King

My shock lasted only a few seconds before I cupped my lips, letting out a scream. There was no echo, no resonance. It was safe to say that the darkness ate the sounds I made. I liked that. I did it again, making sure to mention the names of the people that had made my life a living hell in the past weeks.

By the time, the noise ceased, I had cursed quite a number of people. I made a small sound and laughed, this actually felt good, refreshing; better than I'd anticipated. It was fun, different from what I was used to and I was more than willing to return here.

There was a honk, three honks from the ship and on cue, the whole place became quiet. Sadness hung in the air. Probably the same sadness that had crept into Uti's voice when she explained what was going on. It had fled when she talked about shouting.

A weight rested on my shoulder and arms wrapped around my waist from behind. The excitement had dwindled, realisation was setting in. In comfortable silence, we watched the ship leave the dock and I knew, I was not going anywhere without her.

* * *

A smile breezed onto my face as we walked out to the main road with our hands woven together to meet Confidence or whatever the uber guy's name was. Without warning, Uti began to laugh. I stilled, wondering if she had heard some of the curses I directed at a particular person she knew.

"Why are you laughing?"

Her laugh quieted down. "I'm happy."

"Me too," I said; I was. 

For a few seconds, our conversations at the port replayed in my head. It was like a confession to a priest but without the penance. No questions asked or answered.

The fact that I didn't have to ask before she told me all about it made the moment even more beautiful. With the sky, sea and warm breeze as our only companions, I had felt closer to her in more ways than one.

Tonight was perfect, minus the gun scare.

Our ride home was in view now, a Toyota Camry with its inner lights on. The road was empty as we crossed over to the other side, the street lights illuminating our path.

Her phone's flashlight came on and she let go of my hand to pull it from her pocket. An unusual sense of loss overtook me and as soon as she put the phone back in her pocket, I placed her hand back in mine.

Unlike our coming here, there was no space left in between us when we settled into the backseat. Uti brought out her phone when the driver asked for our destination, she fiddled with her hands on her lap, her head raised to meet mine but she said nothing.

"What is it?" I asked; the way she bit down on her lower lip had not gone unnoticed by me. It was a new habit of hers that I liked.

"I'd like to see Madam Bose, she's now a grandma. We won't spend much time."

I had no idea who the hell Madam Bose was but Uti was so cute with her fingers drawing random patterns on her trouser. There were many sides to Uti and I was most familiar with the stubborn side but I found this new, shy version of her extremely cute. 

Uti gave the driver her phone after I nodded my approval. I scoffed, she didn't even need to ask, I would have followed her anywhere. When he confirmed the location, she gave the go-ahead for us to leave.

We journeyed in silence with her head propped on my shoulder and my fingers going up and down her arm. Cool air from outside wafted in through the open window and I relaxed further into the seat. This felt all too strange, a good kind of strange and I wanted this moment to last longer.

The car slowed to a halt at the gates of an extremely familiar building and I chuckled, she has got to be kidding me. What would a grandma be doing here and at this time? 

"Really, Uti? Really?"

She responded with a giggle, motioned for me to hold on and then stepped out of the car to open the doors for me; again.

"You didn't have to do that," I said for the second time today and she gave me the same answer. A part of me liked that she did it but I would never admit it out loud.

Today was my first time of having a woman open the doors for me; it was unusually nice. If I knew this was how relationships worked, I might have signed up sooner for it. I was glad I didn't or else, I would have missed Uti and her little cuties.

We walked hand in hand to the back door that was guarded by heavily built men. I spared a look around, the garage was not as full as it would have been on a weekend. 

Who would have thought that this amount of people would be present at a strip club on a Monday night? Maybe I would even ask Uti for a dance, preferably a lap dance.

At the door, the bouncers exchanged smiles and pleasantries with Uti, when they turned to me, all traces of that was gone. The fatter one among them asked, "u sabi komsent?" 

"What?"

He shook his head at me like I was dumb and his partner put an arm over his chest to stop him from taking a step forward. "He means consent," he said. "What's consent?"

Was this a joke? 

From their facial expressions, it wasn't. I ran my hands through my face, not only did someone point a gun at us earlier now we were being questioned by chubby men in suit, asking the definition of a word I was certain they didn't know its meaning. 

"Tell us or leave. What is consent?"

Uti squeezed my hand, urging me to tell them what they wanted. Fuck it. "Approval."

The saner one of the two nodded like he was pleased with my answer. "No means no, yes means yes, stop means stop."

To please him and avoid being kept here any longer, I repeated after him in a bored tone. "No is no. Yes is yes. Stop is stop."

After a quick search and a final pat to my pocket, he let me in. I released a sigh I didn't realise I was holding while trying to process what the hell just happened. The last time I was here, I'd spent less than two minutes at the door with those same bouncers.

