"It's usually someone close to you that the devil uses to disgrace you" Mama raged that evening. I didn't blame her, we were all angry. Uncle Monday has done it again.
The whole house has been filled with excitement and preparations since two weeks ago after Emeka, my cousin announced his wedding. Mama was the eldest daughter in her family so she handled the preparations. Anyway, not until Uncle Monday showed up from nowhere like mosquitos singing in your ear immediately after a power outage.
Honestly, right from childhood, I never understood how he was related to us. Trust me, he wasn’t even a brother related by blood to Mama. He was just one of those “family friends” who had been around since I was small. The kind your uncles and aunties tell you everyday of how he helped raise you even though you can’t remember him ever buying you sweets or candies
Dressed in his usual brown sandals and an almost faded cap he. He barged in sweating and breathing on everyone's face.
“My people!” he said, clapping his hands. “This is our wedding too. We can't allow Emeka to do a one-corner wedding. It needs to be loud. He needs our support."
Mama nodded from her seat where she sat peeling pumpkin seeds. "So what do we do?"
Before anyone would even talk, Uncle Monday, pulled out a notebook and a biro that was already chewing gum at the edge.
“You people don't need to worry. I’ve already drawn up a budget. We need roughly nine hundred and fifty thousand in total. We have to secure a hall first, then food, chairs, and decorations. Oh, plus miscellaneous."
“What is miscellaneous?” Uncle Ike, the illiterate one asked.
Uncle Monday laughed heartily. Exposing his brown teeth. “Ike, in every plan there's usually extra cash for small-small expenses. Even if a goat is to marry, they'll put miscellaneous."
I kept looking from my quiet spot in the sitting room as everyone laughed. Mama nodded.“Very detailed. Very, very detailed.” she continued. "So are we to contribute?" She asked.
"Yes," Uncle Monday replied. "I've already contacted my friend who manages a very large hall. He has promised to keep it for me on that very date, but I just need to give him part payment."
Without arguing. Contributions started flying around. Transfers from one bank to another. Uncle Ike, who hates keeping his money in the bank, walked to his car and brought out a huge envelope which he dropped at Uncle Monday's feet. Even those that weren't present were called and they all promised to send their quota soon.
I kept watching in silence as all this took place. Somehow within me, I knew something was off. I didn’t know what exactly, but my stomach didn’t sit well anytime Brother Monday was around. I've always known him to be someone who wasn't straightforward. Yet, even after scamming his supposed siblings in the past, they still found a way to trust him wholeheartedly.
On second thought. I don't blame them. Uncle Monday was too smooth. He can win your heart easily. Sometimes without even saying a word.
I kept keeping close tabs on him but in a silent way. Making sure to remind Mama in a subtle way to ask him about his progress with the wedding plans.
“Have you paid for the hall?” Mama would ask.
He will smile. “Ah! I just completed the payment for the hall last week. I even have the receipt." He would play with his pocket, pretending to search for the receipt. "Ah! I left it at home.”
Another day, Mama will ask, “Go with Emeka and his wife to be to the decorator so they can be sure and maybe select the colors they want.”
Uncle Monday will laugh. “ I will give them her number, later.”
But I was sure he never did. I kept wondering how everyone was so blinded to the scam he was. I didn't want to accuse him directly, because I knew that even if I did, no one would believe me. So I decided to play smart with him. I didn't know how but I kept hoping I would catch him.
A few weeks before the wedding, Emeka barged in one day, yelling about how Uncle Monday had scammed them. When he was asked what happened, he replied that ever since he had been asking Uncle Monday to take him to see the venue of the wedding, Uncle Monday kept postponing, but on that day, he became so serious that he drove to Uncle Monday's house.
Uncle Monday had welcomed him and asked him to wait there for him to go down the street and get something. Till evening, Uncle Monday never returned, and his phone was switched off. Turns out he hadn't even paid a kobo for the wedding.
“What do you mean he hasn’t paid a kobo?” Mama asked. “He said the caterer had already started buying the stuff needed for cooking!”
Emeka raged. "Call him and find out if I'm living or not".
Mama called and just as Emeka said. Uncle Monday's line wasn't connecting. She blamed it on Uncle Monday's phone running out of battery. By morning, when Mama called again his line wasn't connecting. Mama called his girlfriend and was told that he had “traveled.” Just like that.
That evening, Uncle Ike came to our house with a plastic chair and said, “Let me sit down and process this madness.”
No one wanted to believe they had been scammed again by that one man who they had trusted so foolishly.
Luckily for Emeka, the wedding still held. Though this time, it was smaller but honestly, better. No one had to pretend. Emeka was happy. The food was enough. The music was loud. And there was no miscellaneous.
