'I DIDNT KNOW WHAT TO SAY TO HER"
ONICHA UGBO STATE OF MIND!
Obiageli sat inside the church, five rows front of me. I didn’t recognize her, until she turned around to bless the child being held by her mom, back seat . The baby girl playfully massaged Obiageli’s hairs as her mom held her. She initiated her innocent attention while the Reverend preached the gospel. I was in awe when I recognized her. Obiageli was still a charming sweetheart. It was the first time that I would see her in 30 years. Time and distance matured us. Her beauty was fading, but her elegance remained treasured. Dear God!
The past memories suddenly rushed back to these moments in the church. I felt the pressures of a past guilt. Time was momentarily frozened. She was my everlasting love, my true love that I betrayed. And for thirty years, I wondered what might have happened to her.
Inside this All Saints Catholic Church, her sacred heart was few meters from me, that Sunday. From the offer lane, I starred at the scars of past pains and hurt on her once pretty face . Obiageli was a love fountain that sprouted comfort, unconditional affection, and romance, until that harmattan season when I horribly charred her charm.
We had no roses. We shared tulip flowers as we walked each night to her home, guarded by the dazzling soothing moonlight, toward Abuanor, the dusty heart of our dearest village where the moon teased our nakedness at nights. She visited me at my Ushi Village every evening. Obiageli would stay late and expected a walk home. We would play hide and seek game under the Osisi Ogbu tree, rooted in the centre of narrow paths of Idumu Ogbele, enroute to her parent’s home. Under the sacred tree, we chased each other, captured ourselves in sandy rapture and rolled on the sands of the night, playing and making out. The echoes of our laughers would travel through the surrounding corrugated zincs of our beloved town’s clay homes. We didn’t care. We were in each other’s arms, filled with young love, happy happenstances and electrifying laughters from our hearts. We sat by the tree that produced seeds of money, plucking each tulip flower from the stems, playing Truth or Dare game: “I love you. I love you Not!” This was the beauty of a village love. We were privileged to celebrate those beautiful moments that became memories.
Obiageli and I travelled to Asaba every weekend to be sanitized by the solemn waves of Oshimili, the natural wonder, River Niger that snakes through our Anioma . Obiageli would bare her naked skinny and smooth dark skinned body to the great river. I adored the sights of this flavoured ginger by the banks of the Niger! She would race into the river, submerging with the raging waves, and then suddenly erupted from it, beaming with smiles and encouraging me to catch her if I could, or else she would be married to this wonderful steamy warm nature. I would dive into the river, swimming faster toward her and when I tried to catch her, she would submerge again, somehow, I would feel her weight perched on my back like a butterfly with a smile.
My family embraced Obiageli the moment I introduced her. Extended family members adored her also. She was sensual, respectful, gracefully refined and dignified. She was kind and tender. My father was very fond of her. Baba admired her lovingly because of her blossomed character. He pressured me to begin marriage process with her by formally introducing both families and sharing our intents with them. I pleaded with my father to be patient. I was reluctant. I wanted to wait for the right time...
Though every moment I spent with her, I felt pure love and cherished aura. Obiageli would visit from school and stayed with my family. She visited her village to spend few days with her parents, before running back to our compound. We were inseparable. Her love was contagious. Every day we bloomed like a hibiscus flower flourishing in the rainy season.
Obiageli completed her teachers training education at the Onicha Olona Teachers Training school. She moved to Lagos to be with me.
I relocated to Lagos from our town after my secondary education to await Obiageli. For the first time since we began dating six years ago, we lived together as lovers, with our privacy and our lives as one. Before her arrival, I was employed as a Bank clerk by United Bank for Africa. Through the help of few Lagos contacts, I found Obiageli a job at the Federal Secretariat in Ikoyi, few months after she joined me.
We lived happily, loving and celebrating our happiness with friends and family. We were the happiest unmarried couples in the city. I would take Obiageli to every occasion and our town’s meetings in the city. She gladly and graciously participated in the meetings and any family celebration. She was happy to belong to me. Family members and friends wished their wives or significant others were as benevolent and courteous in beauty and character as Obiageli was to me. Man, she represented me so proudly and profoundly. I was a gladiator in love. I was also human!
Seven years into her job, Obiageli’s boss decided to send her North for six months job training. She didn’t want to go. We had never been separated that long. I encouraged her to take the offer. It was a step toward better position and promotion at work. Her boss liked her dedication and loyalty through the years; so when the opportunity came for him to select a Staff to go for training in his department, he chose Obiageli for that position.
Departure day:
I walked Obiageli to the Igbobi car park at Fadeyi where she took a bus to Kano to begin her training. It was the last time I would walk with and see her.
Three weeks after she left, she sent me a telegram, expressing how lonely and miserable life was without me. We had no cell phones, no social media, and no texting then. I was also missing her every day. The feelings were mutual.
Three months after she left, on a lazy Saturday evening, my friend Emenem came by my apartment and invited me to a party organized by the Nigerian Television Authority where he worked. I reluctantly attended this party with Emenem. I needed an elixir to a missing love. I was so focused on missing Obiageli that it almost drove me insane. I sat at the party, alone.. I had my mind on Obiageli, thinking deeply about her. Suddenly this gorgeous, brown skin girl walked up to me and sat on the empty seat beside me. She engaged me in brief conversations with regards to my feelings concerning the party, “Oga, I hope you are having a good time?” I carelessly nodded in response to her. She grabbed my hands and pulled me up for a dance. I reluctantly obliged. But once we got to the dance floor, the mood changed. We danced all night. I was gyrating to her sensual and seductive moves on the dance floor. She had rhythms for this lonely heart ache and I was feeling the pulse of her seductive sensation, driven by the tempo of dance music. That night, she invited herself to my place. I felt the temptation but resisted. We exchanged addresses. I didn’t know what I was doing with this lady. But she certainly knew what she was doing with me. The next day, she visited . We went to a nearby beer joint and shared alcoholic beverages and conversations until late hours. We walked to my home. That night and for the first time in almost 15 years, I slept with a different woman. I cheated on Obiageli that night with Clara. It would be the beginning of a relationship. Every day we desired each other. Clara was constant in my life. I liked what I felt in her. She began to visit every weekend..Clara’s companionship slowly began to erase the loneliness I felt from Obiageli’s absence. I gradually began to drift from that feeling.
Three months into my tryst with Clara, she informed me that she was pregnant. She wanted me to marry her. She said she was in love with me. I was , lonely when she asked for a dance that night. Sincerely, I longed for her comfortable companionship. I was going to be a father!. My first child!. I accepted that new life, the responsibility and her marriage proposal. We began to plan for our traditional wedding. Obiageli’s sister visited me on a Sunday afternoon and found Clara at my place. I told her to please explain to Obiageli that I had found a wife and that we were expecting our first child. I wanted to move on with my new life without Obiageli, but with Clara and our expected child. That was the last time I heard or would see any member of her family; until this Sunday mass service.
Today Clara and I have four children, three grand children. We are still married. I always wondered what happened to Obiageli after my hopeless sad and sudden departure from her life. It was swift and insincere. I heard she tried marriage twice but was never lucky. She had no children. As I walked to the front of the church altar to give my offerings, our eyes collided and something in us stirred. I felt her heavy gasp. I stood frozen in line for brief seconds. So this was how we would meet again, 30 years after abandoning and disappointing her. I didn’t know what to say to her.
***Unedited Chapter From : WAITING FOR MY HUSBAND TO DIE: A Collection Of Short Stories. This Christmas