by A. D. Koboah
“How long is a while?” she asked, trying to mask her initial reaction with a nervous smile.
“Maybe just a couple of months. But if it works out, I might stay for good.”
“For good?”
“Yeah. I haven’t been back in a while, so I don’t know if it will work out, but the idea of leaving is so…tempting. I know I’m probably still a bit depressed and I might not feel like this in a few months’ time, but at the moment it makes sense to leave and start again somewhere else. You never know, I might find myself a rich man over there and have...and have more kids.”
“I can’t pretend that I don’t want you to stay, because I’ll be really upset when you leave, but you’ve really had a tough time over the past few years and I want the best for you.”
“It’s funny ’cos I was watching you with my mum and Barbara the other day, and it was as if you’ve always been a part of our lives. I can’t imagine how I got by without you. Even Barbara likes you, and trust me, she doesn’t like anybody, so I know she’ll be keeping an eye on you when I’m gone.”
“Well, she could never replace you, but if the jollof rice we had that day is anything to go by, then yeah, I suppose she’ll do. Maybe I can start taking your place at dinner time when you go.”
“You think she won’t get suspicious if you keep turning up at dinner time?” We laughed, but it was tinged with sadness.
“You’re the only proper friend I’ve ever had, Peace, and I wish you didn’t have to go, but leaving is a good idea. I know I would if the opportunity came up.”
“You break up for the summer holidays in a few weeks’ time, maybe you can come over for a holiday.”
“I’d love to go to Ghana.” Her eyes lit up for a few seconds. “I don’t know if I‘ll be able to afford it. I’ll see.”
“Don’t be sad, Eva. This won’t be goodbye. We’ve found you now and we’re not gonna let you go.” She smiled again, evidently touched by my words but the sadness around her eyes stayed as she drifted back to the window, the game she had been playing on her phone completely forgotten.
She broke the silence about ten minutes later.
“So what’s going on with you and Jason?”
I jumped at the mention of his name, reminded that he hadn’t been in contact apart from the odd text message that he sent to Eva.
“Nothing,” I said a little too sharply and quickly looked away.
“He’s really good looking. I can see why you like him.”
“I don’t like him in that way,” I said defensively.
She didn’t say anything else for about a minute.
“So when did it start?”
“When did what start?”
“Whatever is going on between you two.”
I decided to ignore her but it didn’t stop her from pursuing the topic.
“I thought he was stush when I first met him, but he’s not. He’s really sweet and it’s obvious that he really likes you.”
“Eva, I told you, there’s—”
“Yeah, all right, all right, I get it. There’s nothing going on between you and Jason.”
I gave her the coldest look I could manage, but the mischievous, self-satisfied expression on her face didn’t go away so I decided to take the high road by staring out of the window.
“I think it’s really sweet though. You two make such a nice couple.”
I shot her another cold glance, the high road now losing its appeal, but she had already turned back to look out of the window with a knowing smirk.
After a few minutes, I leant over and pinched her spitefully on the thigh.
“Ow! What! What was that for?”
“If you knew I liked him, why the hell did you bring him to my flat when I was in withdrawal and looking like a piece of shit?”
A small smile danced around her mouth.
“Oh come on, I was panicking. I didn’t know who else to call. But looking back on it now…” She pretended to carefully peruse the incident. “I can see what you mean. It’s bad enough that you looked ill, but those pyjamas weren’t really doing much for you, were they?”
I put a hand to my head and joined in her laughter at the memory of my favourite pyjamas which had a Winnie the Pooh motif on the front and had seen better days.
“The PJs I can handle, but my hair! One side was flat from where I’d been sleeping on it, the other was a huge knotted afro. If he liked me before, he sure as hell don’t no more.” More laughter escaped us and we cackled away.
“But do you know what gives me joke?” Eva began. “You were really ill. You were so ill I actually thought you were dying. But the minute Jason turned up, you were suddenly all right and sitting up in bed eating cereal with your hair all combed and no trace of withdrawal.”
We laughed so hard and for so long that two people at the front of the bus turned to stare at us.
“You...you’re...out of order,” I was finally able to say and we laughed even harder.
When the laughter ended, we were left wiping away tears and struggling to take in gulps of air. I gazed out of the window and my thoughts turned briefly to Jason. Feeling her eyes on me, I glanced at Eva to see her staring at me with her eyes slightly widened and a comical expression of horror on her face as if she were remembering the moment she had seen me in my Winnie the Pooh pyjamas, my hair flattened on one side and a huge Afro on the other. Her expression immediately had me in fits of laughter which she joined in. We were still howling with laughter when we got off the bus a few minutes later.
Chapter 27
The following day I returned home to see a male figure standing outside my door. I was about to start backing away, my thoughts immediately turning to Daniel. Seeing that it wasn’t him, I took a few steps forward but my relief was short-lived when I realised it was Mohamed leaning casually against my front door.
I inhaled and expelled the air slowly.
