The Nightwalker

by C.P. Kemabia

“So you’re married, huh?” Antwone asked her.

  The waiter had just brought one steamy cup of coffee and one cup of tea with cream.

  “Yeah, Marc and I got married last year.” She added, “A small ceremony.”

  “Have any kids?”

  “No. Don’t think I want to have kids... What about you?”

  “No kids either.”

  They silently sipped their hot beverages. She was having tea. She had always preferred tea over coffee. It was crazy how he was mentally trying to reconcile everything she did, everything she was now this very instant out here in the terrace of this coffeehouse, with his memories of her, twenty years younger. He thought somehow that the years had been kind to her. But maybe they had just been kind to her outer frame. Maybe internally they had caused some damage... Who the hell knew?

  “Dad passed away,” she said, after putting her cup down. She was looking into the tea. “Three years ago. From cirrhosis... It was awful. Just awful.”

  “Here in the States?” Antwone asked.

  She looked up from the cup of tea, “What?”

  “Did he die here?”

  “Yeah,” she said. Her eyes went back to the tea. “After he retired, he decided to come back. He got himself a flat not far from the old house.”

  The old house… The mention of it had no effect on Antwone. It was like someone else, not him, had lived in that house.

  “I often went to visit him as much as I could,” she said. “He was drinking too much when left on his own. As if it was all he had.”

  The image of his father, misplaced somewhere in the remote reaches of his mind, slowly resurfaced. It was still clear though. His own feelings had not rumpled it with the hardness they carried whenever his name was concerned.

  His father was a square man, in mind and shape, with his square shoulders, square head, square mustache and square feet. Even his teachings were square, Antwone was realizing now.

  Back in the days, he was a college English teacher. Then he went on to teach English as a second language overseas. And that was about the last Antwone had heard of him … and Mary.

  “His final year was just awful,” Mary repeated. “The disease didn’t just kill him, Antwone. It killed every bit of the man he was before then.”

  “I’m very sorry to hear that,” said Antwone. Even though he was telling himself this was only pretend, deep down, he was reeling from the news.

  “In the end, he did ask for you.”

  “Why?”

  The question seemed to trouble her because her eyes hardened, not from anger but from confusion.

  “Why––” she repeated. “He was your father too, wasn’t he?”

  “He was more of a father to you than he was to me.”

  “Don’t say that,” she said and the wavy inflexion of her voice suggested a raw nerve had been stabbed. “You can’t possibly know what you did––what we did to him. What he went through…”

  Antwone said nothing. He didn’t want to go there with her. Not when they were seeing each other for the first time after all those years. To change the subject of their conversation, he said.

  “Marc seems like a nice guy. Is he good to you?”

  The answer came after a moment.

  “Yes,” she said. “He’s a good man.”

  “Did Dad meet him?”

  “Just once.” A smile fleeted across her mouth and she added,“It’s actually how Marc found out I had a sibling. Before then he’d always assumed I was the only child. And I guess that was my bad. That one was on me.”

  “So what’d you tell him after?”

  She shrugged and absently looked toward the street, at the pedestrians walking by, mostly keeping their place at the curb because of the heavy traffic reigning on the roadway. Then remembering the question Antwone had asked, she looked back at him and said, “I told him you and I weren’t close.”

  Antwone nearly smiled. It was a smile of derision though. Antwone thought maybe there was more truth in her statement than lie or whatever else came second to a lie. But he wished to know if those words had just meant to sort of justify to Marc, his absence in her life and also at their small and probably intimate wedding ceremony or if they actually reflected the real feelings she now harbored toward him. Either way, Antwone guessed he’d never know. But it was interesting to think on it.

  “I wrote you,” he told her after the smile was gone from his face. “While I was living with Granny. I wrote you a lot.”

  “I know,” she said. “I still got some of the letters somewhere.”

  “Then why didn’t you write back?”

  “I couldn’t, Antwone. I just couldn’t. And it wasn’t that simple to keep them after Dad saw them.”

