“Nku is our man. He will consider us.” He tried to convince himself inwardly, knitting his brows at Agu, who just walked in, looking bored and drawn. He handed the cheque over to Azuaka Jnr. and went in to bring out a tray containing two bottles of beer and a pack of cigarette.

“That asshole will earn my punch anytime; that very stupid lawyer.” He uncorked his beer and slid out a cigarette.

“I sensed a kooky in him. But never mind,” Azuaka Jnr. slid out his cigarette and a glow from the lighter caught its butt. He drew and puffed like a true Texas street boy; smoke spiraled through his nostrils as he said figuratively, “With seven point five you are inches away from white house.”

“I am nervous,” Agu muttered and sipped at his beer, staring in the space with the cigarette burning away between his fingers, smoking not really appealing to him.

“Why?” asked Azuaka Jnr., searching into Agu’s tetchy face. He stopped puffing and drinking to lock eyes with him.

Agu cleared his throat. “Nku makes it to California tomorrow’s night.”

“Yes, yes.”

“I just sold my only inheritance.”

“And I stole my father’s gratuity, a disguised inheritance too, so?” said Azuaka Jnr. and his cigarette came between his thick lips; his eyes dimmed; he was already drawing as much smoke as he could.

“Are you sure we are going to make it? Do you believe in this project? I mean I have been happy all this while until those two men bought my inheritance, coming to take over in two days.”

Azuaka Jnr. sipped and puffed on, shielding his outburst and he said, “Sometimes I doubt the project too. I always doubt its impossibility. But I don’t want to be feckless. It is possible to create software that can siphon money from any bank account within five seconds. Besides Nku is an ICT genius now; whenever I remember that, all I see pessimism, money, wealth, possibility.”

Azuaka Jnr. chuckled. He knew Agu as much as Nku. They had been cronies way back on campus and Agu was an experimental, fearful, capricious fellow whose only possibility of life’s events was result.

“The night before I stole my father’s gratuity,” he continued, “I spoke with Nku. He said everything was working as planned. He only emphasized on our individual contribution which will be transferred to the software financiers. He has spent three years in New York for this project, remember and he’s a software guru now. We will make it.”

“Yes, in less than three months we will be stealing from bank accounts of people, banks all over the world. The software will help us steal and render the world broke. I know all that, my man.” He puffed his cigarette to the butt and squashed it under his sneakers.

“So why are you nervous then?” he handed the cheque to Agu and uncorked another beer; It frothed over and some dropped on the floor.

“Our money isn’t yet complete. Is he going to take that excuse from us?”

“We will reason together. We will explain things to him. It has never been easy for any of us. He will be considerate. We are safe, son of man. Hope you’re not nervous anymore?”

“Come on, a normal American dude would do same isn’t it?” he mumbled and his smile came from an unsatisfied, fearful soul.

“Believe it, we are rendering the world broke, do you understand me?” He looked sternly at Agu, wishing he would come off that dizzy atmosphere of his, wanting to bring on his mind the possibility of making it happen. He knew Agu had thorny mindsets and he went on to encourage him with the uncertainty he faced in Texas;

“My dad and his five million dollars, hmm!” he chortled, clicking his fingers, and continued. “I didn’t see myself stealing that money from him. I am not boastful but I want you to know the possibility of making this software happen. If I could do that then Monkeys’ software is possible.” He shook his crew-cut head.

“The world is in trouble,” Agu said, looking cheery now. He started smoking at ease. He said after gulping his beer, “Seven years of joblessness needs anything more,” said Agu.

“Yes bro, I believe you,” replied Azuaka Jnr. and his toothy smile came from his mind; it seemed something remarkable crossed it. “And when I thought it was over, the maddening one happened. Didn’t I tell you how I applied at the ministry and waited for one year endless recruitment? One morning I went out to buy doughnut only to see the doughnut seller dishing me doughnut with my CV papers, the same CV I used to apply at the ministry.”

Agu laughed, swaying within his chair and then coughed.

“Is not funny, Agu.”

