Nnenna woke up to the sound of the alarm around 5:30 am. She quickly rushed to the bathroom to have her bathe.

After coming out of the shower, she dressed up, styled her hair and applied a light make up. She was admiring herself in the mirror when Chinasa woke up from sleep.

Chinasa was surprised to see Nnenna dressed up. She quickly checked the time and discovered that it was 6:ooam.

“Nnenna what is going on? Why are you dressed up by this time?”

“I am getting ready for work,” Nnenna answered.

Chinasa could not suppress laughter. “I don’t understand. You told me that your resumption time is 8:00am. Your office is just a stone throw from here. Why did you get ready so early?”

“My dear, I don’t want to take chances,” Nnenna replied.

Afterwards, she rushed into the kitchen to prepare Milo and milk which she ate with bread. After that, she decided to relax a bit before going out.

Nnenna had applied to a cosmetics company to work as receptionist. Her dream was to establish cosmetics business. However, she was afraid that if she start such without experience, the business might crumble.

She decided to drop her CV at some cosmetics companies around the area she was living. Luckily, one of them offered her employment as a receptionist.

Nnenna glanced at her phone screen when a WhatsApp message popped up. She discovered that a strange number sent a message to her. She was wondering who the person could be. She however decided to view the profile picture of the message sender before opening the message.

That was when she discovered that Stanley sent the message. She drew a deep breath and proceeded to read the message.

“Someone told me that angels in human form still exist. Seeing you have confirmed that he was right. May the day be blessed for you sake. Good morning.”

Nnenna smiled to herself. She actually loved the content of the message. One thing she wished for, in marriage was to have a handsome man who will love her so much and always tell her sweet words just like what Stanley wrote to her.

“God has helped me and granted me freedom from the Smith’s. I don’t think that it will be a bad idea to give relationship a chance,” she thought.

Chinasa was having her morning prayers. She concluded the prayers and opened her eyes to discover that Nnenna was looking at her phone and smiling sheepishly. She studied her for a while before calling out her name.

“Nnenna!,” Chinasa called and gave her a suspicious grin.

Nnenna jumped out of her reverie when she heard her name.

“Why are you acting funny like someone that just met Mr. right,” Chinasa asked with a mischievous grin.

Nnenna’s heart raced. She felt like someone that had just been caught at the scene of a crime.

“Why are you always thinking of marriage?” Nnenna asked in a bid to cover up.

“The way you were smiling was what made me to say what I said. But if you say that I was wrong, I will admit it after all I can’t read your mind,” Chinasa responded.

“You are wrong, wronger, wrongest,” Nnenna told her and burst into laughter. She was convinced that she had been able to divert Chinasa’s attention.

“You are not serious. When your mates where inside the classroom, you were busy hawking banana. That is why you don’t know your tenses. Can you imagine a full grown woman saying wrong, wronger, wrongest. I am ashamed of you, ” Chinasa joked.

“It’s better that I didn’t attend class at all, than you that only attended biology class. That is why the only thing you know is marriage terms. If they ask you one plus one , you will tell them it is equal to one. You think that they are talking of marriage.”

She really got Chinasa cracked up.”Nnenna leave me alone. Go to work.” she told her.

Nnenna took a quick glance at her wrist watch and discovered that she was almost late for work. She hurriedly picked her bag and rushed out of the house.

When she got to work, the Human Resource Manager took her round the office for a formal introduction. Later, she settled down at the reception office. She was to work with two other ladies. They don’t look friendly but she made up her mind to work her ways into their hearts.

Nnenna went to ease herself. When she came out, she heard her colleagues discussing about someone. It was obvious that they were talking about a man.

“Wow! This guy is so handsome. I wish that MD will just resign so that he will take over,” Lilly said.

“My dear, I am dying for him. If he make mistake to smile for me, I might faint,” Cynthia told her.

“He is rich, handsome, young, friendly and so caring. If God bless me with such a man, I can never ask of any other thing in life. Let him just marry me. Even if I die a day afterwards, I will rest in peace,” Lilly added.

“My dear, my wish is not as much as yours. What I want is be his side chick. I know that he can never marry me.” Cynthia said with smiles.

