Entangled: A Little Too Many, A Little Too Close

by Kenneth Igiri

  “Horrific!” said a certain plump middle-aged lady who had been in the line behind the duo. She helped Philip get up, being careful not to expose her behind, her dress being somewhat short. She almost toppled over on her two-inch high heels. Philip ended up steadying her and their eyes met. “I am so sorry” she apologized on Hassan’s behalf, “He is such a jerk! What could you have done to him?”

  She had a strong welsh accent though she was a complete negro. Philip couldn’t tell whether she was actually Nigerian. She must have been. He raised his head from her face and was embarrassed to see the crowd staring in his direction from across the street, inside the airport buildings, everywhere. He quickly dusted himself and picked his luggage saying absolutely nothing. The lady trotted behind him, helping to dust his jeans from behind.

  “Oya, abeg let me go,” Hassan said to the Immigration officers. He sounded calmer then. They let him go and made more comment about what warranted such a sudden turn of events between friends.

  “If I know I for capture dis thing for video o. YouTube money for come today o. See punch!” said the second officer, triggering a round of laughter from those who heard him. They watched Hassan walk briskly back to the car park.

  “Next please…” called the first officer.

  Amanda Okoro ended up sitting beside Philip on the flight. She managed to convince the senior citizen whose seat it was to switch seats with her. Philip was happy to have good company. What harm could be done. Besides it was soothing that someone was concerned about him after that huge shock of a punch.

  “You live in Accra?” Amanda started. She adjusted the hem of her dress trying to pull it further towards her knees, but it only ended up attracting Philip’s attention to the exposure. She sat by the aisle and the fifty plus gentleman in glasses on the other side of the aisle had his eyes fixated on her laps.

  “Yes, I do. You?”

  “I do rounds every quarter. London, Lagos, Accra, Abidjan. Hectic!”

  “Wow. A lot of travelling. Must be exciting”

  “Oh no! You get fed up with it after a while. Life’s ever so unstable. Can we switch? I kind of fancy the window, you know”

  Philip thought her smile was manipulative. She had moved his seat partner now she was moving him.

  “So, what happened with your friend?” Amanda asked after she had moved over him to the window seat. “Why did he punch you like that?”

  Amanda kept her eyes on him, but he only glanced at her every now and then as he responded. The conversation went on and on until Philip ended up sharing his dilemma with Amanda Okoro, a complete stranger. He ended up stating that he did not in any way expect such an extreme reaction from Hassan. He thought it had been forgiven in the car. “Brothers look out for their sisters…” Amanda had offered.

  The conversation switched from personal issues to professional issues and about fifty minutes later they were exchanging cards at the Arrivals hall of Kot oka International Airport with a promise to meet up as soon as possible. Amanda left first, and he watched her wondering where this was headed. She was obviously older, so he felt somewhat safe.

  “Surprise!!!”

  “Hey! What are you doing here?”

  It was Abena.

  “I am here to pick you up. Let’s go!”

  “Heerrr… have you been stalking me?”

  Abena laughed. “Well, I went to your office and they told me you were on your way back today. You have dumped me now, so I came to see you myself. Mohammed and the mountain!”

  “Hahaha… no… been busy.”

  “With which one? Your Nigerian girlfriend, Ghanaian girlfriend or the one at the office? By the way I have made up with Helen o. I told her we are just friends. We almost came together in fact”

  “Serious. I am impressed”

  “So, who is your new girlfriend?”

  “Who?”

  “The lady you were talking with”

  Abena walked briskly towards her car and Philip trailed behind, wondering why she was in such a hurry.

  “Hahaha. You think everyone is my girlfriend now? “

  “Ok. Your beloved not your girlfriend”

  Philip startled some passersby with the roar of his laughter. Abena wasn’t amused. Philip noticed how serious she seemed and tried to explain without giving details of what let up to their acquaintance.

  “I just met her on the plane. We happened to sit together”

  “I see…”

  “I haven’t been on a plane outside Ghana before but whenever I go to Tamale by air, whenever people get to their destination everyone goes their own way. I scarcely see people walking with the people they sat with to arrivals!”

