JUST FOR YOU

《66》Goodbyes are hard.

It should be noted that it was approximately five days after I agreed to become Mrs. Obi-Nwanze. The thought of becoming his wife alone made me overjoyed. I don't think I had ever been this happy in a really long time.

The thought of waking up everyday to seeing Vincent's face, in fact, just feeling him sleep beside me gladdened my heart. It was too pleasing to think of that was why I decided we should have the wedding in two month's time.

It wasn't too early, in fact it was too late because knowing how my life was, drama was bound to happen. I was preventing situations like Abbey showing up one day to tell me he still hadn't caught another fish or Jonathan coming to tell me that he must get his revenge or he would die or Alex saying he's sorry for the way he treated me and wants to make things right between us or any other person I couldn't remember coming to ruin my life. I was avoiding situations like that, that was why I wanted to become Mrs. Obi-Nwanze as soon as possible.

Vincent, of course agreed because he too couldn't wait. I couldn't wait to be with Vincent forever till my last breath. I couldn't wait to see if I could still have children as much as I want.

If there wasn't so much to put together when planning a wedding, I'd have married him a week after he proposed!

I was gradually moving out of my house. I had started taking my belongings to Vincent's house. I planned to give the landlord's suite to Umar and Miriam as a gift to their new baby girl but I didn't tell them. It was going to be a surprise.

Vincent and I signed up for dance classes because my dancing needed a lot of work unlike Vincent who was a pro at it. I wanted us to give guests a show at our wedding reception with our spectacular dance routine.

The only thing missing now was my family. I had no issue with my mum and James but my dad was a whole new problem. Of course he was going to insult me because Vincent would be the second man I'd be bringing to the house. I was giving him many reasons to believe I was a slut.

But I wasn't going to let him get to my head. We were going to Lagos to let them know and if he refuses like the last time, it wouldn't be a problem because my mind was made up to go ahead with the wedding.

A Saturday, three weeks prior to our wedding, we flew down to Lagos with Williams. My family needed to know everything about him and still be willing to accept him as my husband. We went straight to my parent's house from the airport and surprisingly there wasn't an ounce of nervousness in me which made me feel kind of relieved and a little worried.

Why wasn't I nervous?

We got to my parent's house. My mum opened the gate. With the way a line appeared on her forehead, I could tell she was surprised to see me and with another man and a child. I looked at her, my eyes telling her I would explain later. Taking a closer look at her, she didn't look well at all. She looked drained emotionally, physically. She was pale and thin. I get that banking job was stressful but this was a whole new level.

At age fifty two, almost all her black hair had been replaced with white ones. She wasn't looking too good, immediately I felt in my guts that something bad had happened.

"Mum, what's the problem? You don't look too good." I stared at her worriedly. She sighed deeply, used the back of her hand to wipe the corner of her left eye, that was when I knew something was wrong.

She sniffled and forced a smile. "It's nothing. Welcome home." I expected her to lie.

I groaned. "Mum! Talk to me."

She cleared her throat and said almost in a whisper. "Come into the house, we will talk. Okay?"

"Is everything okay?" Vincent asked, she nodded and forced another smile before leading the way back to the house. We all walked towards the house in deafening silence.