Nnenna’s eyes widened. She could not believe that someone would wish to be a man’s side chick instead of being a wife. As she was thinking about who they could be talking about, they heard their MD’s voice. Lilly and Cynthia stopped talking and pretended that they were searching for something in the computer.

Nnenna became dumb struck when she looked up to see the person talking with the MD.

What is Stanley doing here” Nnenna thought.

Stanley had a striking resemblance with the MD. Nnenna needed no one to tell her that the MD was his father.

“This is Nnenna, the new receptionist,” The MD told his son.

“Nnenna how are you?” Stanley reached out to her with a soft smile.

Nnenna was just staring at Stanley without uttering a word.

“Are you alright? Is that the way you will be welcoming my visitors?” Stanley’s dad rebuked Nnenna.

“I’m sorry sir, good morning sir” Nnenna responded nervously.

“Daddy please pardon her.. She is just surprised to see me here. She is a new member of my church. I was the person that welcomed her when she came. She might be wondering what I am doing here,” Stanley explained.

“It’s okay. I understand. Let me leave you both,” Stanley’s dad told him and went back to his office.

Stanley sat beside her and started chatting with her.

“I sent a WhatsApp message to you this morning. You read it but didn’t respond. That’s not nice” Stanley said softly

“I’m so sorry sir. Today is my first day of resuming work here. I was rushing to be early.”

“It’s okay I understand. But you have to cut out this ‘sir’ stuff. It makes me uncomfortable. I have talked with you before now, you didn’t answer me sir.”

Nnenna raised her eyebrow, then smiled. “I just discovered that you are my boss. I have to accord you the respect.”

“No please. I am not your boss rather I am your friend. I prefer that we maintain the friendship outlook. It will help us to flow well. Besides , I don’t work here. I only visited because I am on work leave and dad insisted I must come around,” Stanley explained.

“Are you the first child?” Nnenna asked out of curiosity.

“Yes and the only child too,” Stanley informed her.

Some of the workers were surprised to see Stanley talking and laughing with Nnenna. They concluded that they must be relatives.
However, Lilly and Cynthia were dying in envy.

Stanley glanced at the big wall clock hanging on the wall and discovered that it was time for launch.

“Let’s go for launch, it’s already time,” Stanley told her.

Nnenna could not take the risk of being seen, walking into the office cafeteria with Stanley.

“Please go, I will have my lunch later. I and my colleagues cannot leave here at the same time. Nobody will be here to attend to clients,” Nnenna explained nervously.

“But they are not going yet. It’s all right, let me just get snacks for us. We can go and eat later.”

Nnenna smiled in relief.

Immediately Stanley left, Lilly and Cynthia saw it as a chance to humiliate Nnenna.

“Listen to me” Lilly told her “You need to apply wisdom if not, you will be sacked. How can you leave your job, to be discussing and laughing with the son of the MD on your first day at work? You thought that we are stupid to have ignored him. We did that because we love our job,” Lilly scolded her.

“But he never talked to you. Why would you be claiming that you ignored him?” Nnenna asked indifferently.

“What do you mean by that? Are you trying to tell us that he is interested in you?” Cynthia asked in anger.

“I never said so. I am a new member of his church. He was surprised to see me here and he decided to encourage me and make me feel at home,” Nnenna replied confidently.

“Thank God you got the message because some little brats like you loss guard so easily. Now let me inform you, Mr. Stanley is our MD’s only son. He is not your fellow employee. So be guided accordingly. Another is that his father is watching you through the surveillance camera. If you make unnecessary mistake, you will be shown the exit door,” Lilly said with a mischievous wicked smile.

“Thanks for the advice,” Nnenna said without mirth.

“You don’t need to thank us, just take the correction and act accordingly, for your own good. You are acting like a desperate prostitute” Cynthia scolded harshly.

Nnenna smiled to herself.

“I think the person that acted like desperate prostitute and is still acting like one till now is you. It is only a prostitute that would wish to become a side chick to his MD’s son. Maybe when you were saying that, you forgot that surveillance cameras are on you. Your case is already on the MD’s table because he heard everything you said,” Nnenna blasted her back.

Cynthia felt as if cold water was poured on her, while Lilly gave Nnenna a dead stare.