On Friday Kemi and I decided to bond over making tiramisu and watching TV. (Okay I supervised and decided what we'd watch). We started off the evening in the supermarket where we went a bit wild. Ended up with a very heavy bag of groceries which we lugged between us. As we were waiting for the bus, a guy in a Mercedes pulls up and asked
'Where are you going girls? Do you need a lift?"
I blurted out "Yes please" and without hesitating hauled the bag into the back seat, gesturing for Kemi to get in. She almost had an apoplectic fit and whispered furiously,
"Kim, what you doing? You don't even know the guy!"
"But the bus is taking ages to come"
Layi (his name) drove us home. (I must add caveat that Kemi was strongly opposed to this) and then asked us what our plans were for the evening.
"We’re making tiramisu"
You could tell that he wanted us to ask him in. He kept dropping hints, which I ignored and instead thanked him profusely for his kindness. Before he drove off, he asked if he could come and visit us from time to time. "yeah, that would be nice"
"How will I contact you?
So I gave him my number and that was that....
An hour later I got a call from him.
"How’s the tiramisu coming along? Umm, I've got a bottle of wine, and it's really not great to drink on my own. Can I come over and share with you girls?"
"Oh alright then, come over"
Kemi - “What you doing Kim... we don't even know the guy.... what if the wine is poisoned... we need to call someone and let them know that we have a STRANGE man coming to our house.... let’s put out Bibles and play Christian music"
Maybe I'm too trusting but unlike Kemi I wasn't suspicious. Layi brought a nice bottle of French red wine (it wasn't poisoned… see I’m still alive), and stayed chatting until like 3.00am when I politely threw him out (or else he would have gone on for longer). Quite knowledgeable, well travelled, appeared to be genuinely interested in people - a bit of name dropping here and there. Lousy taste in music. He DISSED Beyonce. Hmm! Kemi claims that he was directing all the conversation to me and that he really liked me. (Well she was giving him the third degree ‘Who are you? Where do you work? What kind of family are you from?) I didn't pick up any ‘I like you vibes’. I never do unless it’s blatant. Actually Layi reminds me of one of my best friends, Eddie, who passed away 4 years ago. I can see Eddie doing the same thing.
Typical extravert,
Totally spontaneous
Or maybe he was a bit lonely and just wanted company.
Unfortunately I don’t think we’ll be hearing from him again. He phoned on Sunday morning – I was at church. So he said he’d phone later. When he did, I was on my way to church again for the evening service. He couldn’t have gotten off the phone any quicker. His last words were a vague. “Okay, I’ll phone you some time’
Yeah, and we know what that means…
NEVER.
