Least expected

I have this neighbor that I always look up to, basically because of how he seemed concerned and involved in all our lives. In my compound, we sort of have this one big family lifestyle but then we had a new neighbor who seemed to be the weapon fashioned against us.

There's nothing we are doing in the compound that she'd want to contribute financially to or be a part of. Whenever payment of any utility bill arises, it's usually a struggle to get her to pay. There was even a time she had a fight with my neighbor I earlier mentioned, let us call him Isaac and the new neighbor Faith. Although after Faith, another Neighbour came in but not much happened with that one. Let us call him Solo

Moving on, ever since Faith had a fight with Isaac and his wife, both parties did well to avoid each other. Although, there were subtle confrontations every now and then regarding utility bills. Confrontations that were inevitable because Isaac was the caretaker of the compound. There were times my mom would pay Faith's utility bills for peace to reign. During those times, I find myself reimbursing my mom whatever money she pays for Faith, this made me really not like her and at a point I told my mom to stop paying for her, let her sort herself out with Isaac. I mean, it shouldn't be our problem.

But then something happened that was going to change everything, not just with the compound but my mindset.

It so happened that at the beginning of last month, the area (public) transformer got faulty. Life during that period, without electricity was torture and it was also hell to say the least. At that point, Faith did something that we did not expect of her. There is this private transformer at the end of my street meant to service my street and the next street. Everyone on both streets got connected to the transformer except us because the politician whose influence brought the transformer, said someone from my compound offended him.

Luckily, the man got too busy with his political ambition that he created a committee to handle the affairs of the transformer and that was when Faith came in. Seeing that we had no hope of electricity with the public transformer that got bad, Faith approached the committee. Long story short, we got approval to be connected after paying a sum.

But the storm wasn't over because we had to face the electrical distribution company at the state level. They had to migrate us from our old line to the new line and the money they charged us was almost half a million Naira. A sum that we could not afford, causing my neighbors to be discouraged.

It was at that point that I stepped in. Knowing how the country works and knowing that Isaac has a religious brother as one of the state's directors for electricity affairs, I urged him to contact the brother and explain our plight. At first, he was reluctant, but I pushed and eventually got through to him. Isaac contacted the brother, and the brother asked us to pay what we can afford. I was the one doing the drive for the money because no one wanted to be saddled with that responsibility, plus they all had trust issues with themselves.

It was during this period that certain things started coming to limelight. The good thing was that Faith and Isaac put their differences aside, we all put our differences aside and worked as a team to ensure that we migrated to the new line. I even created a WhatsApp group to further fuel the drive, and everything seemed ok. But earlier this month, Isaac did something that raised a red flag, the money we contributed and gave him for the utility bill, he didn't complete the payment. When asked by Faith to upload proof of payment in our WhatsApp group, he simply ignored it. I didn't think of it as an issue, so I ignored it as well.

The following day at work, surprisingly, faith called me on WhatsApp. At first, she struggled to talk to me. Then I received a beep, "babe, please check your WhatsApp, I just forwarded something to you", Faith managed to say. I opened my WhatsApp and saw that it was a copy of the electricity payment over the month. I went through it for some time and got confused because the last payment was reflecting less the amount we gave to Isaac.

In my confused state, Faith called again to inquire, "babe did you get what I just sent to you?".

"Yes, I did but I'm a little confused with the amount that I'm seeing for the last bill payment because it's not commensurate with what we gave Isaac."

"I know babe and that's why I reached out because after we contributed to you, and you sent it to Isaac. He was supposed to upload proof of payment like you did after transferring to him, but he didn't.

Knowing how he is with money, I wasn't comfortable, so I contacted my friend at the electrical distribution company to send me a copy of our bill. Turns out Isaac hasn't changed and he's trying to play a fast one as usual."

Faith's discovery for me was a lot to take in because this is a man that I have respected and looked up to since my childhood. Back then when I had issues choosing a course to study, he guided me and made me study Economics. Being that he's an elder at his Church as well, I had looked up to him as someone that is disciplined.