  “Hahaha. Abena are you OK? You are sounding jealous!”

  Philip had just dropped his luggage in the open booth. He walked to the passenger side of the front seat as he made the last statement. Abena was on the driver’s side. She stopped and stared at him momentarily.

  “You mean jealous of you flying in planes every now and then?”

  The look on her face was a warning that this line of discussion was no longer safe. He changed topics.

  “Nice car” he complimented, shutting the door at exactly the same time as Abena started the engine. He was always proud of his upwardly mobile career lady friend. The rest of the drive was not very eventful and as soon as they reached Ablekuma, Abena declined following him in. Zainab came towards the window as soon as she heard the sound of the small red Kia Venga stopping by the gate. She didn’t see clearly but it was obvious Philip was being dropped off by a young lady.

  Back in the car Philip reached out to hug Abena and she obliged. This was a little rare between them. They held on for a few seconds then Abena pushed him away abruptly when she felt his lips on her neck!

  “What? Are you OK? Did you just kiss me? What? I can’t believe this!”. She kept shaking her head and expressing disgust with the gestures on her face. Philip was dumbfounded. Why did he do that? He had no idea! He just stared into space while Abena questioned him with her eyes. He was glad she resisted at the same time surprised that she, whom he did not think of as particularly spiritual, was the one who woke him up. Abena was raised in a staunch Catholic family and morality was very important. Virginity was a strong virtue. To Pentecostals of the twenty-first century, Speaking in Tongues was much more important than virginity. To Catholics, it was different. There was pride in keeping oneself intact till marriage. Philip experienced the reality of that conviction from Abena’s response. She knew exactly where the boundaries were.

  “You see you…”, Abena continued her scolding, “You need help o. Please get out of my car!”

  Philip promptly opened the door and stepped out. He managed to pick his luggage from the booth and came back, peeping through the glass to say goodbye. “I’m sorry” he mumbled but Abena zoomed off without responding. He pulled out the trolley handle gently and walked through the gate which had been ajar, dragging his bag and a heavy dose of depression. Something was wrong with him. He needed help.

  Zainab opened up the front door and beamed with a smile, bright as sunshine. Her eyes sparkled and looked straight into his. She hugged him hard and she took his travel bag from him bringing it through the door.

  “Great to have you back” Her voice was ever so soft. “How was your trip?”

  “Great! God has been good. Thank God for journey mercies”

  Both were smiling sheepishly and blushing heavily. To Zainab, it felt just like welcoming her husband home. She shut the door gently and locked it while Philip looked at her shorts which she had worn specially for this moment. He smelt the mild feminine body spray. When she turned around and look at his eyes again she knew he was ready for her. She pulled him towards herself and planted her lips on his. He did not resist. The entire cycle repeated itself again and they were in bed with each other at 7:00 PM after a few hours of sleep.

  “We did it again!” Zainab started.

  “Hmm”


  “Why don’t we just accept that we are in love?”

  Zainab chuckled.

  “This is not funny Zainab!”

  Zainab was seated in a fetal position on the bed while Philip was on the edge.

  “There is a cut on your nose. What happened to you?” asked Zainab softly. Philip hesitated.

  “Hassan”

  “Hassan?”

  “He hit me at the airport after I told him”

  “After you told him. After you told him what?”

  “About us…”

  “Philip!” she gasped, “I told you not to tell him. I told you not to tell him. Oh God! What have you done? You have ruined my life, Philip, you have just made my life more complicated”

  “What is he going to do? Tell your parents? I didn’t feel comfortable hiding it from him. My conscience wouldn’t allow me; I just had to let it out. Zainab, I don’t know whether you realize it but we are living in sin…”

  “You and who? Look Philip, sin is a personal thing. If you think you are living in sin that’s your business! Leave me out of your holiness craze. Oh God! What have you done?”

  She paused then started wailing all over again. Philip stood up to leave but she sprang up and pulled him back. He stared at her, shocked.