My eyes did a brief scan of the club. Horny men crowded the stage where a female with big ass and tiny breasts danced for them. They urged her on with their catcalls and whistles, some of them threw money to the stage. She bent down with her scantily covered derriere to them, twerked for a while before grinding against the pole. 

Her dance moves reminded me of a particular female; Amber Lee. But this dancer was without a mask and the long hair. Thinking of it now, I never met Amber in person except for her videos that I have not watched in a long time. Something, rather, someone else now held my fancy.

At the thought of Uti, my gaze lowered to my empty hand and my eyes swept over the room again. We were holding hands just now. I took another look around me and my vision was flooded with women in net meshes that left nothing to the imagination.

They were dancing on men in dim-lit corners while the rest paraded the club with empty trays on their hands and eyes on the lookout for their next catch, probably me if I continued standing here moping.

Laughter floated into my eardrums and I trailed the source to the bar. Uti was leaning in front of the bar, hands akimbo and eyes roaming the place, probably searching for me. It made me feel warm on the insides to know that she was also looking for me.

My brain finally sent a command and my feet moved in her direction. "Hey." 

She pursed her lips as if she wanted to reprimand me but changed her mind. Then she pulled me to a stool and sat on the empty one beside it. A frown took over my face momentarily, she should have taken a seat on my laps, it was more comfortable.

"Alex." The bartender raised his head from the cup in his hands. "What's going on?" Uti gestured in the direction of the door.

Without meaning to, my gaze moved to his face, searching for any signs of attraction towards Uti. His stoic expression was intact as he murmured an answer to her question.

"One of the strippers was raped last week."

The nonchalance with which he spoke made me wonder how much horror he had witnessed inside and outside of this place.

Uti stiffened beside me and one of her hands reached out for me as though seeking protection. I did better at masking my surprise, our fingers now intertwined.

"Who?" Uti's voice came out small like she was personally affected. I raised her hand to my lips, placing feather-like kisses on her knuckles and she smiled thankfully at me.

I didn't realise until now that something like that could happen here. Some strippers were willing to have sex with you at the right price but the main rule was never to touch them without their permission.

Consent.

It hit me then: the reason why the bouncers had asked but was that enough precaution?

I liked women, oh, I did and I enjoyed sex just as much but the idea of being intimate with someone who squirmed under me from pain, not pleasure was enough for my erection to deflate. Why would anyone in the right frame of mind want to have sex with an unwilling partner?

"You don't know her," Alex finally replied; his gaze darted between me and Uti, "she resumed shortly after you ... You quit."

Quit what? Ah, yes. Uti used to work here as the bartender. That felt like a lifetime ago and though I never asked, I was glad to hear that she quit working here long ago.

"Is it working?" By working, I assumed she meant the questioning method at the door.

"It is o." I couldn't help the surprised laugh that slipped from my lips. "Plenty of these men don't understand the meaning of consent. Some of them think no means yes."

My chest swelled with pride that shrunk considerably when I remembered my attitude to the bouncers. At least, I was not on the list of men who didn't understand the word; I would never associate with them.

"How's Madam Bose handling it?"

Madam Bose is real? When we arrived at the strip club instead of a family house, I simply thought Uti had been too shy to tell me that we were headed here.

"Not very well, some of her patrons are major defaulters." He dropped a towel on the counter. "She's losing customers."

I looked around and truly, the place was scanty. Tables that used to be full were empty and I realised that it had nothing to do with the fact that today was a workday.

"I'll go check on her," Uti murmured and the bartender nodded. She slipped cash I didn't realise she had been holding into his hands and he reached out for a hug.

They broke off from the hug but their eyes remained on each other like they were silently communicating. Perhaps, the fact that they had worked together in the past had something to do with that but it didn't stop me from clearing my throat loudly.

"Are you okay?" I asked her as we made our way through a long corridor with coloured lights. She had not taken the news well.

We stopped in front of a door, she sighed. "I was just thinking ... It could have been me."

No way. Whoever raped that stripper was crazy but he wouldn't have been crazy enough to do something like that at the bar. And I would never let anything bad happen to her, not on my watch. I didn't get a chance to tell her that or reassure her before she pushed the door open.

"Madam Bose," Uti greeted a slim woman sitting on a swivel chair in the middle of the room or rather office, a really decent one.

She was stunned momentarily and then a look of pleasant surprise took over her face. She jumped from her seat and the two hugged like old friends who had not seen each other in years. She tilted Uti's chin up, turned her face left and then right like a mother inspecting her child after a big fight.

"How are you?" Madam Bose asked; her voice was laced with a softness that made you want to talk to her about anything.

"I'm fine," Uti replied with one of her happy smiles. "I heard what happened."

