Netu looked at Lina for a brief moment but remained silent. The second lady, sturdier and lighter in skin tone, with deep-set eyes and fleecy curls, edged toward the steps.
"Just imagine a twerp like Netu doing this to Anne!” she said, gritting her teeth. “He must think he's pretty smart. He promised my friend the sun and the moon; marry her, and such stuff. She believed every word of his lies only to discover he’s a bad dream not worthy of recall." She clenched her fist and continued. "He had his fun, all right. Now it's our turn to see him fall....I'd love to see him whimper like a hurt urchin.”
"Agnes is right," the other lady edged in. "He made me cry without end. He stole my heart to heights I didn't comprehend and tore it into pieces. I want him to suffer.” A devious grin played at the corner of Anne's lips, which Lina considered sardonic.
“Is this what the whole goddamn fuss is about?" Lina asked, suppressing her temper. Netu’s alleged victim in particular roused her interest.
"Yes," said Anne with derision in her voice. "If I can't have him, I'll have my gift back; or have his neck. The choice is his."
In Netu’s mind, Anne’s remark splintered a sanguine, perfect world. A world in which he and Anne had built everlasting monoliths of passion, endless streams of wealth, castles of happiness, and a future as stolid as the breadth of the widest mountain range. They would float forever on its blissful wings. Now, though, he saw the various pieces of that world, and knew that it would never be the same again.
A different Anne was now stalking him. The tender and often cajoling lady he had loved, and who had relied much on his spiritual strength and gentle manliness, his forgiving spirit, and high career prospects, had disappeared. Now, Anne looked like a savage from a dense jungle of his passion, thirsty for his blood, sworn to vengeance, and cutting corners to nail his coffin. Netu cleared his eyes with the back of his hand and stared hard at Anne, in disbelief.
"And if he rejects either of your options?" Lina scoffed at the ladies.
"Don’t even think about it," Anne shot back with confidence. "He has no choice but to take an option.”
Lina turned to Netu. "Did you tell this twat you’d have anything to do with her?”
"Not at all," Netu said. "We were just friends, same way with other people. Nothing extra.”
"Good," replied Lina on a strident note, and then turned to the ladies. "You heard the man. He said he didn't promise you a single pin, and that you gave him zilch. Now, if you'd excuse me, get lost."
Lina stepped aside for Netu. "You are free to go inside now," she said. Once again, facing the ladies’ direction, she continued. "You'd agree my generosity is quite robust, wouldn’t you both? To have allowed you to trespass on my property so long means I’m quite large at heart. I'll be humane enough to let you slip out of here. On the other hand, if you insist on making trouble, be sure you'll have it from me double. Now get lost!"
Netu scurried in, stopping by the stairway. Through the gaping door he peered at Lina and her unwanted guests. The ladies were hesitant, as if to give Lina a fight; but she appeared to be in control. Lina noticed their defiant posturing and ventured with aggression towards them, but they retreated in haste to a safe distance. From there they turned their hate full force on this woman who stood between them and Netu.
Lina never before felt so insulted. Daring her to a fight, the ladies did not reckon with her as the 'Queen' revered by their kind, same Lina to whom they submitted in the spiritual world. What had gone wrong with decorum, she thought. In her world, the law remained the law; and the Queen represented the law. I will string them just where they belonged, she told herself. A malicious smile punctuated her thought.
"I take it by your impudence you don't know me,” she said, now less on-guard, “and you’re ready for a fight. If you want to get Netu, there's only one way: get me first. Simple deal, don't you think?"
Lina leapt on Anne, narrowly missing target. Swinging off her assailant’s path by instinct, Anne retreated towards the main gate, and stood on a luscious, well-groomed lawn.
"I'm beginning to understand your sudden concern for Netu,” she cackled like a savage in a jungle. “You’re having it real good with him, not so? It makes you think you can piss me off so easily. If you think you're so good at defending him, why don't you carry your sword and fence around town, defending every man who touches your thighs? What makes you think you're not just one of his many flings? No doubt, a great defender of cheats and liars you are."