  “What is it?” he asked, “Let me go and sort out myself with God since you have no problem with this arrangement”

  She pushed him on the chest and yelled loudly, “You are a fool, Philip! You are a fool! You don’t even know what you have done”

  Philip was flabbergasted. This was way out of line coming from a lady he let into his house. It appears letting someone into one’s bed comes with consequences. He was utterly confused, bereft of words. “Zainab, behave yourself! Behave!” Her eyes widened, defiant. He pushed her away and made for the door again, but she pulled him back. That was when he turned and threw a slap which narrowly missed her left cheek. He heard her mutter the ‘F’ word and gasped. She repeated herself, much louder.

  “Yes! I said it! Do you worst. You have already done your worst. How about CNN and BBC?” She cried, and let loose the bed sheet with which she had been covering herself, “You can even take my nude pictures and post on Facebook so that God can forgive you. Nonsense!”

  Philip walked out and went towards his room. She followed. Zainab kept talking, voice raised:

  “And in case it hadn’t dawned on you, Hassan and I have been together! Many times!”

  Philip turned back and stared at her for a moment. He wanted to say something, but he had no idea what he could possibly say. Should he ask whether they were really cousins? Should he ask how long ago this was? What was the nature of their relationship? Was it real sexual intercourse or merely the kind of encounters they had been having? He just did not know what to say. He turned back and went into his room. From behind the door, he could still hear Zainab’s voice:

  “Yes, Philip, someone made love to me. I am worth it! Someone had the courage to come into me. I am a woman, Philip, I am …”

  Then the sobbing started, and she went back and slammed the door shut behind her. She threw herself on the floor and sobbed till midnight.

  “Do not look on the wine when it is red,

  When it sparkles in the cup,

  When it swirls around smoothly;

  At the last it bites like a serpent,

  And stings like a viper.”

  Solomon, Israel’s Wisest King

  Forgiveness

  “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” I John 1:9

  Some of the holiest and most respected men whose lives were recorded in the Inspired Scriptures carried the peculiar burden of the most jaw-dropping sins; dastardly unspeakable acts of profound wickedness. We speak of things we fail to sufficiently cringe and cry out about because we are simply reading them not watching them happen in the graphic detail of real life. We do not know whether the first man Adam was eventually reconciled to God but if indeed his error plunged the entire human race into the danger of irreversible eternal perdition, ever increasing degrees of callous wickedness, the indescribable pains of thirty-nine classes of disease, catastrophic inexplicable holocausts, sinless bloody wars of accentuating proportions decade after decade, and the several other discomforts of this present world, then we need to ask with all sincerity, Is Adam worth forgiving?

  The error of Abraham gave rise to a man named Ismail. The prophecy about him was that his hand would be against every man and every man’s hand against him. It could well be that if the spouse-sponsored sexual encounter between Abraham and Hagar had been excluded from history, there would be less than half the terrorist organizations there are on earth today and maybe nil in the Middle East? Israel as a nation would be living in absolute peace with her neighbours, the likes of Al Qaeda, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram and ISIS would be non-existent. Palestine would have an entirely different landscape. If we are to tread strictly on the path of absolute justice, we cannot help but ask: Is Abraham worth forgiving?

  Dawud was well known to be the man after God’s heart, one of the greatest kings of Israel by conquest. His fame spread throughout his generation as a champion of faith starting from his victory over a giant probably twice his height. He was the most loved king of Israel, turning distressed, in-debt and discontented fellows into mighty men of valour. Even today, Dawud is a significant reference point to Jews, Christian and Muslims, yet in his moment of idleness, what was initially an unwise act in search of fleeting pleasure, a temporary sensual, visual gratification grew into an adulterous affair of weeks, and eventually into a carefully planned murder, executed right at the battlefront when the king discovered the woman was pregnant. Uriyah was a foreigner but he was obviously more disciplined and more committed than Dawud to Israel’s victory in that battle and thus died in it. Is Dawud worth forgiving?

