Chapter 5 Lunch Gone Bad

Belinda's POV

I was really really shocked when she admitted that the white car was hers, the beautiful white car, and so unexpectedly, I exclaimed out and they both turned to look at me, and that was when I tried composing myself, it was already late though, Jasmine had already comprehended what happened, I noticed her smiling satisfactorily.

"What? Is anything the problem?", she asked and I shook my head.

"Not really. Um, what happened to your old car?", I asked, just to be sure.

She smiled.

"My old car? I gave it to one of my fans. You see this baby right here...", she said pointing at the car and waving the car key at my face, "I just got it yesterday", she concluded.

"Oh...!", I mouthed and before I knew it, I was already staggering backwards and quickly, I held onto Kelly so as not to fall to the ground, for my eyes were already becoming heavy.

They both looked at me curiously, I composed immediately and Kelly actually gave me a helping hand, he held onto me and then turned to Jasmine.

"It's really nice, congratulations", he said pointing at the car and smiling.

Jasmine smiled broadly.

"Thank you Kelly", then she turned to me, "Belinda, I think you should try their food, it would help you to cool off okay?", she said.

I couldn't even say anything, I only just nodded, forcing myself to smile.

"Alright guys, bye and see you some other time", she said and began walking away.

At the instant she turned, I immediately raised up my hands like I wanted to hit her, and Kelly came to my rescue.

He quickly wrapped his arms around me and grabbed me back, I smiled, trying so very hard to compose myself. Still grabbing me, we went into the restaurant.

As soon as we entered, a waitress approached us. I looked around, it was a nice restaurant anyway.

"Welcome sir, welcome ma'am", the waitress said to us smiling so broadly, obviously, I could see it in her that she was elated to have us in her midst.

I smiled at her, nodding my head.

"Congratulations on your recent engagement. Please, let me show you to a special table", she said and immediately began walking away, towards a particular empty table at the far end.

We glanced at each other, shrugged and followed her. We got to the table and sat down, then made our orders.

I sighed deeply as I dropped my bag and phone on the table, Kelly dropped his phone and adjusted into his seat, I watched him closely, as expected, he was calm, like nothing ever happened at the entrance few minutes ago. I sighed again.

Minutes later, two waitresses approached our table carrying with them, our orders. It was exactly what I had seen Jasmine feasting on, in her live stream. That was what I had ordered for.

The waitresses set the plates of noodles, eggplant chicken streaks and veggies, and then poured into our glasses, some juice.

I picked up my glass of juice and sipped, then I picked up my cutlery to eat, but the appetite wasn't there anymore, the discovery of Jasmine's new car had taken it away and so, I began playing with the food, using the fork to turn my noodles over and over.

Kelly who always seemed to be never bothered about anything, ignored me and picked up his cutleries to eat.

He dipped his fork into his plate of noodles and straight into his mouth, I was watching him. At the instant the food entered his mouth, he immediately crumpled his face and turned to me, I looked away immediately.

With his face still squeezed and grimaced, he dropped his cutleries and stretched out his hand to take up the souvenir, and he spat the food into it, he hadn't swallowed it.

I deliberately ignored him, still playing with my food.

"This food is horrible", he spat out.

"Kelly it's not that bad", I said almost in a whisper.

"Really?", he asked.

"Yes", I replied.

"So why are you not eating?".

My eyes flickered.

"I am, look...", I trailed off then picked up noodles with my fork and straight into my mouth.

Jeez! The taste I had gotten was really horrible, I wasn't good in cooking but I could tell that the food was lacking taste in so many areas.

The noddles was gummy and gooey, the seasoning was much, it had a sharp taste on the tongue, the pepper was much as well and the veggies wasn't fully done, it was half done.

I couldn't even chew, I decided to swallow and I had a very hard time swallowing it, it was really horrible. But I had to compose like nothing was wrong, Kelly was actually watching me.

"It... it's not that bad", I stuttered, my eyelids flickering, my face grimaced.

Kelly smiled.

"Wow!", he exclaimed, nodding his head.

I couldn't hold it anymore, I quickly picked up the glass of water and began gulping.

"You know what? Let me just save us this... this misery, let's go get a better food somewhere else please", he said.

