Dedicated to the one who flooded me with her comments when I list expected
JanetLeon3

~Chloe~

July 16th, 2011

Dear diary,

"Get away from me you creep, how many times do I have to tell you that you don't belong

here. You are only here because you won that's stupid scholarship."

Of course, I couldn't do anything about it, neither could I stand up to her. Her name was
Genevieve Omagbemi, the only daughter of the principal of this school and, my worst nightmare...

It was a hot Sunday morning and I was in my room reading MJ's diary. The news of his kidnap threw me off really bad and as a result, I couldn't sleep. I mean how could I possibly sleep when my classmate and friend is somewhere, locked up, cowering in fear in the corner of a cold dark room? I still couldn't believe he had been kidnapped.

How did it happen? where did it happen? And more importantly why the fuck did it have to happen now, of all time? Those were the questions that were hovering around constantly, in my head. I couldn't come up with answers to those questions, at least not on my own. After thinking long and hard, I did the one thing I knew would bring the answer to the question I keep asking myself. I flipped open another page hoping to find some answers.

July 27th, 2016

Dear Diary,

Happy birthday to me. I guess who am I kidding, there is no use celebrating when everyone
is going to turn me into the punching bag in school like every other day. But today was different, in
the process of celebrating my birthday for me, someone poured very corrosive chemicals on my body

causing mild thermal burns. My skin was decolorized in the process... I don't want to talk about it too much. Although I did meet someone special today though; she is South African and she helped me find an antidote to whatever damage the chemicals did to my skin. I guess you could call her a gift from God to me, on a day as horrible as this... I think I have feelings for her.

...

September 12th, 2016

Dear Diary,

I'm officially an SS2 student. And thank goodness Genevieve Omagbemi and her Mom are no longer in Wesley Academy. It's going to be a glorious day for me in school today. I hope that now Genevieve Omagbemi and her Mom is out of the way, maybe, just maybe things will finally be looking good for me.

...

October 16th, 2016

Dear Diary,

I wish I could forget but sadly it'll keep haunting me forever. My sit partner Mary Jane Okafor was killed behind the cafeteria two days ago and only parts of her body were found. We heard the rumour it was the vice principal's son, Jacob Omotola that was the one responsible for this abominable act, using a student for ritual. He is nowhere to be found now but I hope they find him and bring justice upon him. If I am being honest, I am scared as hell because I've been seeing her in my dreams and all she ever says to me is "You are next.".

That was by far scarier than watching a horror movie with the lights off. I marked the page and kept reading his diary completely out of touch with my surroundings. I heard a knock on the door of my room and I mindlessly said "come in". The door squeaked open and my elder brother Damilare walked in with a tray of food in his hands.

"Good morning, Chocolate Chloe. You know there is an actual world that exists outside the four walls of a book."

"Good morning to you as well big bro. No, I'm not reading—you know what, never mind. And breakfast in bed? What am I, five?"

"I know, I know, I just... I miss doing that for you. Don't tell Zoe but, you were always my favourite twin and I won't lie, I miss seeing your jovial face around."

I smiled at him finally getting out of bed to hug him. I could feel his body automatically relax into the hug and I smiled hugging him a little tighter. After a while, I mumbled into his chest,

"I missed you too Dre Bear."

Damilare and I have been inseparable ever since I learned to call him by his name just before I turned a year old. We always had each other's back and there was not a time that I needed his help that he wasn't there for me. He always made sure Zoe got the punishment she deserved whenever he was around because he knew she would have done way worse to me when he wasn't around.

We finally freed each other from the 30-second-long embrace. I went into my walking-in bathroom to take a quick shower and wash my teeth while my brother got comfortable in my room. Waking back out, I re-entered my room heading for my closet picking some random clothes. I ended up with a pair of long khakis an oversized round-neck T-shirt. Once I was properly dressed,

I finally joined my brother in my room who was whistling away quietly. I sat on my dressing table to
apply a little makeup. I was aware my brother wasn't just here to feed me breakfast, which by the way was noodles and fried eggs. I made sure I didn't overdo the makeup. When I was done, I picked up a pair of shoes from the rack and fastened it to my feet."I heard—" He took a long pause. "Heard what?" I asked still working on the shoelaces. He looked at me for a while before saying. "You can't really judge a bat by its wings you know. I never took MJ for the type of guys to get into this thing but, I guess I was wrong."

I was all done fixing my shoelaces so I turned to look at him sharply and asked intently. "What are you talking about bro?" "I'm talking about your friend, Michael Jordan. He was kidnapped, wasn't he? Well maybe he wasn't kidnapped, maybe he ran away from home for some reason best known to him."

"Uh... no. I don't think so. The news—"

"The news would say what they want to say. Come here, look at this."

My brother beckoned on me and I went to sit beside him. He held his phone to my face. I was shocked by the content of what he was showing me. It was a video of MJ and two other guys from our school. They were both still in school uniforms and they were both talking loudly about getting laid later than night. Right before my eyes in the video, the other guys who were in the video were smoking the same cigarette while MJ was gobbling down a bottle of beer. After standing in front of his house for a while, a blue bus came and I watched them enter the bus and that was where the video ended.

"Whoa. So, he wasn't kidnapped after all..."