“What do you want, Mohamed?” I asked when I was a few feet from him.
“Don’t be like that,” he said, using his foot to push himself off the door so that he was standing upright.
“What. Do. You. Want?”
“I didn’t come here to argue with you, so let’s go inside and talk,” he said with a smile.
“About what? You found out what happened to Dante, so what do you want?”
“You know what? I just wanted to find out how you’re doing.”
I stared at him blankly.
The smile wavered and then he stared down at his feet.
“I’m here ’cos I’m obviously upset about what happened to my son. You’re the only one who would know what that feels like.”
“Please,” I scoffed, walking toward the door with the intention of pushing past him, but he deliberately stood in the way and blocked my path. “You didn’t know him. You never even laid eyes on him so how the hell would you know how I feel?”
“Why are you being like this with me? Is this about what happened with Nicola? ’Cos that didn’t last. She didn’t even mean anything—”
“You really need to get out of my way, Mohamed.”
He stood his ground, refusing to budge even an inch.
“Nicola was never what I wanted. She was just...convenient.”
“Spare me, Mohamed. I couldn’t give a flying fuck about you and Nicola.”
“Then what? What’s your problem? Why are you still angry?”
“You want to know why I’m angry? I’m angry because you don’t think you’ve done anything wrong. You turned your back on your own flesh and blood and you don’t even think you did anything wrong. You turned up here out of the blue demanding to know about your son, the fact that he’s dead doesn’t change anything for you.”
It was then that he became even angrier.
“I’ve forgiven you and I haven’t even asked you to give me back my money. Why can’t you forgive me?”
“That’s big of you!” I spat sarcastically.
“Yeah it is fucking big
of me. You never should’ve put me in that situation at eighteen. I was too young for a baby then.”
“You bastard! We both got ourselves in that situation. I didn’t do it all by myself did I?”
He was quiet, acknowledging defeat.
“I know I messed up and I’m suffering now.”
“No you’re not. You’re not suffering anywhere near as much as you deserve to. You get to walk away and get on with your life like before. I’m the one who will never be able to get over what happened to Dante. I’m the one God punished by taking him away.”
He rolled his eyes.
“That’s not what life’s about,” he said sounding impatient and acting as if he were talking to a child. “It’s not about punishment. He weren’t mine or yours to take away. God let you have him for a while and then he took him back. Nobody’s punishing you for anything.”
“Of course you would say that, wouldn’t you? His death is easy for you to accept because he didn’t mean anything to you. Now move so I can get inside.”
“So you really won’t talk to me?”
“I said move!”
He stepped aside and I was able to walk up to my door. I expected him to walk away but he was still behind me.
“Things don’t have to be like this, you know,” he said. “I was young and stupid back then and I know I made a mistake with Nicola. But we can do things over. Start afresh. What do you say, Peace?”
I looked back at him incredulously.
“You’re serious?”
“Yeah, I am. I’m ready now. We can maybe have another one, do it right this time.”
“I did it right the first time round. I don’t need to do anything over, especially not with you.”
“All right, maybe I’m getting a bit ahead of myself. Why don’t we just take it one day at a time? I never really got you out of my head, Peace. Give me the chance to make everything up to you.”
Looking at him, I was reminded of the day I had found him waiting for me at the tube station and we had gone to the chicken shop and talked. I remembered the vulnerable Mohamed who had seemed to need something from me. I also remembered how many nights I had sat up wishing for him to come back and say these words to me; ask me to forgive him and take him back.
“Don’t come back here again, Mohamed. Like I said to you the first time you came knocking on my door after all those years, there’s nothing for you here.”
His face darkened with anger and I sighed, waiting for the inevitable explosion. But instead a slow crafty smile spread across his face.
“I know what all this is about.”
“All of what?” I asked impatiently, wanting to simply get in my flat and away from him.
He had a malicious looking gleam in his eye, and when he answered, his voice was soft and silky.
“All this nonsense, like you think you’re too nice for me or something. It’s because you like Jason, ain’t it?”
He laughed when he saw my gaze drop nervously to the ground. “Do you know Jason don’t even like talking about you. Whenever I mention you, he only ever says that you’re not who he thought you were or something like that. Or he changes the subject. You’re a joker if you think you’ve got a chance with him.”
He watched me carefully with cold, calculated malice that was only just able to hide an arctic fury.
I continued to stare at the ground, my thoughts on the image of pure disgust on Jason’s face when he had found out that I was a junkie.
“Jason’s veerrry picky when it comes to the kind of women he’s into,” Mohamed said. “You’re dreaming if you think you can get him. Come to think of it, there aren’t that many men who would even look at you if they knew what I know about you. I mean heroin, what the fuck were you thinking?”
“That’s just it, Mohamed. I wasn’t thinking. I was in pain. But you wouldn’t know how I was feeling because you’re too selfish and self-centred to think about anyone but yourself.” I pushed the front door open. “Stay away from me. I don’t want anything to do with you.”
