Alright, so last week we realize Jacob sends a lovely message intended for his girlfriend after a great sexual encounter to his wife and after realizing the gravity of what he has done, he thinks of a way to get the message off the wife’s phone before she sees it. In case you missed it, you can read from here Story Time: Read Francis Doku’s “The SMS” which will soon become a movie but here is the continuation.
Conitnuation:
“Did I have water in my mouth when I said it the first time? I HAVE NOT RECEIVED A TEXT MESSAGE FROM YOU,” Becky screamed.
“Goddamn it I am dead, goddamn it I am dead!” he exclaimed.
“Why are you cursing?”
“I think I have sent the message to my wife, no I know I have sent the message to my wife!”
“Yieee you are dead,” she said teasingly. “But how did you do that?”
“You know I saved her name with B-E-C-K-I-E and your name B-E-C-K-Y but when I was sending the message I chose her own instead of yours.”
“I am really dead; I will call you back okay?”
“Okay but….” Jacob cut the line before she would finish her sentence. He got off his chair and started to walk from one corner of the office to the other muttering to himself “what do I do, what do I do” for about five minutes.
He walked back to his chair, sat down and decided to call his wife. He picked the phone, went through her phonebook to the B section and having picked the name Beckie, he pressed the call button but he cut the call before it would ring.
He looked at his palm and saw the sweat. He touched his brow and felt the moist – beads of sweat were forming. He looked at the split air conditioner on the wall and it was at the lowest temperature – 16.
He pressed the call button on the phone again and this time he allowed it to ring. The phone rang through to the end. He called again but no one picked the call. He tried the third time and yet again the phone rang to the end without anyone picking. He tried the fourth time and it was the same result.
He took out his handkerchief and wiped the beads of sweat that had now become palpable from his forehead. “What do I do now?” he asked himself. After thinking for a minute or two he picked up the handset of the Vodafone branded landline phone on his desk and dialed 0 for front desk. “Ama, can you kindly call my wife on her office line for me?” he sad and hanged up. He put his head on the desk and started to tap his left foot on the carpet pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa “cring cring” the phone rang and he picked it up in haste.
“Hello,” he said.
It was Ama the receptionist at the other end “Mr. Asante, I was told your wife is in a meeting and would call back immediately she is done.”
“How many minutes?” he asked Ama
“I have no idea, but her secretary said it won’t be long,” Ama explained.
“Thank you very much, Ama,” he said, hanged up and sighed.
He opened the folder Kate brought to him earlier and tried to make a sense of the contents. He was not seeing anything written in there. He closed the folder. He got off the chair and walked to the door. Jacob opened the door and eased himself out of his office, walked through the adjoining office where Kate and another colleague were seated.
He turned right through the corridor and took left at the end to the washroom. He stood over the water closet, unzipped his flap, brought out his manhood to urinate but for about three minutes no urine dropped. He put it back and zipped the trousers. He walked to the mirror and looked at himself. “I think I have grown old in the last ten minutes,” he soliloquized. He washed his hands and went back to his office.
When he entered the office his phone was ringing and when he rushed to pick it up, it was his wife’s office line. He looked up to the ceiling and then picked the call.
“Hello Jacob here,” he said.
“Yeah Jake, it’s me, I understand you called a while ago,” Rebecca said.
“Yes I did…..I was calling to….to….find out how you were,” he struggled to say.
“I don’t get it Jake, its 10am and you have not done anything like that in the last four years,” she responded questioningly.
“Of course, but I mean people change, don’t they.”
“So you’ve changed, but please tell me the real reason why you called. You don’t call the entire day until you are on your way coming to pick me home.”
“Well I was trying to reach you on your mobile phone but there was no response so I called your office…”
“Just to find out how I am?” she cut him. “Well I left my phone at home. I only realized it when you dropped me off this morning and I wanted to call the school to find out how Maame was,” she said.
Jacob heaved a silent sigh and made the sign of the cross. “Actually I was trying to find out if you were able to call the teacher,” he capitalized on the situation.
“Well I am fine, but I was not able to call her because I left my phone and I have not memorized her number. I am sure she will be fine. And so if you have nothing else to say can we end this conversation so I can go back to work and we talk later when you pick me up,” she suggested.
“Sure. Will pick you up in the evening and do remember I love you.”
“I will and I love you too,” Rebecca said before hanging up.
“O God, thank you,” Jacob said as he punched the air!
Jacob Asante had been married for five years to Rebecca Amoah. Maame their only daughter was three years old. Jacob worked as an investment advisor with a brokerage firm at Asylum Down while Rebecca works as a partner in one of the leading law firms at Labone both in Accra.
What’s next for Jacob? Would he drive home for his wife’s phone? What if there is a password on it? Come back next week for the continuation. It’s “The SMS”.