"I believe not. Now eat your food, it's getting cold and then we can go have our brother- sister bonding time." I giggled at the last statement he made before diving into the noodles he made for me which was still warm thankfully. I was still bothered as to why MJ would go AWOL, but I was thankful it wasn't what we thought initially. Once I was done with breakfast, it finally dawned on me that there were a lot of things I didn't follow up on, most importantly my father. I still don't know if he was back from the hospital, and when did my brother come home?. My face was contoured into a small frown and that didn't go unnoticed.

"What is it this time Chocolate Chloe? That's your 'something is wrong' face."

"Nothing, I'm just curious—"

"About what?"

"About a lot. For starters, I haven't head from Dad since he went to the hospital. I don't even know when you got back, you just showed up to my room with a plate of food. More importantly, I'm still not entirely sure what happened with MJ. Why is the news saying he was kidnapped if he wasn't? As if this isn't all to overwhelming enough, I have a bunch of unsolved riddles to deal with."

"Okay, li'l sis, breathe. Problems no dey finish ooo," he started."Now to answer your question one at a time... Dad is well. He isn't fine, but he is alive in
and the hospital. The doctors are still trying to find a diagnosis as to what is wrong with him, so he is still there with Mom. Then I came home yesterday evening but went to meet with Mom in the hospital to check on Dad. Now about your friend's case, I have no idea but I'm sure he will resurface when the time comes. Then what riddles are you talking about? Let me see if I can solve it..." I just looked at him with my mouth slightly opened, he saw my expressions and chuckled saying. "What?"

"Nothing, I'm just glad you're back. Let me go and get the papers. It's on my study table." I got up from the bed we were both sitting on and walked towards my study table. After searching for it for a while, I found it and handed it over to him, while he opened it up and read through it. "What do you think it means?" I asked.

"So, let see, the second riddle says, "Dear Chloe, I'm sure you must be all worked up that no one remembered to send you anything on Valentine's day. That's alright, it happens to the best of us. However I thought I'd leave you with something to ponder on. I'm in life but not in death; you can't have fun without me. What am I? With love, Jayson."

This is easy. The answer is 'F'."

"F? As in, the letter 'F'?"

"Yes, there's an F in life, but none in death, and without an F, you can't spell 'fun', or you can't have fun... do you get it now?"

"Yeah. Nice. That's actually pretty neat. What about the first one? It says, "I am something, people buy me to eat, but they never eat me. What am I?"

"That too is quite easy. A takeaway plate should be the answer..." I put my face in my palms. "I'm so dumb," I said to myself, loud enough for Damilare to hear and to laugh. "But what's the point of the riddles though. 'F' and 'takeaway plate'? What does it ultimately mean?" I asked him hoping he would have some sort of answers but all he said was

"Who knows? C'mon we are heading out," my brother said, pulling me from off the bed. "Wait. Where are we going; and what about Zoe, and Mom and Dad?"

"Oh, Chloe, Chloe, you worry too much, I'm sure they can handle themselves. Come on now, it's just you and me today. We're going to have lots of fun."
With that, my 25-year-old brother dragged me out of my room with my dirty plate in his hands, dropped it off in the kitchen before we both hopped into his car as we headed to Oceans Baskets in Victoria island.

Or at least, that's where he said we were going. The drive there waspretty fun as he told me about all the hilarious escapades, he did that semester in his school, Babcock University. I couldn't stop laughing my head off as he narrated his story. My brother was by far the most jovial and fun-loving person I've ever know and that's why I'm always super excited about his arrival.

We got to Ocean Baskets at 2 p.m, and the minute we settled in, a waiter came to attend to us. Moments later while I was looking around, MJ's favourite song started playing. I couldn't help the sadness that began to creep into my chest as I thought about him. "Where could he really be if he wasn't kidnapped and who were those guys that he was with?" I kept asking myself. I most certainly haven't seen them before. "Are they even students of Wesley academy?"

"Hey chocolate Chloe, I just learned a new magic trick I want to show you. You see this coin I'm going to make it disappear," my brother said, snapping me out of my thoughts. "Really? You—you know there's no such thing as magic, right?"

"Just because I'm studying medicine doesn't mean I have to be a dork. And don't be a cunt and observe." He smirked at me for a second before flipping the coin upwards a couple times and slamming it on the table. Swiftly switching hands, the coin moved so fast I almost missed him quietly slipping into the collar of his shirt. Seconds later, I giggled at his pathetic attempts of a magic trick. "Ta-da where is the coin now, Chocolate Chloe?"

"It's in the collar of your shirt silly. Did you really think you can make a coin disappear? Ha, you failed!" I said mockingly. "The real magic was me making you happy. Cos you're clearly happier, and this is just the beginning," he said with a huge grin on his face. "That's really sweet." I couldn't help the smile had crept its way onto my face as I mouthed "thank you" to him before the waiter came to serve us lunch.

A/N

Awwwwwn don't you all just love big brothers like this. I mean look at that🥺🥺🥺
he is just too sweet for his own good. 😂😂😂 before you people chop my head off I want to apologize for not updating for two months straight it is no not like me and that why o genuinely apologize.

What do you guys think about this chapter tho is it a smash or pass for you ?? Hit me up in the comment section and pls don't forget to vote on your way there. Thank you 🙏🏽