The Influencer

You adopted the name Mark.

It wasn’t just a name—it was a currency, a door-opener, a password into rooms most people didn’t even know existed. Across Africa, they knew you. Mark was the biggest influencer the continent had ever produced—or at least, that’s what they believed.

The truth was far less glamorous.

Ebere—the real you—was someone you’d locked away years ago, back when you learned that the right name could smooth over accents, melt suspicion, and make strangers smile without knowing why. In a way, Mark was your greatest creation.

You arrived at Coachella like you owned the desert. Heat swelled around you, warm and dry as oven air, laced with faint hints of sweat, perfume, and grass. The Uber driver asked what you did for a living.

“I help people find their voice,” you told him.

It sounded noble. Generous. You didn’t mention that you’d mostly found yours by drowning out everyone else’s.

By the time you reached the festival gates, you’d already been stopped three times for photos. People grinned like just standing next to you made their lives sharper, brighter. You gave each of them a flash of perfect teeth, a hand on the shoulder, a quick “Hey, my guy!” or “Sis, you look amazing!” before moving on.

That was the secret: connection didn’t have to be real—only convincing.

Inside, the music pulsed like a second heartbeat. Sunlight fractured through thousands of sequins and mirrored glasses. You liked crowds—not because you felt at home in them, but because they were the best place to disappear in plain sight.

That’s when you met Maya.

Sequined top, denim shorts, glitter tracing her collarbones, hair piled high like she’d been sculpted for the stage. She wasn’t a fan—or at least she didn’t say she was. She asked where you were from. You said Lagos. She asked what it was really like—not the Instagram Lagos, the real one.

You told her about smoky suya stands, about danfos with cracked windshields blasting Wizkid, about the sea breeze masking the island’s stench of excess. You gave her the version that sounded grounded, human.

Her laugh, light and almost shy, caught you off guard. For a moment you thought of Chika—your first real partner. The one who’d taken out a loan for “your” business expansion, then disappeared from your life two months later when you rebranded without her. Last you heard, she was back in Enugu, selling sachet water at her father’s kiosk. You hadn’t regretted it. Not really.

As the sun dipped and the desert cooled, you and Maya drifted to the edges of the grounds where shadows pooled and the music softened to a memory. She told you about an ex who’d ghosted her. You tilted your head, gave her that I get you look, and stayed silent. You’d ghosted more people than you could count—Tunde, for one. He’d quit his job to shoot your content full-time, even covered your expenses when you were “waiting for payments.” When a global agency noticed your brand, you took the deal solo, leaving him with nothing but a cracked camera lens and unanswered calls.

You didn’t hate these people. You didn’t even think about them. You just… moved past them. Like a snake shedding skin.

By night, Coachella was neon and basslines rolling like distant thunder, bodies swaying as if morning didn’t exist. Maya leaned into you, her perfume sharp and sweet. You told her about your “hard childhood,” the streets you “barely survived,” the “hustle” that built you. Every word perfectly placed, just enough to make it believable.

You didn’t mention the marble floors of your childhood home. Or your father’s fleet of cars. Or how many campaigns you’d stolen wholesale from smaller creators and passed off as yours.

Two a.m., Palm Springs. You were on the balcony of your suite, the desert breathing under the stars. The festival’s bass still throbbed faintly in the air. Your phone buzzed—a message from the documentary filmmaker you’d met in the VIP lounge.

"You tell stories well," he’d said earlier, eyes sharp as glass. You’d taken it as praise.

Now, the message was a transcript of your own words—stripped of charm:

"You have never built anything without stealing pieces from someone else.

You have never loved anyone without using them.

You have never told a story without bending it into a lie."

Below it, in smaller text:

There’s a name for people like you: Psychopath.

You stared at it. No guilt. No shame. Just the warm, steady hum of recognition.

Maya wrapped her arms around you from behind, the scent of your latest conquest still heavy on her. You tapped her lightly across the knuckles—a mindless gesture you’d bestowed on countless groupies before. By tomorrow she’d be forgotten, her calls ignored unless nostalgia decided to be kind.

Somewhere far off, Post Malone’s voice floated through the night—low, melancholic. But you were listening to a different song: the quiet percussion of deposits landing, the soft rustle of figures climbing in neat green columns, the slow, symphonic swell of your net worth blooming higher with each breath.

And you smiled.