  Another awkward pause invited itself and they both silently sipped their drinks to fill the lull while thinking of something else to say.

  Then looking at him and trying to alleviate the tension between them with a smile, she said, “I was really happy for you when you got your first book published and all. You were always talking about becoming a writer. You made it happen. I always believed you’d make it… It’s silly to say it now but I always knew.”

  “You read any of my books?”

  She blushed and two spots showed on her cheeks.

  “I was tempted,” she confessed. “I really was.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “I guess I just didn’t want to… I was afraid of what I’d find in it.”

  “So all these years,” Antwone said, “you’ve been keeping track of me?”

  “Not always but––” she sighed. A veil of sadness came over her eyes. “I came to a signing once, to see you, to tell you our dad was dying. I was there and I just couldn’t go through with it. So I left. Because it was easier that way, you understand.”

  Antwone looked at her. She tried to scrutinize the expression on his face and then she added, “I still hate myself for that. Dad really wanted to see you. He wanted to tell you that he was sorry. That he loved you. That he’d always loved you even though he got mad all over and cut you loose the way he did. I think he regretted it. But you know how he was when his mind was made up. But he truly regretted it, Antwone. Everything at home changed after that, after you moved out and went to live with Granny. I had to stay on and live with him. And it wasn’t easy as you can imagine; and going abroad didn’t make it any easier. But he loved you. You were a part of him and he let you go. But it was just the anger. We can’t blame him for it––I’ve stopped blaming him.”

  An intense emotion suddenly welled up in Antwone; it caught him unawares and moved his insides to the point he had to hold himself calm not to tear up in front of her.

  Mary went on: “I’m sure he would’ve been proud to see you now. To see the person you had become. I’m proud of you, Antwone.”

  “You’re proud of me,” Antwone repeated. Presently, his voice was thick with a gush of repressed tears. “What do you think is going to happen now? I want to know what you expect to see happen now?”

  “I don’t know, Antwone,” she said. “I don’t know. All I know is the past is the past. And nothing can change who we are, what we are. You’re still my brother, no matter what. And I’m your sister. We can go on in that direction today and be in each other’s lives again. It could be as simple as that…”

  It could be as simple as that… Mary’s words were still echoing in his mind even long after they had parted at the coffeehouse. But it could never be as simple as that, he told himself on the way to meet Ava. Not in his book.

  He’d called Ava to let her know that he’d show up late and before telling her that, he had even considered telling her he would not show up at all. But then, she would have wanted an explanation, a satisfying one, and he was in no mind to make up an excuse that she could buy. He told himself the business with Mary was his business and his business alone, and he did not want to share it with anyone including Ava.

  He and Mary had traded thei
r information back at the coffeehouse, to make it easier should they decide to keep in touch in the future. He didn’t mind keeping in touch with her even though that could’ve meant the beginning of the end for the life he’d built for himself around his abnegation, his sense of detachment for his father and for her.

  Now his father was gone. And whether he wanted it or not, Mary was back in his life. Even if they never saw each other again for the next twenty years, the estrangement wouldn’t be as easy to bear as it’d been for the first twenty years. Because now, having that face-to-face moment with her had broken the walls that protected him from his attachment to her, the deep-rooted affection he had when they were both younger.

  As the taxi waded through the stop-and-go traffic, Antwone tried to be rational. There had been a lot of water under the bridge and it was foolish not to realize that and keep pretending to be thick-skinned and uncaring when in reality his heart was so close to exploding in his chest and revealing what was truly in it.

  Afterwards, when he thought about it, he wished Mary hadn’t stopped him in the street. He wished she had just passed him right by, and gone along unnoticed with the crowd. It would have been easier that way. But at the same time, a part of him, a part that was perhaps sick or weak or both, was glad she had found the stomach to reconnect with him after everything that had happened. This whole thing, their chance meeting and all, certainly felt surreal now that he could look back on it from a clear perspective.

