By Corporal Mark Jr.
Dear Genevieve Nnaji,
I’m one among the many men whose obsession with you has gone agog and brought them to their knees. I’m writing in awe that I pause every minute to think.
Yes, because I’m to reveal an age -long secret which I have kept to myself for more than one and a half a decade. Besides, I don’t know what people in this Topsy-Turvy world would think of me.
It is commonplace for them to call me a delusional vagabond. Well, I don’t care what runs through their insipid heart anymore, for it is better I say it now than come to regret in later years that I never said it.
However, before I say anything, I need to slide through the groove that leads to my far misty past; it is from this past that this fiery and melodramatic connection with you began.
It all started in 1999 when I, in a high-spirited manner, watched the movie titled IJELE on a white and black colored TV screen.
Seeing you then, I was stunned by your raw beauty and completely disarmed by the glistening innocence with which your face was naturally manicured.
And from that day I became a prisoner of yours that you didn’t know about. I made you the heroine of my heart, and nurtured the false feeling that I will someday wrap you in my arms as though we just freshly fell in love.
Of course, you may say this feeling was prompted by a light juvenile fantasy. But it followed me into my sleep that I caught the flashes of you neatly dressed in a white garment – the type angels wear in Hollywood.
Many a time I tried to kill that feeling. But it died today and resurrected the next day. So I accepted it as something I could not escape from.
Deep into the night when all were fast asleep and those who snore defiled the silence, I turned on the TV to watch your movies alone in the sitting room.
Whenever you make a solemn love confession to your partner in the movie, I quickly put myself in his place and assume it was me you said them to.
Unnatural and crazy as the act may seem, those words belted my pulse and soul, and from them I felt a thrill of hope that sustained me while I watched till the end.
Any time I heard that you are still single, my hope multiplied, and the wish to be with you clumsily solidified, too. Perhaps I felt my ancestors, bayonets in their hands, were fighting for me.
But after some years of not realising this dream, I began to think with my head. The fact that we are of different worlds became glaring – you were a phenomenal star, while I was an incredulously naive chap.
And as soon as this resounding thought sank into my head, and settled fairly as an irrecoverable insight, I retired from this fatiguing journey and became your fan for life.
Now, as one of your die-hard fans, I no longer feel weary or panic when I take a seat in the Genesis Cinema, with a cup full of porncorn and coke in hand, watching a movie which you are featured in.
Sincerely yours, Corporal Mark Jr.
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