  Solomon, Israel’s wisest king, went way beyond the Old Testament boundaries for kings by having sexual relationships with one thousand women of different creeds, religions, nations and social backgrounds. He started out well, asking for wisdom rather than wealth yet receiving wealth of unimaginable proportions from the Giver. With his gift intact, he plunged his nation into the path of idol worship incurring divine wrath and eventually division and judgment for Israel through his multiplicity of idol worshipping women. Yet in the twenty-first century, we read his books, and covet his wisdom and wealth. Is Solomon worth forgiving?

  Philip’s private contemplations had reached the point where he asked the same question about himself. Was Philip Ezeani worth forgiving? He knew all there was to know about sexual purity, he had taught others on setting boundaries, and he had seen all the signs long before he found himself repeatedly entangled in Zainab’s arms. Was he worth forgiving? Locked away in his room himself in the room and began running the previous few months’ events through his mind: the first call from Hassan, the day he picked up Zainab from the bus park, the night she played music for him, the first encounter, the night he couldn’t even utter a word of prayer when she fell ill. Who would he be praying to? A God he had so terribly disappointed? He just could not get himself to look in His face. Would God even listen to him? It seemed to him a severe case of hypocrisy to be praying for Zainab if the subject of the prayer was not how to get help out of the quagmire he had sunk into since Zainab came into his house. This time however, he knew exactly what to say.

  “Lord, I have failed so woefully. I cannot even believe it myself. I cannot understand how I got this far. I missed it when I let Zainab come here. I am so sorry. I wish I had insisted on telling Hassan ‘NO’. I don’t even know what to do. I cannot believe how nasty this has become. Even Hassan has slept with her. I am so sorry. I wish I had never let this happened. And look what I have become, even with Abena … so shameful. I am so sorry Lord! Please forgive me. ‘If you should mark iniquity, who would stand?’. Help me to be strong. Help me to stop repeating this sin. I am so sorry. Pleas
e take distractive women away from my life. Take Zainab away, take Abena away, take Helen away from me. Lord take all these distractions away from me. I want to live for you. Please help me to be strong. Help me to honour You with my life.”

  Philip spoke to God for almost two hours, praying and crying. The emotional burden on him was heavy. He wanted a radical change that evening. He wanted to be free. He wanted to be restored to the spiritual state he was known for before he arrived in Ghana. He wanted to be confident about preaching the Gospel in public again. He wanted his reputation restored. He wanted to be able to tell those who looked up to him for spiritual guidance back in Nigeria that he lived an upright life abroad. His prayer was heartfelt and intense, and he did receive forgiveness, forgiveness is free. It is given as soon as it is requested. There are no prerequisites for forgiveness except the simple, sincere request. He did hear the Voice though, the Silent Whisper. It had been ages since he heard that soft nudging voice in his heart.

  “Three questions for you, Philip: One. Are you more concerned about Zainab’s forgiveness than about yours? Two. What bothers you most? Your reputation or your relationship with Me? Three. How far can you go to ensure that you do not repeat this error?”

  A week later Philip went through interviews to join the Ushers in Church. Following the interview, a senior member of the team took special interest in him. She was in her fifties, a single mother of a fifteen-year-old girl. She had never been married. She had the most vibrant personality Philip had ever encountered and they got along very well the first time. Philip felt she could help him and he was willing to express himself more freely with her.

  Within the same week Zainab left the house to stay at a cheap hotel till her house was ready. It was a shock to Philip when he came home one night and found she was not there. They hadn’t spoken to each other much since the last quarrel that followed the last sexual encounter. But he couldn’t afford her absence just yet, especially at a hotel. He still felt responsible for her and Hassan was due to arrive in Accra that same week. He did not want Hassan to come and find out he had left her to go and stay at a hotel in a strange country, almost as if Zainab was a little girl. But then, Hassan had sort of handed her over to him, hadn’t he? He dropped his office paraphernalia and dashed out again. As soon as he started the engine he realized he didn’t know which hotel she was at. He dashed back into the living room and picked up the note she left which he had not finished reading. Magenta Hotel. He knew that three-star hotel, it was near the Gazelle West Africa head office where they had met face to face for the first time a few months earlier.