Its been almost a month since kola broke up with me. I never thought I could survive a broken relationship let alone a heartbreak of that magnitude. I mean I contemplated suicide once or twice but thank God I did not push through with it. I can only imagine what people would have been saying about my family but that's all in the past now.
After the whole incident with kola, I decided to take some time off at work. Being the head of the "HR" department at Vidacommunications has its privileges; I get to take time off when I want, I can work from home whenever I feel like it and the office comes with a personal assistant who keeps me updated with progress at the office whenever I'm away so I'm always informed about happenings at the office.
Its a very loud and busy Monday morning, I'm stuck in Lagos traffic on the third mainland bridge with nothing but a clueless radio station to keep myself amused. I wonder how they get radio licensing these days, one cannot even listen to good music anymore. I miss the good old days when you could entertain yourself with radio mix tapes of Marvin gaye, Lionel Richie and Michael Bolton just to mention a few. I turned off the radio out of frustration, arched my back against the car seat in an attempt to unstiffen my body at the same time combing through my mind in search of thoughts to keep me distracted. Having been moving slowly through the jam and then finally getting to a gridlock, I couldn't help but notice this guy in a Mercedes Benz 350 Who just kept staring at me like he had some sort of "viewership" rights. I just had to put him in his place. I motioned at him with a gesture that could be interpreted as "see something you're looking for?" He responded with a large grin, exposing his rather brownish teeth.
"Quite a nice ride you've got there" he said,
" you sure that's the only thing you're seeing?" I replied with a sarcastic tone to my voice while sticking out my middle finger provocatively. "Bloody Yoruba dogs" I said to myself disgruntledly as I rolled up my tinted glass windows, turned on the air conditioning and concentrated on thoughts of making a good first impression with the new management at the office.
The Vidacommunications building was a rather imposing structure, one that the owners took personal pride in. With an exterior glass finishing, the building had become one of the interesting landmarks in Lagos. Consisting of fifty floors and with a staggering height of 675ft, the Vidacommunications building was a giant castle overlooking the ocean. I came in through the ranks of this company as a data analyst and after five years I'm still amused every time I ride the elevator, maybe because I'm always bequeathed with an unadulterated view of the still ocean as it forms a flawlessly articulated backdrop for the magnificent sub Saharan sunrise.
"Welcome to Vidacommunications" the female automated electronic voice chorused "the time is 8 O Clock". " cling cling" The elevator bell rang Signalling arrival at my destination. The elevator door slid open as I walked into the 33rd floor of the building, the HR floor. After two weeks of being absent at the office, everything still looked the same. I sucked in a lung full of breath, exhaled relaxedly and then proceeded towards my office. My office was quite a large space, enough space for me to gossip with my best pal at the office.
"Good morning boss" Emeka walked into my office, he'd always had this bad habit of walking into my office unannounced. I would have had his head for it maybe three years ago but now I just have to live with it, Emeka will never change. I mean I disliked him so much when I first met him, thought he was gay because he was acting all girly and then Emeka loves being in front of the camera, little wonder why he is the head of the media unit at vidacom.
"Talk of the devil" I said "was just thinking about you".
" who wouldn't be thinking about me" Emeka replied, his face beaming with pride as he tried to hilariously pull off a Michael Jackson moonwalk. "Anyways I came to see how my favourite person at work was doing and to remind you about the meeting with the new management", " and please don't be late" he said with a mischievous grin on his face, "you'll thank me later".