Agnes coughed a glob of spittle onto the lawn and stormed across the driveway towards the right flank of the yard, facing Lina’s direction. “We have no business with you,” she ranted, “but with this smart ass you’re shielding. Let him come face the music.”
“Then come and get him," Lina roared, signaling to the stairs. "Your prey is right in there. Go have your feast."
Anne started fretting. Netu had been too slippery. On her first date with him, she recognized that she did not know a thing about him. He loved her as no other person had done. So, she thought she had him caged and would conjure his form at will. To her surprise, he slipped out of the box like a slithering serpent. Now she found herself in the cage.
"I should've seen the signs long ago. I was off my mind, I should've known better,” Anne whimpered. “Please, fellow woman, don't do this to me. You know what it means to be hurt. Stay clear of this, and you'd ease my pain. We’ll settle it on our own terms. If you bungle my mission because of sentiments, how will I gain promotion in my world? Netu knows why he came to you. With you he's sure of protection; but consider the consequences if I fail in this assignment."
Lina winced at Anne's piteous drama. My heart sure chimes the right impulses all the time and never fails to alert me, she thought. A stupid egghead Netu is. Never would listen to advice. His magnified ego wouldn't let him. Just how long do I continue to beat it into his empty head to stay away from women? It is the only hurdle left for him to cross, but he always crashes into it. He needs to learn a lesson or two about life. Perhaps, I should allow these women to have to take their pound of flesh. Netu believes he’s just what he is...insulated from people of Anne's deviousness. Now, he will learn.
Nonetheless, Lina knew she could not afford to see Netu hurt. She was fond of him in a strange way. She had not been able to put words to that emotion, but she knew she cared a lot about him and sometimes tried to show it. It was proper, she thought, to defend someone you cared for. So, she would stand by him at this hour of need.
"What sort of promotion did you say you want?" Lina asked Anne aloud. "I figure you have an overblown ambition and I feel obliged to help you. If what I think is the kind of promotion you desire, you can count on me. I'll be on hand to grant it. If you want to know, I'll tell you where to. I'll promote you to hell!"
Anne and Agnes shuddered from Lina's grave voice.
"But for Netu and people like him who do not listen to advice,” Lina went on barking, “rats, small rats like you, won't dare to encroach on my privacy and insult me like this. For the last time, I tell you, know your limit or you'll forever curse your stars."
Lina paused, turned towards Netu by the door. "Lover boy, Netu,” she jeered. “Come hear what your girl is saying. She wants promotion, and your neck would be the prize for getting it.”
She looked at the ladies with scorn in her eyes and said, "So what's your choice, life or promotion in hell? If your choice is hell, then wait for me.”
Lina dashed into the house. Her brusque movement drew Agnes' suspicion. Should this ruthless woman spring a surprise, would it not be disastrous for both of them? In this circumstance, the best option would be to accept defeat. She scurried to Anne's side and pulled her.
"What are you waiting for?” Agnes whispered hard. “Can't you feel the bull in this woman? She's meaner than we thought. Besides, she's still the Queen. Let's get out of here fast. Let’s scram while we st
ill have time on our hands. Hurry!"
On hearing Lina’s clattering steps down the stairs, Anne scampered away with Agnes. By the time Lina reappeared at the doorway, they had disappeared into the night.
Lina leaned on the door frame, drawing in a lungful of air. She exhaled the draft with a rasping sound. She felt drained. Thankful for her sheer guts in averting an ugly scene, she allowed the cool breeze to tease her face and rustle her negligée, followed by another stream of fresh air, coursing through her lungs and calming her frazzled nerves. Then she saw a missing piece of the jigsaw puzzle falling into place: Gabriel!
Where had he and the other guards been all the while? Asleep? I will go fetch these lousy, good-for-nothing oafs before I get on to a real roast of this stubborn, stray-feet Netu, she thought, stomping down the steps toward the large mansion.