"There must be an explanation to this". I said to Faith trying so hard to convince myself that it's not how it seemed. Still, more secrets unfolded.
After my conversation with Faith, I had told her to keep calm about her findings and let me handle it, of which she agreed.

I went on to confront Isaac on all that Faith had said and Isaac in his defense said it was a glitch in the system because he didn't make the payment on time. I don't know if I believed him, but I just didn't argue and decided to give him the benefit of doubt but then, another thing happened to make me think of him differently.

The machine that we use to pump water started having minor issues and when I told my mom about it, she said that we would give it to Solo as he took it for repair the last time. My mom went further to reveal that all the time Isaac takes the machine for repair, it ends up getting bad almost immediately and this is the longest the machine has worked when Solo took it.

Suddenly, Faith came to mind. "Could she be right about Isaac playing a fast one on us?" I had thought really hard and was still in doubt till we had to pay another electricity bill. This time around, instead of reverting to the old system and paying directly to Isaac, Faith and Solo paid to me, to pay to Isaac. I had already transferred the fund to Isaac and had come on the WhatsApp group to drop proof of payment and ask Isaac to confirm when I noticed he left the group chat.

Immediately, I alerted everyone in the group. I then sent Isaac a private message inquiring why he left and also forwarded the receipt of payment from my end. I also asked him to acknowledge with proof of payment to the electricity company.

Not long after, Faith called me to ask what's going on. I explained the situation to her and all she could mutter was "hmmm."

At that point, I felt she knew more than she was letting on and I was right because for some brief seconds, we were both quiet. Then suddenly, I heard her inhale and exhaled sharply. While Faith and I were still on with the mute game, Isaac responded to my WhatsApp message with the receipt of payment for the electricity bill as I had earlier requested but he did not respond to why he left the group chat. I noticed he also completed the previous payment he claimed to be a glitch.

I went on to drop the forwarded receipt from Isaac in the group chat, I think Faith saw it because what followed next was a thunderous laughter and I wondered what could be so amusing. Then she dropped the bombshell which cleared all my doubts.

"I knew it!" Faith exclaimed like a scientist who just got a Eureka moment.

"You knew what? Faith, what's going on? I questioned, more confused than ever.

"Isaac thinks he's smart. you know after you had told me to calm down and let you handle it; I knew you had doubts. I needed you to see for yourself who Isaac really is. So, I met with Solo and asked him not to pay his electricity bill to Isaac again but to you of which he did.

This morning, on his way to work, Isaac ambushed him asking for his payment and he told Isaac that he just sent it to you to give to him.

According to Solo, his actions did not go down well with Isaac as he immediately became cold and wore a frown. I didn't want to tell you immediately what's going on because I was anticipating Isaac's next move and of course evil always has a way of exposing itself. Good thing he cleared all backlogs."

Faith didn't stop there; she concluded by revealing to me how Isaac has been ripping us off with the repair of the pumping machine, this she discovered when she went to the repair shop to inquire about the fault and cost of repairs. She also told me how Solo discovered from the electricity bill sent to her that Isaac has been collecting more than the required share from him.

It was a lot to take in but concluding all that transpired between us and Isaac, Faith asked that I become the new caretaker. According to her, she saw how transparent I was from the onset when we were migrating to a new line. She also said that I am the reason she saw the whole process through till the end, citing that if it was Isaac in charge, she would have opted out.

I took Faith up on her offer and Solo didn't have an issue with the change either. Isaac, however, became antagonistic to me and everyone else in the compound.

IMAGES ARE MINE

---

---

THIS IS A POST OF MULTIPLE ENTRY, BEING THAT ALL THE PROMPTS ALIGN, I DECIDED TO MAKE A THREE IN ONE POST. THUS, ABOVE IS ALSO MY RESPONSE TO THE INLEO PROMPT DAY 12 & 20
Feel free to check it out Here

Posted Using InLeo Alpha