In Times Like This (Prompt #150)

Source from Pixabay

We lived in an estate in the southwestern part of our country, Nigeria. The compound harbours 6 tenants. Among the tenants is an outstanding man who was normally timely in everything. His name is Jude. He pays rent on time, goes out early and returns on time. His rate of timeliness earned him a nickname in the compound, “park well”. This is because he always returns early and parks his car correctly to make space for other tenants. Recently, something happened that changed that narrative and the dents will remain in the sands of time.

The night of August 9, 2025, was a day of its kind. At about 1:25 am (WAT) in the dead of the night, I was sitting at our dining table with my laptop, typing posts I wanted to publish on my Hive blog. Suddenly, I started hearing shouts in front of our living room. “You can’t do anything, you are a criminal, oya, come and hold me now, I would have shown you who I am, assuming you did not open that gate, ….. At the first shout, I quickly turned off our lights, thinking otherwise, but as the rants continued, I realised that it was our neighbour, Mr. Jude, so I turned on the lights and eavesdropped, but their voices faded. I could not also make any sense out of the random arguments. To complicate the issue, the man hurriedly dashed into his apartment while banging the gate while the other people retired to wherever they came from. I was left wondering what could have happened in the first place.

On the preceding morning, at about 5 am (WAT), we started hearing group voices and knocks on each tenant's door requesting the presence of the breadwinners for a meeting. That was when my husband joined the other tenants for the meeting. At the meeting, Mr. Jude was present. It was confirmed that he was the one shouting that night. Sitting at the other side were the estate security personnel with the other tenants, including the street councillor. Mr. Jude was asked to explain what transpired that night.

Source from Pixabay

Calmly, he narrated how he went for a business trip, on his way back to Lagos, the vehicle he boarded broke down. He and other passengers waited for the vehicle to be fixed all to no avail. Therefore, he boarded another vehicle and got to Lagos very late. Fortunately for him, the bus driver mentioned that he was going towards his location. That was how he followed him to a trekkable distance to the estate. Normally, the estate gate closes by 11 pm (WAT). The implication is that once you are behind that time, you must wait for a security check and clearance before you are allowed entrance to the estate.

In times like this, precaution and patience would have performed the magic that is needed.However, Jude did not take recognisance of the time therein and refused to wait for clearance to be issued to him, claiming that the security agents were wasting his time. His impatience led to an exchange of words and more delays because he was obstructing them from clearing up other occupants. In the heat of the argument and back and forth with the estate security agents, Mr. Jude started shaking the estate gate and ended up pulling off the handle. Immediately, he noticed that he had pulled down the gate’s handle, he entered the estate. To avoid further security breaches, they followed him home to ensure that he arrived safely and lived in the estate as claimed. This, did not happen without heated arguments and raised voices.

In the spirit of fair hearing, the estate security agents were allowed to tell their part of the story, which they did. Their narrative matched that of Mr. Jude.
Therefore, Mr. Jude was penalised by the estate councillor as stated in the estate tenancy agreement. He was also asked to fix the gate and sign an undertaking to that effect.

Here ends my story. See you on the next page.