by Jane Igharo
“I was busy putting the nursery together.”
“Right.” I focus on the ivory rug. “Well, I thought . . . um . . .”
“You thought what?”
I wish his tone would change. Maybe into something light and sweet as it often was whenever we were done making love.
“I thought we could talk. About us.”
“Us.” He says the word as if it’s completely foreign to him.
“Yeah.” I muster the confidence to meet his hard stare. “Us as a couple.”
“Azere, you stood in front of me, looked me in the eyes, and told me you wanted to be with another man. You picked him. We aren’t a couple.”
“Rafael, I know that. But I was with Christina’s parents this weekend. And we talked. And I thought . . . maybe . . . me and you . . . could . . . could . . . um.” Damn it. I have all these words I want to say, all these emotions I’m dying to express, but there’s a muzzle on my mouth. There’s something hindering me from being vocal.
“Azere, why are you here?”
“Because I . . .” When I open my mouth, when those two words fall out, his eyes brighten in anticipation of what I’m going to say. Though, when that invisible muzzle claps over my mouth again, his eyes dim with disappointment, frustration, hurt. So much hurt.
He turns away as if he can’t bear to look at me. “I think you should leave.”
“Rafael.” I’m taken aback. “You don’t mean that.” I want to reach out and touch him, but maybe my touch no longer has an effect on him. Maybe everything he once felt for me has drained from his system.
“Azere, listen.” He faces me again. “No matter what happens between us, we’re going to be great parents.” Tears gleam in his eyes, and I swear a piece of my heart chips away. “You’ll be the mother of my child, and I’ll be the father of your child. But that’s all we’ll ever be to each other. Nothing more.”
“Rafael, don’t—”
“Nothing more, Azere. I just can’t. Okay? I don’t have it in me. Not anymore.” His pitch deflates. He sounds so defeated. “So, please. Just go.”
But I can’t. Not yet.
“Rafael, I know I messed up. But you can’t put the blame solely on me. We were together for months. I gave up so much for you, and you kept so many secrets. How do you think that made me feel?” I search his eyes. “It made me feel alone. It made it easier to regret my choice and to focus on the ways I felt I had let my parents down. Your secrets did that. So, whether you choose to accept it or not, this is on you too.”
And that’s all I permit myself to say. Any other words will come out amidst sobs and squeals. I hurry down the stairs and to the elevator. The doors slide open and I enter. I won’t cry—not here, not when there’s a security camera he has access to. I’ll sustain my breaking heart for a minute more.
chapter
39
Rafael
“What the hell happened, Rafael?” Selena looks from the closed elevator to me. “Azere ran outta here looking like someone had taken an ax to her heart. What the hell did you do?”
“Selena, don’t start.” I head to the kitchen and she follows.
“Seriously.” She bounces in front of me, preventing me from opening the refrigerator. “What happened? Talk!” There’s so much authority emanating from her. Even as her brother, it often takes me a moment to reconcile her small stature with her audacious character. “Rafael!”
“It’s really none of your business, Selena. So just stop.” I leave her in the kitchen and move toward the grand piano that separates the dining space and the living space. I run my fingers over the keys and play a few notes from Mendelssohn’s “The Venetian Gondola,” a melody I learned as a child. My fingers move fast, determined to drown out Selena’s high-pitched nagging. Though, when she reaches for the fallboard, I retreat before the lid hits my knuckles.
“Don’t ignore me, Rafael.” With the classical music gone, she has no reason to raise her voice. She’s soft-spoken. Maybe she even believes her gentleness will coax an explanation out of me. “I’m pretty sure Azere wanted to get back together, but then she left on the verge of tears. What did you do?”
“I did us both a favor. Things wouldn’t have worked between us.” My explanation, short and simple, will hopefully end her interrogation.
“Says who?” She isn’t satisfied with my curt answer. “Rafael, says who?”
“I just know it. Okay? She wants to be with that other guy. She chose him. She chose him over me.” I shake my head, trying to dispel the painful memory. “Do you have any idea how that felt? I’m not putting myself through another round of that. No. Besides, I was better off without her.”
“Better off?” Selena’s thick brows bend in a deep scowl. “You think your life, post Sofia, was better?”
Sofia. That name speeds up my heartbeat. Sweat seeps from my pores, gathering between the creases on my tense forehead.
“Rafael, it’s been three years. Three years. Sofia died. And you’ve been closed off ever since.” Her pink lips pout and tremble. “And I’m sorry you had to go through that. I’m sorry that experience broke you. I’m sorry that for three years, you’ve been a ghost—here but not really here, detached from the living.
“But as you mourned your loss, our family mourned you. You have been lost to us for three years, Rafael.” Tears touch the corners of her grieved eyes. “You came back a few months ago. Do you remember the day you called us—me, Mom, Dad, Max? Do you remember that day? You told us Azere was pregnant.” Now, tears flood her eyes. “For the first time in three years, I heard you laugh. It was brief, but you laughed. Azere did that. You were dead, Rafael. You were a ghost, and she breathed life into you. Don’t you see that?”