I walked into the flat and firmly shut the door on the past.
Walking into the living room, I picked up a picture of Dante and stared at it forlornly.
I missed him so much and it wasn’t only a mental thing, it was a physical ache.
I thought about Mohamed’s words. Maybe he was right and Dante was only meant to be with me for a short time. I also thought about what Barbara had said to me. Dante had been happy during his short time with us on this Earth. Happy and very much loved by all of us. That really was all that mattered.
***
I casually glanced up from my seat at the back of the bus and looked in the direction of two young women and a young man who appeared to be of Hispanic descent. They were having an argument with an older black woman who was sitting in a seat opposite the bus exit doors.
“There was no need to be rude,” I heard the man say calmly to the woman. “I was only telling you that to…”
I turned away from them to the window, having no interest in their dispute until my attention was brought back to them when the noise level increased.
“Shut your mouth,” the black woman, who was still sitting down, retorted arrogantly as the bus doors noisily jerked open. One of the two younger women leaned over her aggressively and began shouting at her.
“You shut your mouth, you stupid woman. You are ignorant.” She then made a sweeping gesture to the majority of black people on the bottom deck of the bus. “You are all ignorant,” she added with a flourish before they left the bus.
I heard a man next to me snort with indignation at the insult, whilst another black woman ran up to the bus doors and shouted a rebuke at the departing trio. The subject of her fury merely smiled triumphantly as they walked away.
I leaned back in my seat and looked out of the window, wondering why the woman who had ran to the doors and shouted after the departing trio had even bothered waste her breath.
Nothing changed.
I tried to put the unpleasant incident to the back of my mind, but it lingered, like the fumes from a toxic fire that stays long after the flames have been put out. It was still with me when I got to my destination and walked up to one of those impressive office buildings in the city. This one was a king amongst kings that overlooked the river and dominated the other buildings in that area. I hesitated for a second before I entered through revolving doors into a large, busy reception area.
People in suits were using swipe cards to either enter or leave the reception area through turnstiles to my right. I caught sight of a set of lifts beyond the turnstiles but was unable to see what else lay beyond them. I saw a cluster of chairs to my left beneath a huge widescreen television which displayed the company logo before flicking to financial news. It was being attentively watched by a man sitting in one of the chairs who wore an expensive-looking business suit and had a briefcase at his feet.
I immediately felt out of place in my jeans and jean jacket even though I had spent a lot of time picking out those clothes as well as on my hair and make-up. Nervous now, I walked up to the reception desk and waited patiently behind another man and as I waited, I wondered if I had maybe made a mistake in coming here.
After a few moments, I took a step back and then walked toward the revolving doors.
“Peace?”
I turned to see Jason in smart black trousers, a blue and white checked shirt and dark blue tie, hurriedly approaching. He had the look of a man in a foreign country who had come across a familiar face amongst the crowd of strangers. He smiled as he came toward me.
“What are you doing here?” he asked. Then the smile disappeared and his eyebrows knitted together. “Is everything all right?”
He spoke quickly, the urban twang I was used to hearing from him replaced by polished, clipped tones that were more suited to this environment.
“Hi Jason.”
“Is everything all right?” he repeated.
“Yeah, of course.
Um…I was just…” I found I couldn’t remember the excuse Eva and I had spent half the night thinking up to explain my turning up at his workplace like this.
“Are you in a hurry?” he asked, looking back in the direction he had just come from, at two men and a woman who were looking at us with interest. He put his index finger up to them before turning back to me.
“No—”
“I’ll be finished in twenty minutes. Can you wait that long?”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Take a seat, I won’t be long.”
He walked back toward the turnstiles and rejoined his group. His eyes met mine briefly before he disappeared into the lifts.
I moved over to the nest of chairs and gingerly sat down, keeping my hands clasped tightly in my lap. I eventually reached over and picked up one of the newspapers on the coffee table in front of me and leafed through it, pretending to be absorbed in an article that might as well have been written in another language. It was an hour before Jason reappeared.
“Sorry,” he said as soon as we made eye contact.
I smiled and shrugged as I rose out of the chair, gladly discarding another article I had pretended to be engrossed in.
“There were a couple of things I needed to sort out,” he explained once he was by my side. I nodded as we left the building.
“You hungry?” he asked, sounding more like himself now that we were away from the office.
“Kinda.”
“Good. There’s a Korean restaurant about five minutes from here.”
“How are you?”
“Not too bad. You?”
“I’m good.”
We walked the rest of the way to the restaurant in silence. The sky was overcast with grey clouds threatening us with rain which deepened as the sun went down. I thought about the silent man beside me and glanced up at him occasionally, trying to read more than was possible in his impassive expression. I was pleased to get to the restaurant, to a hostess who greeted us warmly and then silently glided to a table in the corner. She returned to take our orders and then left us alone in the soft glow of the restaurant.