# # #
Lina Phillip Uwa rolled over to her right side of her bed disrupting the flickering reel of the dream. Suppressing a choke, she clutched her bosom to nurse its tingling pain. She then rested her body on the headboard. She tucked a pillow between her and the wall giving her head a snug incline.
So she had been dreaming, she admitted. She wondered at how real it seemed.
Back to real life now, she realized it came as a warning of some sort for Netu. Lina Uwa glanced about her in dismay, somehow derided by the ironical jokes life often played on individuals. Not quite a minute gone, she had found herself swinging in the cloak of a revered Queen, enjoying the accompanying affluence and splendor of a large mansion. It was quite annoying waking up to real life of her haunting plight - a divorcee whose existence hinged on her will to overcome poverty. She gazed at the one room she had managed to maintain for over two years and felt the revulsion. Not the mansion of her spiritual flight but a drab square space clustered with bundles of time-worn clothes and a stack of utensils. The almost bare room had as tangible furniture, two stools, a cast iron bed, and a medium size bench. She had fabricated the rest of the furnishing in her imagination, hoping someday she would smile at the fruits of her mind's seed.
Where went the trappings of the spiritual affluence in which I lived? Life has not been fair, she thought. She would have loved to live the life of a Queen forever, but reality as she saw it now, came with just one tinted meaning: bit by bit, calculatedly, life meted out its blows and she lacked the resilience to counter it.
Her plight was not her utmost bother; rather, Netu seemed the pain seething through her being, rendering her restless. The way he went about things - such carefree attitude as she had never seen in any man. She knew he would get himself hurt one way or the other, and she could well narrow down the scope of hurt to a single cause: women. Of course, she admired how he had tried to tame his great libido in spite of his teeming female admirers. Quite inspiring for an intelligent, handsome, and well-bred young man. While she did not see him as promiscuous, he always ended up with the wrong company as her dream had shown.
Though a mere dream that she could wish away, from her past experiences, her dreams were almost always accurate prophecies.
In slow motion, Lina rolled up on her pinto bed and gave a heavy sigh. She then sought to still herself with an even heavier breath to feed her strained lungs. She gazed across the room at the taut string above her head, and then at the flaps of old issues of magazines and newspapers hung on it beneath the green bulb in the small room.
Whether Netu Deo would listen to her this time or take it in his strides as he had always done in the past, she would steer him clear of the enemy's hatchet. It would not be easy, she knew, but she would do it even if it meant another scar on her pride. The dream replayed itself to her in harried clarity, and Lina saw in Anne a monster.
The previous evening, Netu had showed up giving flimsy excuses, but she figured he wanted an escape route out of her clutches, to scamper to areas he would ease out his hidden desires. He had said he would be back the next morning, but morning had passed and night had fallen. Still, no sign he would keep his promise. In spite of her feelings, Lina felt confident she would see him soon. And when he did show up, she would let him have it clear and crisp. The bitter truth, and he would have no choice than to face up to it.
Lina uncoiled herself on her bed and tried to go back to sleep by relishing the memories of Netu. She found sleep hard to come as her mind was troubled. She kept gazing at the white ceiling boards for a long time before she was swept off her worries into deep, unobtrusive slumber.
# # #
"Lata, turn the stereo volume down," ordered Netu. "We are not in a discotheque. The stereo noise may stir trouble for us from neighbors. You know how irritated they often are. Just turn the volume down."
Lata grinned, his eyes glinting in his characteristic exuberance. "Neighbors and trouble, you say?” he responded in defense. “Come on, Netu! I don't buy it any more than you do. They play music louder than anyone else in the neighborhood, but no one ever complains." He wheeled to the stereo beat and the overhead light embellished his fair complexion with a slight flare.
"Will you do as I say, Lata?" snapped Netu, worried by the young man’s defiance.
Agitated, Lata stared at both Netu and John, an uncle. John urged him with a slight nod to obey Netu’s order. Lata was astonished they thought he courted trouble with the blaring stereo speakers, which did not penetrate the four walls of the room. Anyhow, he rose from his couch, switched off the machine and went back to his seat.