Of course, I do. After Sofia, I became numb. The pain of losing her and the guilt that came with it did something to me, took something from the depth of my core. Though, every single moment with Azere restored what I had lost. With her, I was smiling and laughing again. With her, the emptiness inside of me slowly began to fill. With her, life had a different flavor; it was sweet and I wanted to savor every moment. Azere revived me gradually until one day, I looked in the mirror and saw the man I used to be.
“Rafael, don’t delude yourself into thinking you’re better off without Azere. Because you aren’t, and you know it.”
I bob my head, agreeing with my sister.
“Rafael, you love her. Don’t you?”
“So much.” The words rush out, as if they’ve been hanging on the tip of my tongue just waiting to fall. “I love her so much.”
“Then you have to fix this, Rafael. I understand you’re scared. You don’t want her to hurt you again. That’s totally understandable. But I’m asking you to risk it. Risk getting hurt on the chance that you might get a lifetime of happiness.” She leans forward and wraps her arms around me. “Because you deserve it, Rafa. I don’t know anyone who deserves it more.”
My arms wind around her too, and we hold each other like we did three years ago when I experienced the greatest loss of my life.
“You have to go to her. Talk to her.”
“After today, she probably hates me. What do I say?”
“Don’t worry. It’ll come to you.”
And it does.
I have to tell Azere the truth—reveal every secret I’ve kept, completely bare myself to her, and see what she makes of me.
chapter
40
As I pull into my mother’s driveway, my heart palpitates. My attempt to step out of the car is miserable. I stumble on a crack in the pavement but catch myself before my body meets concrete. I’m a mess. The safe arrival from Rafael’s place to my mother’s is a miracle.
On the porch, I twist the doorknob. It’s unlocked. I enter the house and scan the space. It’s late in the evening. Efe isn’t home, but my mother is. Her car is in
the driveway.
“Mom?” She isn’t in the living room or in the kitchen. “Where are you?”
Honestly, I’m not sure why I’m here. Christina’s place should have been my destination. Though, when I left Rafael, I got in my car and drove straight here. Maybe it’s the child in me, running to mommy after getting hurt. I’m uncertain what comfort she can offer in this situation, but maybe she’ll just hold me. That would be enough.
With a hand on my stomach, I wobble down the hallway. At my mother’s bedroom door, I don’t knock. I don’t call her. I simply open the door. That’s all I do. And that’s the moment a crack ripples in the already strained glass that’s been sustaining my chaotic life. That’s the moment my whole world shatters.
“Mom?”
She’s in bed with him. My uncle. Their naked bodies are half-exposed, half-hidden by white sheets. She was kissing him when I walked in, unaware of my presence until I spoke. Now, she’s hurriedly pulling sheets over her bare body, covering parts of herself he has no right seeing or touching.
“No.” I shake my head. “No.”
This is a dream. She wouldn’t do this. Not to Baba. I’m dreaming.
But she walks to me, gripping a rumpled sheet to her chest, and when her hand falls on my shoulder, doubt vanishes and reality pulls me into its whirlwind. “Don’t touch me!” I fling her hand away.
“Azere, please. Please let me explain.”
“Explain what? No explanation in the world can make this okay! You’re in bed with Baba’s brother.”
“Azere.” My uncle approaches me with sheets wrapped around his waist. “Give us a chance to explain.” His dark eyes, guilt-stricken, are pleading. “Omwinwen.”
“No,” I say sternly. “Don’t call me that. Don’t ever call me that again.” I turn away and hurry down the hall.
“Zere, wait!” My mother races after me. “Please!”
“How could you?” I stop at the front door and spin to face her. “How could you do this?”
“I can explain. Let me explain.”
“How long has this been going on?”
She’s quiet.
“How long?” I demand.
“Over a year.”
I stagger until my back hits the closed door. “A year! How in the world did this even happen? Why did it happen? How could you let it happen? How could he? Do Efe and Jacob know?” The last question seems more important than the others. “Do they know?” This will destroy my sister as it’s destroying me. And Jacob? How will he take this?
“Azere, no one knows.”
With one question answered, I focus on others. “How could you do this? What were you thinking?”
“It just happened.”
“It just happened? Seriously? Is that your excuse?”
She shakes her head.
“Then explain this to me, Mom. Explain it because I don’t understand!”
“Azere, please don’t get upset. You’re pregnant. Just stay calm.”
“Are you going to give me an explanation or not?”
“Okay. Okay.” As she gathers her words, her eyes wander. “Your uncle is a good man. For years, he took care of us selflessly. He never asked for anything in return. As the years progressed, I started having feelings for him. I tried my best to hide it.
“One day, he came to the house. We were alone. We talked. One thing led to another. He told me he had feelings for me. I admitted my feelings. And then we started to . . .”
“Have an affair.”
“Affair?” She squints, considering the word. “Azere, he is not married, and neither am I. We are not having an affair. We are in a relationship.”
“A relationship!” My jaw drops. “With your husband’s brother!”
“Late husband,” she says. “Azere, your father has been dead for thirteen years. I mourned him. I respected his memory and took care of his children.” Tears fill her red eyes. “Until your uncle, I refrained from having a relationship with any man. Zere, I have done everything I can, but he is dead. Your father is dead, and I am alive. I cannot live my life for him.”