“And I could remember asking you if that very doughnut was sweeter than ever. Do you know your experience discouraged me from applying further, although I was faced with one of the ministry workers who demanded a three-hundred-thousand dollars bribe if I must get the job? I had to keep to my taxi driving even when I got little from it. Now I need money to rain. If it wants to rain let it rain and not drop.”

“Yes, we need that now. This is our heyday.” Azuaka Jnr. cheered, pushing the bottle against the air.

Agu gazed upon the cheque and thought of his homelessness thudded in his head. “We are homeless,” he said with arms widespread, showing Azuaka Jnr. what remained of them.

Azuaka Jnr. puffed hugely this time around and smoke clouded his face. The smoke was disappearing behind his head when he asked, “Are we really homeless when my girlfriend is somewhere around town?”

“Who could that be?” His eyeballs rolled before he said, “Opula I guess.”

He shook his head.

“Pretty Opula. I can’t wait to see her again. Hmm… love on campus, boy,” Agu shook hands with him.

“Hey, come on, back then I was her assignment and exam boyfriend.” He tittered.

“Save your honesty, AZ. She must be a big girl now.” He guzzled his beer and reached out to another.

“She works at a factory. We will meet with Nku before squatting with her.” He stared at the cheque in Agu’s hand and a strange thought crossed his mind. “I think that cheque will be useful.” He smacked his lips at the cheque.

Agu blinked at the cheque and seemed unable to see into the mystery of his words. Among them, Azuaka Jnr. was the only buffer whose canny thinking had clinched them success in the grey days on campus. In everything he saw good or evil and would always blare his warning or opinion.

Agu asked, “How do you mean?” He had always asked that question whenever Azuaka Jnr. confronted with his foresight.

“After launching the software we will be hunting for account numbers, right?”

“Yes, yes.” He was wondering, “Ok, OK,” Agu seemed to have understood now. He shook his galaxy-hair style.

“We will first launch into his bank account and steal as much as we can. Isn’t he a rich, influential Mexican man?”

They stood up almost at once, shook hands and hugged each other with an indispensable excitement hanging over them. They slumped back in their chairs.

“You know that buyer is a big cockroach,” Agu intoned.

“One that skipped larva,” Azuaka Jnr. added and they laughed. “We will make it,” Agu said, lifting his half drunken beer.

“Yes of course,” Azuaka Jnr. said and then hammered, “Monkeys software!”

“The world is in our pockets!” Agu responded and their bottles clicked as they toasted to it. A toasty silence hung over them while they smoked on and reasoned within themselves.

I rather die than lose out of this Monkeys’ software, Azuaka Jnr. thought. I am made, yes, I am. I have come a long way, a long way from my father’s gratuity. I wonder what would become of the old man now. I am sorry, father. Monkeys’ software will make it up to you. I will make it up to you when I become rich.

***

Hmm, if it is not working out show me a sign, Lord, Agu came with his thought. All my inheritance is deeply involved, Lord. Please, God, don’t fail Agu, your street son. I just need more money. Let the world be in my pocket now and the declining days of my life.

The whistling cold wind of winter outside took over their thought.

The software loomed on…

When they got a call from Nku about his arrival, Azuaka Jnr. stayed back at home while Agu went to the airport by taxi. Earlier, Agu did not see Azuaka Jnr. staying back, keeping to himself while Nku arrived at Long Beach Airport. But he wished Azuaka Jnr. would understand he allowed it on sufferance and not his reason – his allergy to cold. Before Agu left for airport that evening, exactly at the estimated time of arrival, Azuaka Jnr. had his face suffused with smoke from his cigarette; body cloaked in hoody and eyes clamored for the chilled champagne on the table. Agu shot his warning about Azuaka Jnr. not drinking from the champagne because they would toast with it upon the arrival of the computer genius himself, Nku..

