?'

'Don't mind him,' Eric said and stood up, going toward the window. His breathing came in rapid gasps and his fingers had folded into fists. 'He is taking us for a ride. Can you imagine what he is saying?' He turned to me. 'He said he is feverish and won't make it tomorrow. He looked as healthy as bull this evening, didn't he? He is now coming up with a cock and bull story that he has malaria. That he took a drug, it doesn't seem to be working. And he had the audacity to tell me to go ahead with the plan.'

I was shaking my head before he finished. 'The man will be suspicious if Tolu will not be at the airport. This will not work; we have to abort.'

'Abort? Eric asked, with his face stern as if I had slapped him. 'Abort? Abort and return to what? Do you have another plan to get us out of the hellish situation we are in? We will make this work, whether Tolu likes it or not. He must recover from that fever if it means taking ten thousand anti-malarial drugs tonight.'

I stared at him. He looked like a bull in mating season—desperate and unreasonable. I realized at that moment that Eric was completely sold on the kidnapping job and not even getting a job at that moment would have stopped him from going ahead with the plan. He had crossed a line in his mind, it seems, and no mountain was big enough to stand on his way.

'What do you propose we do?' I asked.

'We go ahead, with or without Tolu. This is my ticket to getting out of this miserable life and no obstacle will stand on my way.' 

I smiled. 'Can the two of us pull it off? The plan is based on three people; without Tolu, it's doomed.' 

'We can do it!' Eric said. 'We will adjust the plan and carry it out. That fearful rat can't stop us from going on, that's for sure. I am committed to this venture and no one can stop me from achieving it.' 

I shook my head and thought for a while. 'If we are going ahead, we better change the plan now. We don't have time.'

Eric sat on edge of the mattress. 'Tolu is a defector and a coward. I should never have planned this with him. I hate people who get cold feet when it's time to act.'

 I stared at the sheet on which we had drawn out the plan. I didn't see how two of us could pull it off. 

'What do we do?' Eric asked at last. His voice was less confident than it was a minute ago. 

'Well,' I said, my hand brushing over the crumble sheet. 'I think we have to get a third person or change the entire plan. I don't see how we can—'

Knock, knock, and knock. 

Eric and I stared at the door and then at each other. We then turned our eyes back to the door. I looked at Eric again and raised my eyebrows. He shook his head and our eyes returned to the door again.

Knock, knock, knock, the knocks came again, louder and persistent. I looked at the screen on my phone: the time was eleven thirty-four. 

Maybe Tolu had gotten afraid of Eric's threats and went to spill the beans to the police. I thought. Maybe he had told them everything.

The room got stuffier than it usually was and I felt the sudden rush of sweat all over my body. Eric stood up and walked to the door. 

'Who is there?' he asked. His voice was loud, but I heard a faint shiver in it. 'Who is it?'

'Open the door,' a voice said behind the door. 'It's me.'

Eric and I looked at each other again, and then his eyes went quickly back to the door.

'Shit!' he said. 'Maria, what are you doing here in the middle of the night?'

'Are you going to ask me that or open the door for me to come in?' the voice outside the door said.

'Shit!' Eric cried again. 

He stood there awhile, cursing under his breath. Then reluctantly, the key on the door clang against the keyhole and he unlocked the door. He opened it slightly, pushed his head out while his body blocked the entrance. 

'What do you want?' Eric asked.

'Are you letting me in or what?' she asked. Her voice was loud, unafraid and confident.

Eric said nothing for a while. 'It's late and you didn't tell me you were coming.'

'When did you become an European that I have to tell you of my coming beforehand?'

'Maria,' Eric said, his voice rising in the quiet night. 'You can't come around anytime you want because this is not your house. I told you that. Besides, my friend is here; there is no room for you to stay. Go to your uncle's house.'

'That's the problem,' she said. 'My uncle is not in town and his house is locked up. I am coming from there.'

'See what I am saying?' Eric said and I heard the frustration in his voice. 'Why don't you call people first before you show up on their doorsteps? That's what phones are made for—not for taking selfies.'

'I didn't come to see you, Erico,' Maria said. 'I came to see my uncle. And I don't have to tell my uncle that I was coming to his house. The reason I am standing outside your door and catching cold is because he is not in town. You wouldn't have known I was in town.'

There was another pause, long and awkward, as if the Devil had paused to give the world a respite. 

'Go to a hotel,' Eric said at last, still blocking the entrance with his body. 'I told you I have a friend. There is no place for you to sleep here.'

'Erico!' Maria shouted. 'You either let me in or I swear to God I will stand here and keep knocking until all your poor neighbors come to find out what's going on. And you know I can do it, don't you?'

This time the silence was longer. I held my breath, wondering what will happen next and eager to see this female who had the temerity to stand up to Eric.

The door creaked and Eric moved backward, reluctantly, and the door stood wide open. Eric did not collect the bag Maria shoved forward, nor did he leave the way entirely for her to pass through easily. He glared at her as she walked through the door. 

Maria came into my view and the first thought that crossed my mind was that she was as short as Jada Pinket Smith. She had the same height—but as she raised her head to look at me, I saw that she wasn't half as beautiful as Jada. Her eyes were black and hard and her face looked puffy, either from the weariness of the journey or that's the way it was. She had a blue tee shirt over black jeans and her complexion was as black as the back of a pot. 

'Welcome,' I said, getting up from the mattress, realizing I was staring at her.

'Thank you,' she said, and remained standing, staring at me. 

I stretched out my hand. 'Pleased to meet you.'

She gave me a look that said, can't you see I have no free hand? 

I withdrew my hand quickly. She stood with the bags in her hands and looked around the room.

'Paul, Maria,' Eric said in a chocking voice. 'Maria, Paul.'

'Welcome,' I said again. 

'Thank you,' she said and kept turning around. 

Then she moved to the bags lined up at the bottom of the mattress and dumped the travelling bag on the floor beside the other bags. She placed the large handbag on top of the travelling bag and sat on the mattress. She rummaged into the bag and her hand came out with a cotton bud. She slid it into her left ear and began to twist the stick to the left and to the right. 

She closed her eyes. 

We stood there looking at her as if hypnotized by what she was doing. She pulled the cotton bud out of the left ear and stuck it to the right without opening her eyes and continued to twist.

She's as comfortable as the lady of the house, I thought. Like a wife returning home from a journey and taking authority automatically.

I looked at Eric, but he glared at Maria. I knew, without a doubt, that this night was going to be a long one. 

I was right.