Chasing Pink dreams II
I took the book from Chinonye and traced my thumb over the gold embossed title “Pink”. My mind went back to that night.
It had been a sleepover to remember. We sat facing the open window as the cool night breeze tousled our hair and washed over our faces. Chinonye was sandwiched between us, me on her left and Douye on her right. She was reading from the book “Pink”. We were all listening with rapt attention as our minds took us on the journey through the life of the protagonist, Mivanyi and her amazing/inspiring story of how she published an international bestseller at the age of nineteen.
“‘It was the best feeling ever. One that Mivanyi would always cherish as her novel, “Pink” was the rave of the literary world.’” She read with a contented sigh and closed the book. Her face was flushed with emotions from the book.
‘’I want to be like Mivanyi. When I’m twenty, I want to have accomplished a very important dream that gets noticed by my country’’. She said quietly.
Douye nodded. “Yeah, me too. Maybe I’ll have my name in fashion magazines for the craziest dresses.” She loved fashion designing and at fifteen, she was full of passion for it. She was always drawing new designs for dresses. And her designs were surprisingly very aesthetic.
I was also touched by Mivanyi’s story. She’d conquered her fear and achieved her biggest dreams at twenty. I wanted no less for myself. Yes, I could be very lazy and carefree about things, but *sigh*, I also wanted the spotlight to shine on my ebony skin. I mean, what right thinking teenage girl wouldn’t?
“I’m willing to work towards being a popular singer at 20. Maybe win the MTN Project Fame before 20. Yeah…that’s what I’ll do.” I solemnly said.
I faced my two friends.
“Girls, you know we can do this. Mivanyi did it. We just have to start now.’’ I said earnestly.
“That gives us five years.” Douye said. We were all fifteen at the time, having the same birthdays.
“On our 20th birthday, we’d get together and celebrate our accomplishments.” She continued.
It was settled then. Solemnly, we pledged to do so, and that night, our dreams were filled with beautiful pictures of the future.
Five years.
The first year, we worked hard at our dreams. I worked hard to be a singer. I composed zillions of songs, most of which ended up in the trash. I stopped eating junk and tearfully but firmly said goodbye to potato chips and began to take honey in warm water (on the recommendation of my aunt who was a Music teacher at school) each time I felt like eating a snack that would damage my singing career. Mom was impressed. Dad was proud of me. I lost a bit of my 65 kilograms.
Douye made more designs and joined a sewing class. At the end of the year, she could make some of her designs. She was going well.
Chinonye…well, Chinonye was our motivator. Not once did I hear her complain about anything. She was always the one to think and see the silver lining in our dark clouds. Douye was too busy wearing Gucci sunshades to notice any silver linings. And of course, the clouds always looked dark to her.
My head was always down staring at or scribbling a new composition in my song notebook. I didn’t even see the clouds, much less, notice that they were dark. Chinonye was a shoulder to lean on.
She had a great body, tall, slim and graceful. Her warm, brown eyes always held a hint of wisdom in them and we were glad that she was our friend. We knew she was interested in gymnastics but that wasn’t what she wanted to spend the rest of her life doing. So, she just egged us on while she faithfully practiced her on her bars, and rings and what other things gymnasts used. Lord knows I had never been anywhere near a gym in my entire life.
Graduation day came and I wrote a song for my class titled “A Piece of You”. I sang it on grad day and the crowd loved it. I was thrilled to bits. It was a very good start for me. Then college came up and as we separated to different schools, getting an A or at least a C in our various courses somehow seemed to be the most important thing in our lives. Our dreams were there and they remained dreams.
And now…they were all coming back to us. We had only less than a year to accomplish our goals.
Long after Chinonye and Douye left, I laid on my bed thinking, with the packet of potato chips to help process my thoughts. Seriously, was this going to work? Could we work hard enough and get just the right amount of luck to live our dreams? I was somewhat scared. I didn’t want to disappoint myself. What if I failed? Failing scared the heck out of me. Three years ago, when I’d failed the post-UME for the school after my heart, UNILAG, I’d almost gone into depression. Nobody could understand why I didn’t eat for two days (though I secretly sneaked some Mars bars when the hunger became too unbearable but still…). The other time too when I flunked that Chemistry competition in secondary school, I refused to go to school the next day. I was miserable. Down in the dumps.