“It is about to begin,” Azuaka Jnr. reminded himself inwardly. He stared at his T-shirt, which had ‘My Money Grows Like Grass’ blazoned across it and he blinked out of it. He had always worn that T-shirt and kept it until the day it would happen; when his ice cube would melt the sun; when money would choke his bank account and his spending spree would be in the direction of keeping problems at bay. He had endured a beggarly life; trodden upon by job hunt; ignored by dashing girls he admired and reproached by the lavished lifestyle of the rich. Regrettably, even in the fantasy world he could not be found; poverty had recreated him invisible, something less than stones, somewhere out of the underworld. He had only endeared as one of the 1 billion Azuaka Juniors that stood breathing; reviled by wealth because of a long stay in the uterus of poverty. And he could not wait to be born; only Monkeys’ software would deliver him and breathe life into his world.

“I will make it,” he assured himself.

Azuaka Jnr. snapped out of his thought as he sniffed and sneezed like a goat. He rubbed his nostrils and smeared the catarrh streaming through. His phlegm was much now and he sneezed into his handkerchief to collect it.

“Fear or what,” he thought.

The jug on the shelf came in sight and he reached to it; shook it, poured himself a cupful of hot coffee, since he had been warned by Agu not to touch the champagne. He lit a fresh cigar and sat to it. His thought turned on; “I need money, whatever Monkeys’ software would bring to the table. I just need to be made before I turn 26 years. Agu might have seen it since he was born with the egg of a dragon, Nku might have counted cool money in New York but what has the son of a police officer got to offer?”

And he earnestly needed to see and count his first one million naira and beaucoup more. He stole his father’s gratuity on the off-chance of making it through Monkeys’ software. Back on the surface of Texas Tech University, in their final year, when they seized the vision, he did not see himself in the plan. Nku had travelled to New York, leaving him brooding over plans of making ten million dollars to secure his place in the project. It was less off-chance when he realized endless job hunt could not save him the bill and then he relaxed at home, rubbed his stomach and waited for his father’s retirement. Azuaka Jnr. snorted and shook his head. “I will make it. It is possible,” he whispered and glugged down the now warm coffee. “I would return to see my father, kneel before him and beg him with thirty million dollars; that is more than triple of his gratuity. He would not dare do anything funny; the police in him would contend that I did well. And then the rest of my life would be dead set on getting richer through Monkeys’ software,” he said thoughtfully.

There was a stormy noise at the outside and his thought blanked. There were around. He adjusted himself to put on a bodacious look. A car buzzed into the compound, doors opened and slammed furiously before the thwacking of shoes on the veranda. The door creaked open and three people walked in. Azuaka Jnr. looked queerly at the white man in the door – his frown gathered around his eyes.

Nku gave Azuaka Jnr. a hug that seemed to last forever. “Hello, bad boy! I am back,” he said and Azuaka Jnr. was still staring at the white man; something in him was already spiking Azuaka Jnr. He remained in the door, his enviable smile held and his luggage in front. Agu came and took the luggage from him and then he started strutting forward.

At night the boys sat in the sitting room, round a tray of cigarettes, a laptop, and a bottle of champagne.

Azuaka Jnr. was smoking heavily and studying the white man who had been bringing out his cigarette from the pocket and smoking gently all this while.

Nku had been going through some documents while Agu tried to peep into the documents. The quiet mood hung over them for a while until Azuaka Jnr. said, “Who is he?” he asked, pointing at the white man. “I mean we haven’t known one another up till this time.” Azuaka Jnr. blurted, his eyes gathering bullets. I wonder what he is doing here,” he said in his head.

“Oh, yeah, introduction isn’t late,” said Nku, drawing from his cigarette and puffing a narrow smoke. “Guys, meet Ferguson, my friend and big gun in this project, Ferguson,” he said, throwing his toned, hairy hand across Agu and Azuaka Jnr., “Meet Agu, the graduate taxi driver.”

They burst out laughing ecstatically except Azuaka Jnr. he was thinking; so if he is the big gun we should twist our necks and kiss our buttocks.

Agu cursed, “Your father! Your stroke-eaten father!” They laughed.

“Yeah, this is Azuaka Jnr. the son to one of the men in black we often call cops. I think the last time I rang him he was jobless.”

