He
drove into my hostel around noon in his black Peugeot, the car was painted
black and its glasses were darkly tainted. He was just as dark with mushy moustache;
he was tall with a gentle pointed nose and a feminine body frame; slimmed and
trimmed like a female model. No wonder he sounded epicene on phone. ‘Yeah I look
a lot like my Mother.’ He spoke as I stood and looked at him with apparent
amazement.
‘No
wonder the mushy moustache, something must stand you out as a man.’ I felt so
close and familiar with him and sat comfortably in his car. I didn’t even ask
where he was taking me to.
As
much as I dread downfall, I cannot deny its striking amazement, the seeming
wonder of strokes of water and the wetness the earth would soak up in due time.
Bright, dark or murky, rain is not a respecter of time or events and it strikes
when it pleases. But life isn’t a stream of coincidences; it is actions that
breed reactions and reactions actions. The clouds that now gathered to fall
were dense of water, synthesized from my dryness and made to form into concrete
strokes of scary drops.
I
knew when he drove me into a bar and ordered drinks for me, when he kept
pouring the tasty liquid into my glass and I kept drinking, I knew it tasted
sweet, sour and itchy and my throat consequently thirst for more. I knew I felt
liberated and said things I never thought I could utter, I even flirted with
him and it all seemed too easy. He took me to dance and I danced and laughed as
if I never existed before that moment, before I lost consciousness I knew I had
known fun and it was wild, crazy and exciting but that was all I knew till I
woke up in my bed naked and dizzy and Sanda was just gone.
Everything
seemed normal and my skin felt cold as if I had just bathed. I stood and
managed myself into the bathroom and found the clothes I wore yester night
soaked inside a bucket with detergent. I tried to clean up but I was already
cleaned except my mouth that still seriously smelled of alcohol. So I brushed
and decided to call Sanda but I was shocked to death by what I heard. ‘The
number you are trying to call does not exist, please check…’ I hung up and
tried again and again but the result was the same so I decided to check him on
Facebook and leave him a message but the account does not exist and even the
chat history was gone. Now I was confident it was all a dream, but I was torn
between what part was reality and was part was the dream, because Sanda seemed
so real and how did I wake up naked on my bed on Sunday the 15th.
Maybe I had just dreamed the whole thing throughout valentine. But what about
the soaked cloth in the bathroom, the smell of alcohol in my mouth, and the
number saved as Sanda on my phone. This must be madness, I need a psychologist.
Every
day I wake up with a thought of Sanda, and then I had no thought of him at all
because he had existed neither in my dream nor in my reality, because Stephen
Sanda does not exist anywhere. I took up my average life of sleeping, waking up
and schooling till the semester was over and I went back home to my parents.
Mum called me into her room on my third day at home. ‘Jennifer, when was the
last time you saw your period? She asked mildly as if I may be afraid to answer
but I was simply perplexed. My mother had
never spoken about period or no period with me since I was 10.
‘Huh?
My period?’
‘Yes,
your menstruation!’ now her voice was slightly raised and I wondered what for?
‘I’m
even on my period right now. What’s the question about period for mummy?’ I was
getting curios too.
‘Have
you started having sex?’ Sex? I had
never heard my mother uttered that word, at least not with such bareness.
‘Mum,
I’m still a virgin. What’s up with all this questions?’
‘You
are pregnant Jennifer. I’m your mother; don’t dare lie to me again.’
‘Pregnant!!!’
I shouted. I meant it as a question but my word was emphatic. I wished I could
just fall down and faint but that was another thing I had never done.
It
was four months and yet my period came every month and stopped the month my Mum
discovered I was pregnant. Stephen Sanda was gone, or he never existed but he
was present within me and I bear the testimony of his existence. The clouds
gathered and yet shall soon fall, but there are consequences for every
downfall, for the earth will have to soak up the waters and prepare for
germinations. No one will believe my story, not even the Sanda within me and so
earth shall be dry again and the memory of the gathered clouds and the downfall
will fade in expectance of another. Maybe I’ve dreamt it all and I dread
nothing, not even the impending rain.
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