I rolled my eyes.

"Whatever", I said.

He hissed.

"The food that was served at location was even better than this nonsense", he spat out and I just looked on, I couldn't even say anything.

He turned towards the counter and called, "waiter?".

A lady immediately walked up to us with a menu, and a POS terminal in her hands. She got to us and handed over the menu to Kelly who took it.

He opened the menu and his eyes widened.

"What!", he exclaimed.

"What is it?", I asked.

He ignored me and turned to the lady.

"Is this the price of the food or the price of the restaurant?", Kelly asked.

"It's the price of the food sir", she replied.

Kelly turned to me, he was really shocked, I could see it.

"What is this?", he asked.

"Kelly...", I called in muffles, trying to calm him down.

"It's too expensive", he complained, his voice going a pitch higher.

"Kelly stop you are embarrassing me", I continued saying in whispers, but he wouldn't listen.

"I can't even...", he continued talking and I immediately looked around, as expected, people were watching, already snapping their heads at us. I felt so embarrassed.

"Stop please", I continued pleading with him.

"I can't even eat the food", he said.

I kept my eyes fixated on him, trying to communicate with him using my eyes.

"Okay, fine", he said and reluctantly took out his debit card from his pocket and handed it over to the lady, he still wasn't ready to let go, before my very eyes he and the lady began dragging the card.

"Um...", I fumed, stretched out my hand to take the card from him, and he quickly let go.

"Thank you", I said to the lady, smiling, and then turned to him, staring daggers with my eyes.

The lady inserted the debit card into the terminal, punched in some digits and then handed the terminal to Kelly so he could put in his pin.

He reluctantly did and after that, the transaction was made. He took his card and immediately got up and walked away, leaving me behind. I lowly gasped, hurriedly got up and followed him.

We drove in silence all the way back to our movie location, he didn't talk to me, and I didn't talk to him either.

Halfway into our journey, he spoke up.

"Are you okay?", he asked turning to me, and I ignored him. He looked away, focusing on the road.

"What is wrong?", he asked again.

"You", I replied, not turning to look at him, "you are what is wrong with me Kelly", I added.

There was silence for a while and then he broke it with a snort.

"Me? How?", he asked.

"Yes you are what is wrong with me Kelly because everytime, you are always finding a way to embarrass me. Kelly it's not fair", I said, my voice was breaking, the tears were gradually welling up in my eyes.

He sighed deeply, saying nothing and just focusing on the road. This got me more peeved.

"Okay...", he finally spoke up, "I'm sorry that you felt embarrassed, it wasn't intentional", he immediately slowed down and then parked by the road.

"If you had let me ordered for food, at least we would not have eaten that nonsense that we had to eat there", he added.

"How was I supposed to know that the food was gonna be terrible?", I asked, almost interrupting him, "I just only thought that if Jasmine eats there, then it's good enough for us to eat there as well".

"That's exactly the problem", he said, almost cutting me short, "you need to keep up appearances everywhere no matter what it costs", he added.

"But Jasmine is there and... and...".

"I don't care what Jasmine does", he shouted this time, interrupting me, "I don't care", and I turned to him, my eyes were brimming with tears.

"She isn't the one who paid the thirty five thousand naira I paid in there for nothing", he was still shouting and vibrating in anger.

I looked away from him, slowly nodding my head and trying very hard to hold the tears in my eyes from rolling down my cheeks.

"All I do, I do it for you, I do it out of love, I do it to maintain your image. But it always seems that all I do is never enough, you always find a reason to pick fight with me", I shouted and turned to him, he was just calm, looking elsewhere.

"I'm not...", he said, "I'm not trying to fight you Linda, I'm not".

"Then why do I feel so antagonized and unloved Kelly?", he quickly turned to me, surprised, infact, he was gawping.

"Oh! So because, I do not see the reason to spend my money on frivolities, you now feel unloved huh?", he asked.

I shook my head in disagreement.

"No, that's not what this is about".

"That is exactly what this is about", he argued, shouting.

"Why are you shouting at me?", I asked and he gnashed his teeth, and calmed down.

"Can we go? We still have to shoot, you know that", he said and I looked away, saying nothing to him.

Then he revved up the car engine and we drove away.