Agu thought it laughable but smiled. Nku and Ferguson laughed out loud. Azuaka Jnr. thought it scornful because Ferguson laughed at a joke directed to him. He should have scowled like a dog migrated into a strange cage.

When he walked to Ferguson he said, “I am Azuaka Jnr.,” His disgusting voice, he thought, would be best appreciated if Ferguson perceived the hatred it gathered. He shook hands with Ferguson, his eyes scanning through his white sleeves and blue waist coat to his jeans and black boot. With his long hair, goatee and chiseled face, Azuaka Jnr. saw nothing than a desperate Ojubwa possessed with his American dream. He wanted to tell him to his face that he didn’t like his presence; ask him who made him part of the project; and where he was the day they strategized to render the world broke. He had never hated anyone at first sight. Maybe it was because of something more than Monkeys’ software, something clustering into the pocket of mystery. He would have to ask himself why he hated Ferguson, some white stranger he just met. As he withdrew his palm from Ferguson’s he wanted to tell him that his presence irritated him so much but he reserved his comment. “Hey, Mr. Man, please, have a haircut, this project is for clean guys with clean asses,” he said and that was the only broadside he could shoot.

Nku and Agu smiled and took it for a joke.

Ferguson forced a smile and knew he had an enemy in this project already, and the days ahead were going to be tough and dark, with blood, sweat and survival being their battle ground.

He stroked his hair as though he was feeling his words. He kept to his silence and pouted his red lips for the first time.

Nku noticed his pouted lips but did not know how much he was hurt. His anger always paired with cigarette and Nku saw it coming; Ferguson’s chagrined face and his hands fondling quickly into his pocket for cigarette. Immediately the lighter glowed at the butt, Nku said lively, “Guys we are good to go.”

Everyone sat down except Azuaka Jnr. He was gazing at Ferguson.

“We will be sacrificing our Christmas for this project,” Nku said, staring across them. I crave your hard work and cooperation. Developing software as this, demand brains and brawn and we’ve got both.” He pointed to the luggage. “In that luggage you will find the Rolls-Royce of software gadgets and coded machines. All we pray for is life, life to see this software make us rich. The Monkeys’ software will be running at five seconds baud.” Nku’s face was beaded with sweat. He took off his jacket and tossed it in the sofa close by. Hush silence hung over the boys as they were all ears, as though anything missed now would deprive them their money. Azuaka Jnr. summoned his stare around Nku; his pink lips that offended his vanity and lush beards that tickled his mentality. They watched Nku as he took a cigarette in between his lips and Ferguson lit it. He puffed narrowly before he continued, “Electronically Baud means speed, so upon launching into any bank account it will steal money at five seconds speed. In other words, every five seconds someone in this world goes broke, Monkeys.”

“Yes!” Agu chanted and then again. “Yes!” he stood up and pummeled his fist into his palm. “We are made. Too much money, my fellow Monkeys! I can’t wait.”

Azuaka Jnr. rubbed his palms as though he was about devouring a hot pepper soup. He watched Ferguson walk to the fan switch, crackled the knob and the blade started off slowly. Azuaka Jnr. cursed him inwardly, asshole. Let’s see how you survive this project. He smiled thinly, the smiles of one suffering suspicion. “That means the more account number we have the more money we will steal,” he said.

“Yes,” replied Nku. “This is the time to reap from a project that will end poverty in our generations. We will keep rendering the world broke until death do us part.” He coughed, dimmed his eyes and drew from his cigarette. “Our meeting place will be in hotels and no particular one precisely; that’s the only way we can wade off police. The police are everywhere and we can’t afford to lose this project. I will always ring you guys whenever we want to meet,” said Nku. He pointed his cigarette across them, “Whatever we steal will be transferred automatically into our e-account from which will be dispensed to every Monkey. Am I understood?” he asked, casting his stare across them and they shook their heads. “But one thing is remaining.”

I know it is about the money, Azuaka Jnr. thought as his heart pounded.

“I hope we’ve our money,” Nku said abruptly.

Hearing that, Agu had his seat; the drag of debt helped him do that.

