Mikayla
Yesterday, I pledged my love to a vile, evil man who has no heart while in the presence of MamLalumi, a woman I respect and love, and two other men I hardly know.
Now, I’m at the home of Zane Solarin. His wife, who is in her late forties and about the same size as me, has provided me with a few dresses. I’m wearing a flowy one, my arms are wrapped around myself and it takes a minute of glancing around to become aware that I’m in their upscale kitchen. All stainless steel appliances.
“Princess Mikayla, can I get you anything else?” Mrs. Solarin asks. She’s beautiful, with hair in a thick braid, like a halo around her head. The look in her eyes for him and him for her when he brought me home, makes me want to curl into the fetal position and cry.
I’m supposed to be in hiding until Qaaim is brought to justice.
“Oh, I… this is so good,” I grab the spoon that’s sitting in a bowl of oatmeal, which was steaming…a minute ago, maybe more? I can’t recall, every time I’m not engaged in conversation, I contemplate on how stupid I was for falling for Jagger Johansson.
“Please, you need your strength. That no good uncle of yours is prepared to meet Zane tomorrow afternoon. We have to get him. I’m from Zihula, I’ll always love my island, but I have some good friends who should’ve never believed in him.”
“I have heard of your land.”
“My King is a very good man as long as he trusts you,” she chuckles. “I don’t mean you in particular, I’m sorry, you make me nervous but he did not trust your King Regent. King Damba is sick and set in his ways. He didn’t like how your lands were sold off so quickly after… after… well, you know.” She sits down next to me.
My ears perk. I need to forget Jagger and everything about him. Mrs. Solarin may have more than gossip.
“I am cooking dinner tonight. A grand dinner. The advisor for Zihula will be in attendance. The moment you snatch your throne back, you must work on the crops. The land is worked so hard, due to all the selling in the past.” She stops speaking and places a hand on her chest. “Forgive me, I cannot say ‘you must’ to a royal. And I have entertained lots, it’s just, the tales about your disappearance. We all have prayed for you, it feels like I know you. Everyone is curious about you.”
“It’s okay.” Though my eyes sting with fresh tears, I focus on Mrs. Solarin. Her mouth moves in rapid succession until another thought pops into her head. Then she’s standing again.
“I have lots of cooking to do. The kitchen is yours, anything you’d like. Tonight will be perfect.”
“I understand that an advisor from your country will be in attendance but please don’t prepare anything out of the ordinary for me.”
***
Last night, I reminded myself to breathe, and to smile on occasion. Just the simple things in life were so hard to do. I met with an advisor of the Zihula nation who gifted me with jewels and wouldn’t take no for an answer. The man was adamant that I had not only the King but Prince Fari’s backing for the confrontation this afternoon. He even agreed that the nation would provide materials such as compost for my country prior to when we are to plant our seeds. It’s a process, but I’ll learn.
Mr. Solarin indicated that he knew of good people in my tribe who would make the best counsel. Although, he stated as a government official, the choice is mine. Chumi has rounded up a recommendation of future elders that I’m in trepidation about meeting. Seems like another set of folks that can get rid of me when necessary. Yet I cannot fathom running a country all alone…
I sigh while lying in the comfortable bed. I reach over and grab the pillow at the opposite side, instead of hugging it to my chest, I flick it with my wrist. The feather pillow falls to the glossy wood floor below.
I don’t need a man on the other side of the bed. Hell, in middle school I couldn’t understand the necessity. Same went for high school and college.
I just loved me some Cree.
Thoughts of my oldest friend place a much-needed smile on my face as I sit up. After the conference with Qaaim, the news will be national enough for me to seek out my parents and start the process of rectifying the wrongs started by Qaaim and Ava Sinclair.
Just thinking over her death sends a chill down my spine.
“I did that. I can do anything,” I motivate myself. The altercation was self-defense anyway.
***
“What is going on…” I mumble as Mrs. Solarin starts into the parking lot where her husband works.
She was just mid-sentence about visiting once a week with his favorite lunch when I noticed the slew of news vans.
“You will oust Qaaim in front of all of South Africa.” She huffs. “Zane did not tell you, did he?”
“He mentioned a conference. Guess he failed to state the press were invited as well.” I lean over until my chest is against my knees. This is cruel… if Qaaim had recorded my statement about “screw the country” almost two weeks ago, they’d spit in my face.
“Are you alright?”
I slink back into a seated position. “Yes. I can do this. My uncle deserves to be hated by the masses. Your husband made sure they’d all come. So,” I sigh, “thank you. This past few days have been highly stressful.”
“I hope I didn’t add to the craziness.”
“The opposite, in fact,” I offer as much of a smile as I can muster. Listening to Mrs. Solarin drone on about this and that even taught me a few things. I’ve certainly got some apologizing to do for telling off my country. I need to learn about them as individuals, not see them all as mob of people who hate me.
Solarin comes to the driver’s door as his wife presses the button to roll down the windows. He affectionately cups her face with his hand, and I look away. I’m almost startled that I hadn’t noticed two other men with government badges, one dark. The lighter one opens my door.
Solarin addressed me with, “Mikayla, this is Peter and Toma.” The guy holding the door nods first then the other one. “They will help escort you to the front of the building. It’s a short walk, but as you can see, you will be noticed.”