"Now what?" he sneered.
“Stop the nonsense,” John warned. “Can't you see what Netu said is right? Since when have you become full of air?"
Tall, dark-skinned, oblong-faced, square-shouldered and with piercing eyes, John was in his early twenties. He seemed amazed at the insensitivity of Lata, who took too many things for granted, as if great values and tradition were eroded by the passage of time. He shrugged with disdain seeing that his brother, Lata, exemplified a child lost in the web time made him.
"I’m sorry," Lata apologized coming to terms with the situation. "I didn't intend to be rash. I'm sorry."
"Sounds better," John said, impressed.
Netu felt indifferent. Life had turned him round too often in circles and left him at the mercy of other people to the extent he felt thick-skinned about it. What people thought of him or how they reacted at times to his words no longer counted. Yes, life had jeered at his inability to interpret and understand its rhythms, the reason his ego had suffered without mercy.
The bond between Netu and the two younger men had no tint of blood to it, but a product of a once intense friendship he had enjoyed with their late uncle, Tom. On the crest of OldHill, the middle class residential area on Newland's western fringe, the three-bedroom apartment they lived in stood as one of six apartments in a grand, one-story building. They occupied the third apartment downstairs. Netu had often given his weight to the thought that the apartment came across as Tom's unsigned will for them before his premature transit to the beyond.
Until early in January of 1996 when a sword of fate swung and spilled Tom’s blood on the day’s bright hue, he had believed he could simply reach out and pull the brilliant strings of his life. He felt this way, knowing he had a friend he could trust. A friend who understood the intrinsic depths of his being, believed in him, and shared the burdens of his aspirations. Since the pillar Netu reclined so much on had been snatched by fate, nothing had been the same again.
Netu also realized that in this world nothing ever remained the same, except for one to constantly adjust to the forms ever altering before one's eyes. One had to adjust even to time itself. This had been his lot in recent times. Netu brushed aside such thoughts. The past remained the past, and his business belonged in the now.
The day had begun on an inspirational note, the reason Netu and John had enjoyed a refreshing chat in the apartment. They had broached on far-ranging issues concerning their lives as each had been entangl
ed with Tom's. Also, they had examined the plight of man on the globe and of the roles they wished they played to reverse the tide of fate with a critical mind. They had also shared the intrigues of a box-office movie. It had all been wonderful, if not for Lata's need for loud music.
Netu smiled to himself on recollecting his own exuberance at twenty. You just can’t figure what one is capable of doing at twenty. The world is like an exquisite toy you want to fiddle with. Often times you want to remold it to your childish fancies; and it hurts your soaring zeal when you realize things don’t really work the way you think. Then you are told politely in the dialectics of the time, you must bend so the world can accommodate your rough edges. And how many times had he yielded to this strange cajoling? He had lost count, Netu admitted.
He thought it rather queer about life. Either one bent as dictated by time or a natural process enforced it. This amused him. Lata appeared to be struggling out of shoes Netu had long out-grown. Even then, the world never stopped pressurizing his frame to bend, especially with the awareness of his predestined role as Light Bearer.
The process by which nature made things bend its way intrigued Netu and the stuff of life he was yet to grasp. He had been responsive to several pressures before. In spite of the mystique surrounding those situations, they came without the kind of manipulation he felt in his relationship with Lina. The earlier pressures could be explained in the light of an economic drought. Without the gritty realities of a drought of any type, the latest pressure dug deep into his being, stirred wells of emotions, and held his mind captive.
Netu could feel the steel bars of Lina's charm imprisoning his mind again with frightening irresistibility. He did not like it one bit due to its implications. Still, he could not in any way refuse the protection Lina offered. He had never really thought about how he got mixed up with Lina, beyond the awareness that she had a strange pull on his heartstrings. It often made him swing in her direction when the force tugged at him from within. As he thought about her again, he realized how inextricably nestled he was in her care and overbearing protection.
Titan Race Page 5
