MONALISA (chapter 4)

My dad once told me that life wasn’t all about skirts and beautiful faces, he would from time to time assert that paper was the ultimate goal of a good life. This one advice changed my life for good, from chasing Monalisa to chasing real papers. A man must survive, so did I. However, my ex, Wendy crowned this other phase of my life, she made me what I became and somehow connected me to a fate I had always wished for, in an ugly way though.

Apparently, she had been stalking me all that while and got every detail about my quest for love unsuccessfully, the hell broke loose when she publicly declared me a looser. Maybe she was right, I was a looser, I lost her when I thought that she was my whole world. She met this one guy from abroad and dumped me like I didn’t deserve her in the first place. She was having the best of her life in Canada while I was still chasing on an invisible native girl like a bee to nectar. So many times she’d complain of winter while back in my town I bitterly complained about the scorching sun.

We were two worlds apart; she was living my dream life while me living in her worst horror movie, there was a bridge between us, one that I could never cross easily. The more she attacked me on social media the more she inspired me to make it. My worst days were those when she’d use my pictures for memes. I was a laughing stock and it just had to change that, I had to make it, legal or illegal.

There I was, putting pressure on myself, given up on finding love and totally forgot Monalisa. My ultimate goal was just to make it and then everything else would just follow the money trail. As you all know, the easiest way to earn big is making it illegally, if that’s not the case then use your rich uncles in government parastatals as examples. It started out a little, from conning unsuspecting citizens to other methods.

I was so lucky to survive all through; not even once had I been apprehended for such uncouth behaviors. Maybe Onyango Raballa, my ancestor was interceding with the gods of the land every time I was about to land into problems. You must all be asking how I’d feel every time I conned, honestly, the only moment I regretted was that time I conned an old man his money purported for his cancer treatment, that feeling haunted for a while but still at the sight of every single denomination of his money, guilt swept away, simultaneously.

Sooner than expected, my phone numbers and pseudo accounts had been listed, an awareness was created too and therefore it was so difficult to earn a living. Sometimes I’d go for a week without a single hunt, pathetic! I changed my earning tactic after meeting an accomplice of mine.

That was the beginning of the complex life that followed thereafter. Max was his name, a pianist at the famous St. Jude’s ACK, that one church that I frequented to connect to its public Wi-Fi. He had fell out with the pastor claiming that the latter was exploiting him without paying a penny. Max had been serving the church for six good years without a little cent, every time he’d approach the pastor, she’d be caressed by Bible verses that were carefully directed against him. He was fed up. He had a plan, and being a friend who he knew so much about he decided to tag me along alongside four others. He was the mastermind behind the heist.

The plan was in place. Every plan towards execution of the heist worked out so well. We had packed our car directly opposite to the rough road that connected to the main one, 100 meters away. John sat at the front seat in the church, where he could easily reach for the cash as planned. Max was at his instrument as usual, Ted was at the back, his eyes checking on anyone who would be a problem to us, at my far left was Mary, an ex-soldier, interdicted for allegedly refusing to quench her boss’ thirst.

She would be of so much help to us, and there I was in the second right column, approximately fifty steps to John and perpendicularly opposite Max. I had mini-pistol with me, just in case someone tried to outshine Jesus as the Savior of the day. Lastly, our driver, Harry, also next to the entrance just like Ted. He’d leave the church building exactly 10 minutes before the heist and start the car engine.

The church had a fundraiser, it wasn’t the first nor the last, for the last three years, they had so many but still the purpose wasn’t fulfilling. Some church members could be heard even on that material day complaining about the funds mismanagement and how they talked ill about their pastor. Well, we had just come to their rescue too, just a matter of time. Soon the guests arrived and everyone sat as per the church directions. That day began with a sermon.