The moment we step out of the car, there’s shouting.
“It’s her!”
“That’s the princess!”
“Mikayla, Mikayla, there’s word that you’ve given up your crown?”
“Princess Mikayla, can you tell us where you have been for almost twenty years?”
From dark skin to pale, from various African accents to British, people are shoving cameras in my direction.
Peter holds out his hand to a microphone that’s inches from my mouth. Due to their first impression—well, after all these years—that I provided almost two weeks ago, I smile and try to address the closest investigator.
“I was dropped off in Long Beach, California a few days after my parents deaths.” I hand the man an old newspaper print out that Solarin had from the Los Angeles Times. After all the shame I’ve felt from being on the cover of the article, I can’t believe the articles about me help build a case.
It dawns on me, I was abducted from my home before I understood the meaning of the word.
As the truth sinks in, I’m escorted to the left side of the building and ascend the three steps. Today, I’ll listen as the government provides their evidence. I’m not really needed as an expert witness, but Zane explained it that the South African Government allowed Qaaim to rule, because they were waiting for this day, and he said my people “wanted to have their cake and eat it, too.” With my disappearance, they didn’t want Nivean to be a nation without a ruler, it would have devastated an already weak country.
My shoulder’s square as I take the final step up. They will be without no longer. A podium is stationed between the center of the innermost white columns. The building has a European style to it.
There are two rows of seats, six on each. Smack dab in the front, between a king and queen of the southwest section of Africa, from a country I cannot remember is my Uncle Qaaim. There’s two other sets of monarchs, who I luckily recall from the research Solarin implored me to finish. One is behind them and I start for the back row to the far right of all the people when I notice him.
Dark chocolate with a perfectly constructed goatee, set around full lips. The young, ambitious and smart Djimon Hounsou look-a-like, or also known as Prince Fari of the Zihula nation. His advisor indicated that he was out of the area last night.
I start for the seat on the far left in the back, but the Queen I can’t recall the name of, although she resembles the one from Coming to America, arises.
Royal or not, I’m not sure if I should bow or curtsy, she makes me want to pump a fist into the air and say, “Black girl magic.” But, instead the Queen hugs me.
“You look just like your mother,” she says, squeezing me like my own mother, Joyce, would. I can hear her telling me not to cry, while her own brown gaze is sparkling diamonds from tears.
Qaaim begins to stand up discreetly, and his feet are geared toward the steps. The King beside him places a large hand on his arm.
“Your niece, Princess Mikayla, has arrived. How should you address her, Regent?” He speaks in a deep, James Earl Jones type voice.
Okay, just kidding. I’m a ball of nerves and it’s clear they’re aware of something that Qaaim just caught onto.
My uncle turns toward me. “Why are you here?”
He yanks his arm away from the royal who just addressed him.
Qaaim moves to the podium and slaps at the microphone. A loud static sound grates at our ears. He jumps almost out of his skin as anxious and angry as he is.
I glance to Zane, for confirmation. Qaaim wasn’t supposed to speak now. But Peter winks at me. My friend, Zane, gives a smile while mouthing something about “let him dig his grave.”
Qaaim speaks in his eloquent, powerful voice, “We are all gathered here today to remove the ‘Regent’ portion from my title. To announce to all of South Africa that I will be crowned king!” He whines about the lie the government used to get him here. Little does he know, he’ll be less than King Regent, when all is said and done. “My beautiful niece, Princess Mikayla Mthembu, has washed her hands of our people. I declare that I will continue to rule the nation with–”
“Lies!” People begin to speak up. They’re holding even more newspaper articles about me from California.
I stare in shock until my shoulder is tapped.
“Princess Mikayla, the show has just begun,” a smooth, confident voice says from over my shoulder.
I glance around to see that it belongs to Prince Fari. “Please,” he motions for a chair.
After I sit, he sits next to me. The crowd is a mixture of citizens and news media. I cannot hear my own thoughts as Qaaim is arrested in front of everyone. Then in the crowd, I count five, ten, almost twenty men being handcuffed.
The head of the department steps before the podium and silence ensues, aside from the few angry co-conspirators of my uncle, Qaaim.
“Today, I have news of the King Regent, Qaaim Shaka Mthembu’s heading and organizing a conspiracy to commit murder of none other than Her Royal Highness, Queen Makuachukwa Mthembu Rakoto of the Nivean nation, and the one true king, Bannan Andry Rakoto. Evidence has been submitted as to how their deaths were not by car crash but in fact, trauma due to various stab wounds along their body…”
I can feel myself sinking as the man continues to speak in a systematic tone, explaining how Qaaim and the men who were just apprehended helped orchestrate the plan.
Even in a seated position, my body waivers. I’m almost at the point of fainting when I feel Prince Fari’s hand over mine.
I can almost hear Jagger whispering in my ear that all will be okay. I almost feel a passionate kiss against my forehead. I’ve grown accustomed to those. Jagger does that often when he believes I’m sleep. He’s a man, I know he has to prove that he can kiss me off my feet when his tongue soars into mine. But I just loved it when he kissed my forehead. It’s as if he’d been declaring that he will keep me.
I blink and realize those enduring kisses meant nothing. Then, I turn to Fari and offer the faintest smile of thanks.