In Love with Another Man

Turning off the headlights at the entrance of raven black gate, Rita reached for Henry’s hand if only for an infusion of warmth. “Do you want me to come in with you” he asked face hidden in the shadows of the interior lights. She shook her head and paused for a moment before she alighted from the car and walked through the gate. Rita knocked on the door and she felt rather than heard it open. She looked up into Andy’s smiling face and half grinned back. Blindfolding her with his strong hands he led her into the foyer and to the accompanying sounds of Jazmine Sullivan he whispered “I have a surprise for you”. He let her go to the exquisite sight of tealights, giant lilac candles, multitudes of peach & red rose petals and already sensing what awaited her she turned to find  him wearing a nervous smile on bended knee holding a flawless white gold sapphire ring.

She gazed at him, drinking in very angle of his handsome face. She took in the deep dimples peeking out at his cheeks, the prematurely graying hair, his golden whisky eyes noticing all the little things that she liked to tease him about. This man was goodness, perfection, love and everything any woman would kill for. She was tempted, so very tempted but instead she sighed and cupping his face she said, “Andy we need to talk”.

His face fell and she felt her heart give a lurch at the devastation and sadness she saw in his eyes. Clasping his hand to hers she tilted his head up to meet her own gaze and steeling against all the emotion she could sense in his slightly trembling frame she said “ I can’t go on pretending, I am in love with another man”

She watched him close his eyes, heard the ring tinkle as it fell to the floor and heard him slowly mouth ‘Why?’ Spirit crumbling she begged, “Please at look me”, and when he opened his eyes she went off in a tirade scared  that he would run away before she had a chance to explain. “I can’t explain why it is him and not you. You treat me so much better than him and if I was sane there would be no competition but I find myself in love with him” she uttered. Andy angrily shoved Rita and stood up roughly dragging her along with him, ‘What have I not done right? What have I not given you?” he shouted. “You have given me everything. Henry doesn’t even treat me right but when am with him there isn’t anything like it. If I could I would forget him, please believe me” she pleaded.

“How can I believe anything you say?” he was now yelling upturning flowers and the bucket of champagne, “You made me believe you were in love with me. I wanted to make you my wife” gesturing to the room that was now in tatters. He turned his back to her; his shoulders slumped like a man weighed down with so much pain and in a cold voice said, “Get out. Get out and don’t you ever come back”.

Rita froze, she had hurt the man who had made her happy for so long and all instinct pushed her to run to him, get on her knees, ask for his forgiveness and beg him to take her back but it was for naught. For outside all this pandemonium was Henry; the man with a perfect body, who she always seemed to fight with but was just right for her. Walking towards Andy, his back still turned to her she gently touched his arm, “I am so sorry for what I have done to you. I will never forget us”.

As she turned to leave he held onto her arm and abruptly Rita was whirled into a hug. Andy held her like a vice and in a hoarse broken voice pleaded, “Don’t leave me. Whatever is wrong I can fix it even if it takes me a lifetime. We are soul mates, you know we are. Let’s get married and have those adventures & children we always talked about. Forget him”. Clutching to him, she wept for all our lost dreams and memories, the agonizing heartbreak and the pain that we would no longer be us. “You will find somebody else. There will be another woman who will treat you right and understand the man you are. Don’t let this dim all that fire inside you.” Then she kissed him for one final time, a slow savoring goodbye kiss mingled with salty tears and ache. Standing on tiptoes she kissed his forehead and whispered, “Goodbye Andy, another soul mate will find you. Perhaps we will find each other in another  lifetime”. They clung to each other for a few more seconds and without a backward glance Rita walked out the door guilty, hurting and a total entanglement of emotions.

That was her price for falling in love with another man.

Passion makes the world go round, love just makes it safer - Ice T 

SINGLE GIRL EQUATION

(Boss + First Day x Refusal = Fired)

Dear Diary,

Today was my first day as an IT Officer and after several failed employment searching attempts and taxi journeys in and out of town I totally deserve it. It was only fair therefore that when I walked into the administration office that I wore a coral lipstick smile and donned an outfit that would not look out of place at a Wall Street office. The sun was sunshine, the birds were singing etc (I forget how that song goes). I was Muhammad Ali ready to sting like a bee and fly like a butterfly. I was going to crash this job.

The snobbish secretary waved me towards a door and knocking meekly I entered the Executive Director’s Office. With his back slightly turned to me, staring through the venetian blinds was a bespectacled giant-of-a-man with a slight tummy pouch looking every inch the boss. I sat before I was invited to (the four inch heels were killing me) and we fell into a bit of tete-a-tete. So when my new boss got up, turned the blinds down, turned the key on his door, held out his hands to help me stand up I sensed no danger. That was until he grabbed my derrière, stealthy unzipped my skirt, fumbled around my décolletage all the while trying to stick his tongue through my clenched teeth (the man clearly didn’t know that kissing had been invented). At this point you are probably asking what I was doing.

On the precipice danger of falling over on my unstable heels I found myself unwillingly holding onto this very disgusting man. Using his arm as leverage I gained stability and shoved him away. He was smiling! The fool was smiling and I wanted to punch him just to wipe the smirk off his face. Pretending like nothing happened he handed me the appointment letter and dismissed me. Did I forget to mention he is an old friend of my father?  The man, you see, has no boundaries or limitations.

I strolled to the IT Office in a surreal bubble. I was furious and still fighting to comprehend what had ensued. The ICT Manager was friendly (thank goodness), the orientation a breeze and the day was on track of getting better when my phone started ringing incessantly. For the next 20 minutes I swiped call button left until the caller showed up. Surprised by the sudden presence of the ‘Big Boss’, my other boss hurried forward like an eager weasel, bowing (and scraping?) to receive him. The man was treated like an apparition worthy of adoration.

I was relieved when he made a sign to leave but as fate would have it it he beckoned me to walk out with him. Bile rising in my throat I forced my legs that felt like stones to budge. “I was hoping we rendezvous later and come up with an arrangement” he said and like a bimbo I smiled and nodded. This man was clearly delusional and out of his mind. My first lunch break found me hailing a taxi back home. Later that night over dinner I told the folks in-matter-of-fact way that I and that job were incompatible. The look of disappointment of my father’s face had me blurting out the entire anecdote. It was not worth it to look like the failed & ungrateful child.

While I narrated the incident, my parents’ faces were devoid of emotion. Let’s just say after there was my Papa foaming at the mouth, making a late night phone call and hurling English-Runyankole profanities. My mother just hugged me and took me to bed. Sexually assaulted on the first day was certainly not how I had seen my day going.