OLD FLAMES

I vowed this was going to be our last. But Dre has a way with words. He has a way of pulling the strings of my emotions. In no time I was back at the very thing I wanted to be free from.... My name is Labake Oni and this is my story...

Dr. Babalakin in his characteristic loud voice punctured a hole into our long held believe that argument is the quarrel between people. In his philosophy class- Argument and Critical Thinking, logic is a set of statements comprising the conclusion and the premises. I wasn't one to take interest in such debate but that fact that he called me changed everything...

'Hey you', he said pointing in my direction with thick short thumb of a finger. The breeze blowing into the large lecture theatre seems to be at loggerheads with his oversized suit that kept flying up and exposing his small pouch of a stomach that is a complete distortion to his short slim frame. All eyes turned in my direction at once. I must have been dozing for long when his eyes caught me.

'What is your name'. The smile had gone out of his face to something more serious and angry.

'Laba...Labake...', I stammered afraid of what is to come next.

He turned to face the rest of class briefly then continued.

All girls sleep in class

Labake is a girl

Therefore, Labake sleeps in class.

His statement is followed by a loud roar of laughter. I felt shame washed over me. I have never been embarrassed like this in my life. I became the spectacle of the class. 

His message is lost on the laughing faces and he indulged them to revel in their folly before leading them back to the lesson.

'All of you idiots laughed but didn't understand the message I just passed across. The first two statements I made are known as premises while the last statement is the conclusion that supports the earlier ones I made.'  

There was an 'oh...ho' look on everyone's faces. A look of realization.

I was the first to leave the class as soon as it ended. Shame wouldn't allow me wait for Tosan my roommate whom I guess must have been looking for me.

The cloud above had gathered with a thick darkness of an impending rain that shut out the remainder of the sun in that late afternoon. The wind had increased too. Tossing everything about in the air. The trees at the outskirt of the Art faculty swayed as though they could break any moment.

I covered my face with my hands to prevent the dust from entering my eyes.

'I wouldn't mind if you sleep in my room'. I turned to see the face that spoke behind.  I felt his breath on the nape of my neck.

It was his wavy hair cut into a punk that I first noticed then his pointed nose, red lips, a light skin that is a contrast to my dark shade skin. A round spotless face that gave off a mesmerizing aura. Rather than get angry at  his lewd statement, I stood gawking him in silence. It was there and then I knew I wouldn't be able to resist him. I shook his hand that felt cold but soothing to mine.

'My name is Dare but you can call me Dre. My car is just outside the faculty. I can take you home.'

I can't remember if I told him my name before I entered his car that evening while the rain poured in torrents as we drove to my hostel in silence. He made sure to walk me to the door of my room even though I protested weakly. All the girls in the hall gave him a lecherous stare as we walked under the rain that has reduced to a drizzle from block A to F.

Dre became a regular face in my room and in my mind.  I met his white mum on two occasions when she visited in our second and final year. Dre was a product of a one night stand engineered by a drinking spree. His father was a Nigerian student in London in the same class with his mum. When she realized she was pregnant, she informed Dre's dad who denied any involvement in the matter. Broken and ashamed, she dropped out of college to nurse the child that was a splitting image of his dad. Dre's dad never looked back even though the  test proved he was the father. She named her son after the last name of the man that got her pregnant.

Our love blossomed to the point that I literally became his wife on campus and even played the wife when he rented a room off campus at our final year. Everyone who knew us knew that we were made for each other. Other girls who tried to steal him from me either had their faces scratched with my fierce fingernails in a fight or had to back off when I threatened them with death.

It was the service year that became the clog in the wheel of our relationship. I had thought that we would be posted to the same state or perhaps not too far from each other. It was the time when mobile phone was not yet a common thing in Nigeria. I wept my eyes out when he was posted to Maiduguri and I to Lagos. Dre tried to pacify me that we could communicate by letters but it wasn't working. When all efforts to work out a redeployment for him to Lagos failed, I resigned to fate.

My service year was a grueling time for me. I received only two letters from Dre and afterwards it stopped coming. I was devastated when all my letters didn't come with any response from him. I stopped living then. I became grief-stricken like a widow mourning the untimely death of her husband. I thought of the worst that could have happened to my Dre. Was he dead? Or has he found another girl? I couldn't reach his mum because I don't have any address I could trace her to. The only two times she came to our school, we didn't talk much because as it seems there was a strain between herself and Dre. She was always in a hurry at both times. It was close to the end of my service year that I met Dapo Oni who I am now married to out of loneliness to forget Dre.

Her voiced echoed all across the banking hall. This woman with an appearance of a well-to-do person. She hung her hands bag to her armpit and requested to see the manager or else all hell would break loose. Everyone turned to watch the unfolding drama while the cashier who was attending to her made desperate effort to calm her down but without success.

A man climbed down from the stairs leading to the management office and walked straight to the woman. He asked her to follow him to the office.

I had collected the ATM I came for and was almost exiting the bank when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned and I froze. My breath ceased. The memory rushed back at me with a frightening force making the portals of my eyes open for the tears that came in quick succession.

I clung to him for both support and warmth. Anger and desire cursed through my entire body. I counted the years that had passed by between us. Ten solid years!

He quickly whisked me out of the bank into his car because we had become quite an interesting spectacle in the banking all.

There was anger in my voice but beneath it was an irresistible longing to catch up on the years gone by as we detour to an eatery along the road.

'What was my offence that you chose to abandon me in the dark, lonely and miserable?'

His mum had taken ill after he arrived Maiduguri and had sent for him. The letter came by DHL from London. He had scribbled a letter intending to post it when he get to the more urban area of Maiduguri but his bag somehow de-materialized from the vehicle when they stop over to refresh. If he had put the letter in the envelope he was carrying apart from the bag, the story would have been different. He left Nigeria to be by his mum who eventually died of cancer. After her burial, he returned to Nigeria.

'You are married now'. The way he said it made me feel as though I had betrayed him.

So I fired back.

'You want me to keep waiting for you after those long years without hearing from you. You didn't make any effort to look for me.'

'I am sorry. My mom's death wasn't what I had anticipated. It shook my entire being. I thought the strain between us wouldn't change anything but I was wrong. I loved her more than I knew then. She was my only family. We fought over my decision to come to Nigeria to look for a father that never looked back'.

'You are married too', I asked.

It took him awhile to respond. There was pain  in his eyes that seems not to have changed from the last time I last saw him.

'Twice married, twice divorced', he said.

'I am sorry to hear that'.

I didn't know how I ended up in bed with Dre. All I could remember was his breath upon my ears as the lift took us up to his posh apartment. I forgot that I was married as emotions run riot in my veins bringing back bottled up memories with violent rush. We devoured each other as if to make up for lost time. All moral reasons for us were completely suspended. I didn't know when nightfall came upon us.

I wept on the way home for my actions. I felt dirty and regretted every moment that I spent with Dre. I could have fought to prevent him from kissing me in the car before everything climaxed into his bedroom. But deep down inside me, I knew I enjoyed the way Dre handled me. He has mastered my body like no one else. It felt like those days on campus.

You would have expected everything to end that very night. But not so. I wanted more than anything to find every excuse to be near him, touch him, see is face and surrender my body to him like a lamb for slaughter. I lost all restraint, it felt normal to be married and at the same share my love with another man. How to get out of this, I still don't know.

                          

                               THE END

Thank you for reading this. What advice will you give to the woman in this mess? Until next time. I am Yours Truly,

Julius Topohozin.