Solitude – Episode 47

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SOLITUDE

 

_47_

 

I have been staying with Chanda the past few days, August has been here a couple of times and I can see that she looks like she is willing to give him a chance but I have my own plans so I allow him to take her for a joy ride.

 

‘You are heading out?’ She asks me

 

‘Yes I am.’

 

I am dressed in a black evening gown and black stilettos, I have little makeup on my face and my hair is tied into a bun.

 

‘I will be back after 9PM, don’t wait up for me.’ I say

 

‘Someone has met a man.’ She says and I can’t help but laugh

 

‘Good evening.’ I say when I run into August by the door

 

‘Nella.’ He responds with a smile

 

He has a bouquet of flowers and what looks like nonalcoholic wine

 

‘If he is cooking serve me a plate.’ I say and I hear them laugh

 

I drive to Radisson blu that is where we have decided on meeting.

 

 

I am received at the entrance and told that a table has been reserved for me where my host is waiting. I am led to a secluded table that is dimly lit and notice Mr. Nakamba sitted there.

 

‘One would think this is a romantic dinner.’ He says standing up to peck my right cheek

 

I smile at his chivalrous behavior.

 

He pulls out a chair for me, waits for me to sit before he pushes it back in.

 

The waiter comes and asks what we will be drinking; he waits for me to pick my drink before he picks his. I go for a sparkling nonalcoholic wine whilst he goes for a gin and tonic.

 

‘The way we are seated here is very deceiving.’ He begins

 

I smile noticing how he is very concerned about what people think about him.

 

 

 

 

 

‘Tell me something, how do you like working at the firm?’

 

‘It isn’t something I imagined myself doing but honestly..’

 

‘Yes?’

 

‘I love it.’

 

‘Why?’

 

‘It’s a challenge and that is why.’

 

‘A woman who loves challenges.’

 

I nod my head

 

‘I see.’ He responds

 

Our menus are brought and I want to keep pretending as if I am not anxious about why I am here but I am failing terribly at it.

 

‘Pick your food; we have enough time to talk.’ He says

 

After picking our food and waiting for it to come twenty minutes later, we eat making small conversation here and there until we go outside that is where we have our dessert.

 

‘You are wondering why I called you here not so?’ he asks

 

‘Yes I am.’

 

He smiles, and then I notice the light which he had in his eyes disappear.

 

‘It would be very selfish of me to blame my wife for how we turned out but somehow I feel she has a hand in all this.’

 

I eye him.

 

‘When Patricia and I got married; it was everything I ever thought it would be. I was happy and I would like to believe that she was too. But then she was obsessed with babies.’

 

He pauses

 

‘What is with you ladies and children? Hasn’t anyone ever told you that it is okay to be with the love of your life without children being involved?’

 

He asked it like he was mad

 

‘So yeah, I knew about the baby we had lost, her gynecologist told me that the baby wasn’t growing and wasn’t showing any signs of life a week before she went into labor but was told to be hopeful. And honestly I was, I could have told her what was going on but she was all over the fact that she was pregnant nothing I

 

 

said or did mattered. And that is why when I first laid my eyes on you, I knew you were not mine.’

 

He lets out a small laugh as he wipes tears that have escaped from his eyes with his handkerchief

 

‘You could have told her what the gynecologist told you but you kept quiet and that makes you as bad as she is.’

 

He shrugs

 

‘Maybe she thought coming out of the labor ward without a baby would make her any less of a woman but no, I would have loved her all the same.’

 

‘So that is why the two of you put me up for adoption huh?’ I ask

 

‘There is a bond that a mother has with a child that no one else can ever have, Nella you were never ours and that is why we had to let you go.’

 

‘Just like that? After stealing me from someone? How do you take a child from its mother and give it to strangers? Did the two of you even have hearts?’

 

‘It’s because we had them that we put you up for adoption. You were better off in that orphanage, Patricia started to resent you. She hated that you were not hers and somehow she had to find healing and that wasn’t going to be found in the same place that caused her pain.’

 

‘I was innocent in all this, it was never my fault!’ I scream

 

‘At the time we thought otherwise, we believed in our hearts that you were better off being taken care of that side and that is why I made sure that your mother and my wife made peace.’

 

‘And they did.’ He adds

 

I chuckle

 

 

‘And none of you cared about me huh? About my mental health? About how all this was going to later affect me and Chanda?’

 

‘Don’t answer that, what would you know about that when you don’t even have a child.’

 

‘Wow.’ He says

 

There is silence between us

 

‘Nella.’

 

I swallow hard.

 

‘Nella look at me.’

 

I don’t even realize that I am now in tears

 

‘Nella.’

 

I look at him after taking a deep sigh

 

‘I don’t want to imagine the pain you have been feeling, I don’t want to know the anger you feel because you can’t get answers. I have been in your shoes, I know how it feels like to want answers and not be given any. For the longest of time I wanted to know why my wife had taken the route that she did but I couldn’t because she was hurting and had decided to close herself off and there was nothing I could do about it, Nella I know that pain. It stings, it hurts, and it makes you question everything you know. I never even got to mourn my child in public because she made it look like the baby had survived, she made me a public disgrace. Imagine what we had to go through when we put you up for adopt

 

ion.’ He says in uncontrollable tears

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‘I am sorry.’

 

‘So am I.’

 

 

‘Then why did you hate my mother? What was that about? Was it because of me?’

 

He shakes his head

 

‘It was just business.’ He says