CHAPTER FIVE

Lele and I are at the locker room with Sizwe, who has brought us shots. I down one shot and frown at the taste and the burn in my throat. I bring a slice of lemon to my mouth and bite into it to release its sour juice, making me frown all the more. 'You know, there is this one guy at the VIP section who has been following you with his eyes all night long.' Lele says, giving me a sly look. 'The one in a brown suit?' Sizwe asks and Lele nods at him. 'I noticed too. He pays no one attention but you.' Sizwe continues. My mind rushes back to when the man visibly seduced me and how he succeeded. My breathing grew rapid and I could barely think straight. I felt hot and bothered, and all the more because I could conjure up the size from its imprint. 'You should go back to the VIP section and hear him out when we take their champagne bottles there, apparently its his birthday.'

'Then let's go and prepare before he leaves.' I say, already getting up. Lele jolts from the chair and rushes to her locker, where she pulls out a lipstick and a wet wipe. 'I have been waiting for this night, since you first set foot here.' She says holding my face as she wipes my lips clean. 'What night?' I ask, genuinely confused but she hushes me as she begins to apply the liquid lipstick on my lips. 'There, you look gorgeous. And stop pulling the dress down, makes you look like you have a low self-esteem.' But I do have it. 'And make sure to give him a sight he will enjoy. You know, if I had a body like yours, I would never sit down.' I don't even know what she's talking about but I laugh at her anyway. 'Now think Goddess, you are beautiful, confident and strong. Don't give everything to him now, use your famous teasing skills and paint a picture for him, of what he could have.' Famous teasing skills, why didn't I know about these skills of mine?

In my baffled state, Lele pulls me out of the locker room and we follow Sizwe to the bar, where we have to set up the bottles of champagne. In our shift, its only Lele, Linah and I who work at the VIP section and the only ones who are allowed to work there. Linah has been working here longer than me but she replaced a girl who was fired for stealing from customers whereas I replaced someone who was suspended and is now back. Her name is Mimi, she hates me to death. Sizwe hands us three the bottles of champagne and we begin our journey to the VIP section. My eyes are on a rampage as they keep scouring the section for the man who has apparently had his eyes on me the entire evening. Immediately when I find him, our eyes lock and I feel like air has been knocked right out of my lungs. As we ascend the mini staircase to the VIP section, my body grows excited because I am closer to him.

My eyes refuse to leave his as we encircle the table before placing the bottles of champagne down. I noticed there are now four girls in the section, sitting with the gentlemen and they couldn't be more excited to see the champagne. Lele nudges my arm and gestures with her head, pointing at the man. I roll my eyes at her before spinning on my heels and making my way towards him. The intensity of his eyes doesn't falter even as I sit next to him, on his arm rest. 'Gentleman,' I greet him, my eyes falling to his lips and I watch as he downs the remainder of his glass content. 'Akani Nyathi,' he says, extending his hand towards me. I smile softly and take his hand to shake it. 'Uhuru Makwetu,' a smirk plays on his lips as he brings my hand up to his lips and kisses my knuckles while looking right into my eyes. 'Nice to finally meet you, Uhuru.'

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Time is fast moving when you don't want it to. I have spent merely an hour or two with Akani and I found talking to him easier than I had anticipated. Its evident that he was a bit intoxicated and his eyes were clouded with lust, hence the intensity they hold. We didn't really get personal, our conversations were about anything and everything except us. You can tell by the way he speaks that he's either really intelligent or manipulative. However way he is, my panties are soaked as I sit straddling his lap. I have been doing as Lele said, teasing him and not just because Lele said so, but because I'm genuinely curious about this man who dared demand my attention and received it. It is almost midnight and majority of his friends have left, if I may call them that. I barely had any work done tonight but I guess keeping the birthday man entertained is on my job description.

I have made a couple of observations about Akani. He is a hands on man, very touchy and yet he uses the very same hands to talk. His one hand has been shifting from my waist, to caressing my bareback and to just placing it atop my ass. Thinking of how this would have usually made me uncomfortable, I begin to fear that what Lele once said to me was true, and this industry is beginning to swallow me up. 'What will you be doing tomorrow?' He asks, his head resting on my shoulder. The softness of his tone and the way his warm breath caresses my skin, makes me slightly shiver against him. I gulp before answering his question. 'Resting.' My tone is just as soft, matching his. 'I'd like to see you before the end of the day, can we make that a possibility?' He asks, pulling out an expensive cellphone from his pocket. He hands me the damned device, the screen displaying a keypad of numbers. I quickly type in my numbers, and save them under my name before handing the phone back to him.

'By the way, you have quite the unique name,' he says, wrapping both his arms around my waist after he retrieves his cellphone. I smile because I get that often enough, I might as well write a song about it. 'It means freedom, my mother named me Uhuru because I freed her from the clutches of pain and humiliation. Even though I am her first and last child, I am proof that she was not barren, as the family she married into had assumed.' A painful life that my mother led because her in-laws thought she was barren. My father was almost forced to marry Nkokheli's mother because not only had she given them a son but she was quick about it too. My mother only found out about his existence two years into their marriage, when the family began asking her about why she still hadn't fallen pregnant. 'That is a touching story, she must have took time to think of the name.'

After much struggle, I manage to free myself from Akani's grasp and get up from his lap. 'I need to get back to work before I lose my job.' I catch a sly smile on his face and watch as he leans back against the couch. 'I will surely keep in touch, Uhuru,' There is a bit of amusement in his voice. I just nod at him and turn around to walk away but stop in my tracks. I look at him over my shoulder. 'And happy birthday.' I then walk away from him. Something unsettling stirs inside me, like I am to take a dive into a vast and dark ocean where I will no longer find the way in, the way out or even a ray of sunlight. I feel defiled. And when I pass by Lele and she gives me a discreet thumbs up, that's when I truly feel that I am losing myself because I never agreed with any thing she has ever done and yet I was allowing her and everyone else who comes to this club to live lives they wouldn't want their parents to see them live, to influence me.