“We can’t do anything until we settle our software financiers in New York, I told you guys. I can’t afford to disappoint my backers. Tomorrow morning work begins, but before that we will wire the thirty million dollars into their accounts. So have we got our bills, Monkeys? Without the bills this project can’t go on. It’s as good as flying back into our roosts,” his voice crammed Agu and Azuaka Jnr. into the boring thought of how they got their money, how unable they were about a complete bill.

Azuaka Jnr. kept rubbing his nose; it was about letting himself down before Ferguson; I am naked before the crowd now; I am not going to tell them I stole my father’s gratuity. Am I? This mad man must not know about it. I will tell them I sold all the acres of land my father have just to get that money. I think Nku will consider me, he thought.

“That’s the problem,” Agu said gently. “Today will be our last time in this house. The buyer couldn’t cough out ten million dollars for the bungalow and Benz.” His hands gestured across the sitting room and his pitiable looks shot. “I got only seven point five million, son of man.” He looked across them and stared at Azuaka Jnr; he wanted him to say something.

He was befuddled about how to start but then he said, “I could only lay my hands on five million dollars. I…” He was about saying something when Agu cut in.

“Yes, even Azuaka that is here stole his father’s gratuity to get that money. It wasn’t easy for us.”

Oh God! Oh God! What is wrong with Agu? What is wrong with this asshole? Did I tell you to talk on my behalf? Azuaka thought.

It lashed Azuaka Jnr. in the heart as he stared at the floor. He could feel the eddy of disgust around him, the eddy of disgust from their eyes, especially Ferguson’s blue iris. He would have to sort it out with Agu much later.

Nku rubbed his palms and looked at his tattooed arms, as though what he was about saying was embedded in it. He hoped to sound benign. “I am sorry, Monkeys. There is nothing we can do at this point.” He slumped in the sofa. “I am sorry.”

After he said that everywhere was dead.

Only Ferguson was smoking and his white face was the only life they could see; Azuaka Jnr. saw his unwavering smiles and stared at the floor. Agu was busy pleading to Nku in whispers and the next moment Azuaka Jnr. looked at Ferguson, his red lips moved.

This is the time to earn their loyalty, Ferguson thought. “I will foot their balances. Let the Monkeys’ software go on. We can’t afford to lose out now.” he said, rubbing Nku on the shoulders. “But only on the condition, that you Monkeys will pay back as soon as we start rendering the world broke.”

What is he up to? What does he want? Azuaka Jnr. thought.

Agu went on his knees and held Ferguson’s hands. “Oh Christ! Thank you very much, Ferguson. I owe you my respect. I will pay back. Thank you. I can’t thank you enough.” His head kept shaking at Ferguson’s smiling face.

Everyone was waiting for Azuaka Jnr. to say something.

Azuaka Jnr. kept to his silence. He perceived Ferguson wanted their loyalty because of his bossy offering. But he, Azuaka Jnr. would not be his loyalist. “I mean anything for the Monkeys. I will pay back,” he said coldly from his hate, as if it rolled out carelessly from his mouth. He did not see anything likeable about Ferguson, anything about him that inspired loyalty. Nku and Ferguson kept staring at him while Agu fetched the champagne for a toast.

“Monkeys!” Nku chanted as soon as they got a fluteful of the wine. His voice came with the up rush of sadness; something about Azuaka Jnr. posing a problem to their empire.

“Blessed among monkeys!” they chanted in reply and gulped their wine.

The three of them stood to the toast except Ferguson who gazed into his wine. I hope I survive this asshole, he thought, staring at Azuaka Jnr.

Later in the evening, while Agu was asleep in the sofa, Azuaka Jnr. overheard Nku and Ferguson discuss him at the veranda. Ferguson reported to Nku that he was falling out of recognition, especially by Azuaka Jnr:

“That creep, Azu … or whatever he is called is sucking into my skin, maybe because I’m fortunate to be a Monkey. See, I don’t give a damn if this is his California. If he tries any further suck into me I’m gonna sharpen my sword with his blood.”

At that time Azuaka Jnr. was somewhere around the window. “We will see to that,” he mumbled through clenched teeth.