Madam Bose's shoulders slumped and her face seemed to age in those few seconds. Wrinkles appeared on her forehead, the lines at the corners of her eyes deepened; she sighed. I could tell that she was a smiley person but none of that was evident now.

"My dear," she plastered on a smile that was easily identifiable as fake, "we are doing our best." She took Uti's hands in hers, her mood back to what it was when we entered. "Forget that one jare, how are your babies?"

She knows? I felt a small pang in my chest. It seemed like everyone knew except me and I couldn't help wondering if she would have mentioned it if Mother never did.

"They're fine." Uti slipped her iPhone from her pocket, showing her pictures of them. 

I was soon forgotten as the two ogled over pictures of Uti's kids, discussing how grown they have become. I watched them from my position at the door, hands in my pocket and one ankle crossed over the other. The women before me were a happy sight and it felt sacrilegious to break them apart or call attention to my presence. 

"What about you, how is your grandbaby?"

Madam Bose face lit up and she hurried over to the table to retrieve her phone. 

My phone rang and madam Bose jumped. I offered her an apologetic grin, already bringing the device out of my pocket. From the corner of my eyes, I watched her hit Uti on the arm and the two giggled. It was obvious they were talking about me, not like Madam Bose was being subtle about it.

"Madam Bose. Good evening," I greeted after my call ended and they both giggled. I hesitated in speaking up but a look at Uti's cheeky grin encouraged me to go on. "If there's any way we can be of help ..."

I deliberately left the rest of the statement hanging, hoping she would take the hint and she did.

"Owo la need," she responded in Yoruba. 

The only words I got out of her statement were need and owo. Thanks to Tomiwa I knew that owo meant money, the same way I knew it meant ego in Uche's language.

"What bank do you use?" I asked. 

"Access."

I spared a glance at Uti and her facial expression screamed, what are you doing? I winked at her and a shy smile adorned her lips. She was pretty without even trying. 

Bringing out my phone, I turned to Madam Bose. "Account number."

"O. O." 

It took a few seconds for me to realise she meant the number zero not the letter o and I chuckled. I could feel Uti's gaze on me as I typed in the seven digits amount so I made sure not to look in her direction.

A ping came soon after the transfer; it was from Madam Bose's phone. She lifted the phone to her face and her mouth dropped open. "O ti o, it's a lie. Alert ti de."

It was hard to keep up with her Yoruba, even more difficult to believe that the woman who had been speaking English so fluently could switch this easily to her local dialect. I was impressed.

"From me and Uti, to you," I explained at the mention of the word, alert. "Congrats on the latest addition to your family."

Madam Bose danced for a bit to an inaudible song, muttering words that I forgot as soon as they left her mouth. She straightened up. "Wo, God will bless you."

"You, come here." She gestured for Uti to come and stand beside me. When she did, Madam Bose pushed her phone into her bosom and held us by our arms. "O se, oko mi. God will bless both of you for me very well. Your pockets will never run dry."

Still, in disbelief, she looked at her phone again, then performed a similar dance to the first. Uti giggled, folding her arms across her chest. Madam Bose was happy and I was happy to see that Uti felt the same.

Uti looked at me then puckered her lips as if inviting me for a kiss. I was tempted to pull her close, to suck on those lips of hers to see if it would taste like those orange things we drank before coming here. I didn't. Instead, I stared at her two-toned lips until she noticed, smiled shyly and looked away.

"What is it?" I asked when we left Madam Bose's office. Uti had been quiet since.

"How much did you give her?"

"What you give with your left hand, don't let your eyes see it." Those were not the exact words but they read something like that.

"What?" She asked with a laugh; I shrugged.

"That's how they say it in church," I responded, leaving out the fact that I have not been to a worship house in forever.

She shook her head, laughter increasing. "When you give with your left hand, don't let the right hand know." Her head turned slightly. "You need to change your church."

"To yours?"

We took a turn by the left before she spoke again. "Maybe." Then her hand wrapped around mine, pulling us to a stop in the middle of the near dark, empty corridors. 

My forehead furrowed as I twisted to face her. In a voice that was barely above a whisper, "do you want to kiss me?"

*****

Media: Net mesh.

A lot happened in this chapter, I know, ndo. Since the number of rape cases increased, I knew I had to talk about it but I didn't find the right chapter to do that until now. Those of you that were expecting King to find out that Uti is Amber Lee 🤭🤭

Rape is bad. I don't support it, Kuti doesn't support it, you shouldn't either and you owe it to YOU to surround yourself with people who understand that too. S/he is a stripper, s/he is naked, unless s/he gives permission, do not touch them. It's not hard, I promise.

PS: Thank y'all for 30K reads. 'Tis very very appreciated. Don't forget to vote, comment and share with your friends too. And Happy Birthday to my mother.

Q: What is consent?