Remi’s Last Handshake

Remi’s Last Handshake

The lights shift once again in Davy Jones Locker rendezvous. Without explanation I know a forgone terror is preparing to transition. I sure hope he is no casualty of the recent oversexed NAS Converge in Owerri.  Why men will have sex to the point of death baffles me. I think it is sad to die on top of woman or after ravaging her.

This afternoon I have had my triple shot of goscolene, but I am not marooned in drunkenness. A perennial lack of sexual activity has improved my resistance to alcohol. I feel slightly high and very calm though.

The shocking surprise is that the Forgone Terror is not in the rendezvous. The lights do not lie. I walk out of the cavern onto the beach that hems it in. The blue green sea merges with the cloudy blue sky at the horizon. The mild breeze cools my sweaty face. Five meters beyond the mouth of the cavern, I saw the new man in the line of transitioners.  He stood out there in the splendid daylight. Tall, handsome, light skinned and grand I recognized him despite looking much older than when I saw him last thirty-two years ago.

He is Remi Maduemezia a.k.a. Ahoy Red Bible. A charismatic Pyrate of merit. A glance of recognition redirects his eyes.

“Is that not the Wrong Someone, an Ahoy to you!” says Remi.

“O mi Tsunami. Please call me Almost Okolowe, an Ahoy!” I say.

“It’s too late for a forgone terror like me to change my way of thinking. I am forgone.”

“Well, if you do not address me by my correct name, you will not transition higher.”

He looks bemused.

“I used to think you were not human, but I now see you are as human as I am.”

“Really?”

“Yes. You are anti-force, but you now want to use force on me.”

“I do not make the rules, Captain Blood did. No disrespect will be entertained from forgone terrors. Ahoy Pinto Limboko (Sina Mafe) almost dwindled here for ignoring me.”

“Will you do that to me?”

“No Friend No Foe is the rule. But in this case the mitigating factor is you only heard my new name today. You are cool.”

I stretch out my hand to shake him, but he gives me his knuckles to touch instead.

“The handshake is the most social thing a Pyrate does. Why have you refused to shake my hand?”

He notices my shock but just shrugs his shoulders.

“Almost thirty years ago in Benbow Deck I had a disagreement with a fellow Pyrate. I took it as one of those things. Unbeknown to me the guy was a diabolical and fetish person. The next time we shook hands he tried to deposit destructive medicine into my body when my hand touched his palm,” he says.

“Is that true?”

“Yes. If not for the fact that I embalmed myself well, I would have gone down that day or shortly after. I thank God for the extra thirty years I got.”

“I am gob smacked. What will make a brother do that to another over an argument?

“Power and the greed for it.”

“That’s crazy.”

“But it is the Pyrates Confraternity through and through. Never forget it.”

Remi goes silent, his face clouded first with regret, then with nostalgia.

“There was a time brother hood meant brotherhood for real. Well, till life failures started to enter the Confraternity in large numbers. Such men sought within the fold what they could not achieve in the real world,” Remi says.

“Dark triads on a rampage,” I say.

“True. If men crave power, let them win elections, build corporations, make discoveries. Not prey on the weak in a club, just to feel powerful. That’s why we now have perennial NAS officers and Tortuguardes for life – our own House of Lords. Against moribund convention became love outdated conventions.”

“That’s interesting. For Humanistic Ideals is a supposed commitment to humanism. And there are few things more humanistic than the creation of the Republic on the back of democracy. This is true for free speech and freedom of association.  Inhumanity has taken over.”

“The Pyrates Confraternity is a failure. A big failure.”

His face turns sad.

“O Red Remo na so we see am.”

I beckon Remi into the cavern where it is much darker and cooler. His gait and posture were not as elegant as it used to be.

“The last time I saw you, you were angry. Solo, Ahoy Gun Tutored provoked you at Shark Barracuda’s wedding,” I say.

“Gun Tutored is a nuisance. I shouldn’t have said that. He is a great guy but too impulsive.” Remi says.

“Solokito,” I say.

“Those were good days. When Capoon Oleta Ferata was at the helm. I guess you are aware many of those sailors are forgone.”

“Yes. I mascotted Jairus to Fiddler’s Green right here.”

“Do you have rums here?” Remi asks.

“Sure. Are you into goscolene?”

“All good rum works for me.”

He looks around the cavern, curiosity flickering in his eyes. He then sits on a bench which he cleans with a hanky first. Remi always kept a neat appearance.

“How do you manage to live here alone?”

“Peacefulness is all I need in life and it abounds here.”

He smiles.

“Where is Evil Fixito?

“He created the New Atlantis and sails there. He has no time for Davy Jones Locker.”

I limp to where I stash my goscolene, get a full bottle and two glasses. As the older Pyrate Remi touches the cap of the bottle and blesses it. I then pour half a glass for him and a drop myself.

“To the afterlife and what it has to offer,” he toasts.

Relief is all I can see on his face.

“Omi Almost Okolowe, is there any rush to go into transition. I would like to relax and rum. You are a deep fellow. I would like to discuss the “Ills of the Confraternity to my fill.

“Any reason?” I ask.

“I can never be spotted maliciously again, and you don’t care.”

Our chat begins.

When a Confraternity rots and loses its core, farewells become difficult. I guess Remi wants to shed his pains and regrets.

At last, he stretches out his right hand. When our palms meet, I feel the old brotherhood flow through me — what the brotherhood had squandered, but we still preserved.

Be good, not lucky.