Winning a singing talent show was something way bigger. The only option I had was to win. Win or die. Extreme? No, Douye’s slogan the next day was even more intense.
“It’s either these designs sell big time…or I’m gonna shoot everybody who ever told me…‘just give these out, Douye and your name will be on every woman’s lips.’” She said in a no-nonsense voice.
As I shuddered, I made a mental note to buy a bullet proof jacket in the near future. I mean, you never know…
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queennobo @queennobo
If words were rivers, I'd love to swim at the deep end...If stories were fruits, I'd love to be a farmer...Go to queennobo's profile, and read more of his/her posts.
I like this.
Too girly and pinky, but I will forgive it.
Its a very beautiful write, QueenNobo. I especially loved the wisecrack about ‘silver lining in every cloud.’ Showed finesse also at the end of this write. Engaging story to say the least.
@fervency, thank you!
@kaycee….I’m glad you like it despite its girliness…Thank you for reading it…:-)
The Queen of the chick Lit genre dazzles again…. Nice work , Keep it up!
Queen, huh? But I wasn’t invited for my coronation…:-( Thank you, @nicolebassey…:-D
The mail got mixed up on the e way. Apologies- gmail.
What e-mail, @layrite? Another mix up, i presume…
Hun hun…
Not bad. Not bad at all…
Not bad equals good, right? Funny how the negative rule works in English too….thanks for reading, @Layrite
Actually, it is better than my earlier not bad. Just re read it and I hereby upgrade my assessment to Very Good |B++|. Well done!
Nice
Thank you for reading it, @enoquin. And for finding it nice…
I like this, and I found myself smiling a lot. Maybe its because I connect with the universality of it: the dreaming and wishing to live out those dreams.
Well done. Keep improving your art.
@chemokopi…It’s great that you connect with the story…I’m happy you’re reading it. Thank you….
Really nice…would want to see how they get through the next year. You wrote this well. Well done queen…$ß.
Thank you, @sibbylwhyte…I’ll post the third part soon. I also want to see how they will get through!
I really can’t say why everyone wants the story to keep flowing on. You have done really well in the writing. Really good. This particular part encompasses Chic Lit which I thought was lacking somewhat in the first part. You truly capture the essence of that sub-genre in this follow-up.
Are you thinking of elongating the narratives and stringing them into a novel or something? That would be fine. Like I mentioned in the last piece, you have a way of writing that doesn’t impress on the reader the need to go further. I am not desperate to see the next part [like all them others] yet I have a feeling I would enjoy the next part if I get to read it. Well done on this and your writing. Please, keep the flow and don’t let nothing contaminate the smoothness. A few edits and you would be there.
Well done.
@Sueddie, I’m smiling as I’m reading your words…capturing the essence of Chick Lit is something I’ve always wanted to do after reading books like Little Women and many other contemporary Chick Lit books.
As for making a novel, that isn’t something that has not crossed my mind. Knowing that you think it would be a good idea is encouraging, to say the least.
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment affably on my story.
PS: Now, to adjust a bit. the first line was meant to read: ‘I can’t understand the obvious near desperation of everyone wanting to see the next part’ … That, of course is spelt by the way you handle the tale such that one is satisfied at the end…
The rest follows.
Oron’s daughter, well done.
Very inspiring story, @queennobo, and very well written, too. I’m sure most of us have had dreams when we were younger that we’ve had to put to one side because life happened.
I don’t know if you need to write a sequel… if you are going to write about how the MC started working towards her dreams, it could end up being quite a big piece of work.
Please accept 20 points for work well done.
@TolaO, It’s delightful to know that you found the story inspiring…and well written.
Maybe, Preye and her friends will spur us on to aspire to achieve our almost-forgotten dreams.
On writing a sequel, I’m already working on a Part 3…though the challenge now is how to make it in such a way that it won’t be too long while still passing the story across.
And for being my first donor on this site, I say “Thanks a million!”
Still nice. Well done.
Good. I am going to the third one now.
Beautiful….this has the potential of being a novella at the least and i knw u can….dnt kill dt dream…lol