  Had that really just happened? Had he really been seated across from Mary just moments before? Had he just listened to the sound of her voice again for real?

  Antwone thought this was the kind of turn of events that only happened in books. But maybe life itself was written by someone who had a twisted sense of humor.

  If so, Antwone didn’t think his part was really funny.

  The lunch date with Ava could have gone a lot better if he’d been in a better disposition for it. The restaurant they were at was a real culinary temple, and seemingly, one of the favorite gastronomic destinations downtown for anyone who liked the experience of eating food that looked like art and was rich in flavor and showy in texture.

  Ava ate a vegan meal, and Antwone ordered the same as her because there was presently no room for food in his mind and browsing through the menu was a cerebral effort he didn’t feel like making. But he tried as best he could to be pleasant company to her. She always looked her best whenever she was with him and so he thought he ought to return the courtesy and not spoil it for her. Even now, she had made herself pretty for this tryst and looking at her sort of abated his unease from his encounter with Mary.

  Ava was ebullient in her shirtdress and her excitement to be there with him was charming and, next to her, Antwone was a bit of a contrast, like he didn’t belong with her.

  They spoke of many unimportant things and she later told him she was flying back to New York the next day and she was planning to spend the night with him.

  “Can we do this another time?” Antwone asked her.

  “Why? What’s the matter?”

  “I’ve just got a lot on my mind right now. And I sort of need the space to work it all out.”

  She didn’t say anything. Antwone didn’t know whether it was a good or a bad sign. It was hard to know these things. But sometimes, her silence was welcomed. However, now he wanted her to say something. But she simply emptied out her glass of Pinot Noir. Maybe that gesture was part of her reaction, or maybe it was not. But next thing she did was to call up the waiter and order dessert. Only then did she ask Antwone whether he was going to have dessert too. Antwone said he would, even though, in the shape he was, the deliciousness of it would have gone to waste in his mouth. Some melodrama was unraveling on the stage of his heart and, for the life of him, he couldn’t taste anything.

  After lunch, Antwone shared a taxicab with Ava. She was going back to her apartment. She had plans for the night which apparently involved going out to a stand-up comedy club with her girlfriends. Seated next to her on the back seat, Antwone felt emotionally blackmailed by the cold shoulder she gave him throughout the whole trip. She had always had a great appreciation for the bed and her show of indifference now was what he got from not being more attentive to her needs.

  By the time she got off the cab, Antwone tried to think of a way to be in good with her again and, as she slammed the car door shut, he told her he’d call her the next day before she flew out of town. Of course she smiled at him and at first he felt the relief before wondering if the smile meant she was no longer cross.

  Antwone returned to his hotel room with the firm intent of burying himself and the old grievance and misery he felt deep in his work. He was his best self when he wrote. And he owed it to himself to write for his own betterment so that he was a better member of the society he served as an artist.

  But as soon as he sat at his writing desk, Antwone felt like going to sleep. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept, the last time he’d dreamed of simple, innocuous dreams with no odd things with calloused skin crawling along the edge of it. The tiredness suddenly came with a rush and fell on him like a tree and he crashed on his bed like a heavy sandbag.

  He slept … only one hour or so.

  After many hesitations and two or three drinks of brandy down in the hotel bar, Antwone finally called Liv to ask her if the offer of the beach was still on the table.

  It was around five o’clock in the afternoon when his feeling of loneliness had been the most intense and had taken its toll on him. He was writing then for sure. But, for whatever reason, even that was no good medicine at the moment. He’d considered calling Ava but then he’d changed his mind and considered calling Liv instead. Being with her last night had given him a sense of self-worth, a sense of value, and he could definitely use some right now.

  He went out to have a drink down in the hotel barroom, to give himself time to see whether the urge to see her would only be momentary, but it had not been momentary. It was a real, pressing urge. That’s why Antwone had called her.

  Afterwards he was glad he had.

  10