“But you’ve made me live mine for him.”
And this is it—the life-altering moment of realization.
For years, I clung to something that didn’t exist—a phantom made of blood, flesh, and bones. My father, dead, was very much alive in my head. The strong, resourceful farmer who cultivated lands and used its harvest to provide for his family. The proud Edo man who passed on stories of his ancestors and hundreds of years’ worth of tradition to his children. The patriarch who, on his deathbed, bound his eldest daughter to a promise that gave him ease but imprisoned her. For years, that man lived in my head. I struggled to obey him, to please him—to please a man who was long gone, a man unable to speak, a man not entitled to opinion. I lived for him. And now, the realization dawns.
“Baba is dead, and I am alive.” I nod at this simple logic that has somehow evaded me for thirteen years. “He was a good father with good intentions, but he is dead. And for thirteen years, I’ve been obeying a dead man, striving to keep a promise I ignorantly made. And you have been holding that promise over my head.”
“Azere, you—”
“No! Don’t speak!” My voice booms around the house, causing my mother to flinch in surprise. “Listen to me! For the first time in my life, listen to me! Hear me!”
She purses her lips and nods.
“When we were growing up, Efe was stubborn. She never obeyed instructions. I was determined to be better, to be an example for her, to make you and Baba proud by any means.
“So I was obedient—a good daughter. But you took advantage of my willing compliance. You governed parts of my life you had no right over. And I foolishly allowed you because I didn’t know how to be anything else but the obedient daughter.”
“Azere,” she says. “You are a good daughter.”
“Of course. But only when I do what you want. Right? I’m a good daughter only when you can control me.”
“That is not true.”
“Of course it is. You told me to be with Elijah. You pressured me into it. When I obeyed, you permitted me back into the family and accepted me as your daughter again.” I wait for her to deny these events. She doesn’t. “Mom, I know I hurt you, but you didn’t love me enough to just forgive me. Your forgiveness had conditions.”
“Azere.” Her mouth falls open, her chin trembling slightly. “How can you say such a thing? Of course I love you.”
“No, you don’t.” It’s agonizing to admit this—to say it out loud, to breathe life into the terrible words I’ve been mulling over for days. “Mommy, you don’t love me enough. Your love, like your forgiveness, has conditions.”
“Azere, stop saying that. It is not true.”
“Then where were you during my pregnancy? I needed you, and you weren’t there for me. Meanwhile, I gave up the one person who was always there.”
I broke up with Rafael because of my mother, because of her words that were constantly in my head, because of the guilt and obligation she laid on my shoulders, because of the promise she never let me forget, because I was so damn terrified of not pleasing her.
“I gave up Rafael because of you, Mom. I love him.” And there goes the muzzle that’s been confining those words. I couldn’t say them to Rafael, but by some miracle, I can say them now. And it’s incredible, exhilarating, emancipating in every sense. “Mommy, I love him.” I hold her gaze, ensuring she sees the sincerity in my eyes. “I love Rafael so much.”
“Azere, listen.” She takes a small, cautious step toward me. “Ending your relationship with him was for the best. You cannot be with him. I cannot allow it. Don’t you see that being with a man who isn’t Nigerian threatens our culture—puts it at risk of being diluted? Azere, don’t you see that?”
“You know, i
f you wanted me to marry a Nigerian, you should have left me in Nigeria. I mean, the odds of marrying a Nigerian in Nigeria are incredibly high. And if this country is such a threat to our culture, you shouldn’t have brought me here. But you did.
“You brought me to a country that has a culture of its own, a country that’s also home to people from all around the world, and you’ve expected me to ignore these facts for years.” I groan and ruffle my hair. “Do you have any idea how crazy that is?”
She opens her mouth, but words don’t come out. She closes it and looks at me. We look at each other. A single tear rolls down her cheek, and she rubs it away.
“Azere, your father—”
“Don’t.” I squeeze my hand and pound my small fist in the air. “Don’t talk about him. Don’t talk about what he wanted or feared. Because you’re right. He’s dead. And you’ve obviously moved on without him. Let me do the same.”
Wait. I’m not asking for her permission. Not anymore.
“I’m going to do the same. Whether you like it or not is of no interest to me.” I look over her body that’s cocooned in layers of white sheets. There’s so much more I could say, but I choose to say only one thing. “Over the past few months, you’ve done so much, said so much. Just so you know, I will never treat my child the way you’ve treated me. My child will never have to question my love. Never.” I turn around and twist the doorknob.
“Azere, wait.” She grabs my arm before I can step out. “I . . . I . . .”
“You know, I never told you how Rafael and I met.” I yank my arm backward, separating it from her hold. “It was this strange coincidence. I used to think fate played some sick trick on us for its own amusement. Now, I know better.
“Rafael was meant to enter my life. He was meant to interrupt it—to disrupt the plans I had made because if he hadn’t, I would still be under your thumb. And I would have remained there my whole life.”
In my car, as I reverse out of the driveway, I notice something. It’s quiet—too quiet. I continue to drive, and as I pull farther away from the quaint bungalow, the truth becomes apparent.
