CHORALE SANDERS

CHAPTER 8: ACQUAINTANCE

Chorale had just come back from grocery shopping. She bought everything she would need for the rest of this week and the whole of the next. Luckily, she went with Margarita and she was thankful she did. The load was too much and she wouldn’t have been able to carry all the things into the car alone.

They got back to the apartment around 12:00 noon and Chorale was so tired. She thanked Margarita for coming with her. The security man, Antonio, carried all the bags upstairs for her and she was grateful to him. Kay would’ve done same for her. She didn’t want to think too much about him for it made her too emotional and she needed to be tough if she was determined to go through life now without him. Her conscience laughed at her because it was impossible for her to not think about him.

Once she got upstairs, she changed into one of the many T-shirts she had stolen from Kay. Anytime he saw her wearing a different one of them, he’d just give her this weird look and then he’d laugh at her for being so petite. She decided to cook jollof rice. It was Kay’s favorite. She had missed cooking for him. She had missed him behaving so playful at the sight of food. She wiped her eyes and started cooking.

An hour and half later, the food was ready. But now she didn’t feel like eating anymore. Instead, she felt like drinking wine. These cravings! She took out a glass and poured herself some of the red wine.

Things could’ve been so different. She and Kay could be wonderful parents. But he didn’t want children and one had already come, she couldn’t get rid of it. She already loved the child in her womb. And she loved Kay too, that’s why she left. So that he would be happy and her baby would be happy too.

He was a gentleman and there was no way he would maltreat her or hurt her if she told him that she was carrying his baby. He wouldn’t hurt her baby either. He’d just tolerate the child and she didn’t want that. She didn’t want him to just tolerate the child, she wanted him to love her baby, their baby. But she couldn’t force him. No. She took consolation in the fact that she had left with a part of him growing inside of her. A part of him so that she could look at the baby and see Kay. She was crying silently. She had missed everyone; her parents, her siblings, Mama Rica. Kay. She said a quick prayer of protection to God for them. She had thrown away her SIM card and therefore, there was no way she could contact anyone. After so much thinking, she fell asleep.

Around 3:30 p.m. she woke up with a start. She had a dream in which Kay was begging her to come back to him. He looked so tired and lonely. He looked lean, like he hadn’t eaten for days. She woke up because she did not want to keep looking at his sad eyes if not she would be tempted to do something crazy, like getting on the next available flight to Ghana or even call him. She had his number off head and within the few days that she had gotten to Mexico, she had dialed his number more times than she could even remember but on all those occasions, she had reminded herself that he would be so much happier without them. It hurt her but she had to deal with it.

She got into her bathroom and took a long shower. After she was done, she decided to go downstairs to get to know Margarita and Antonio better. They seemed like nice people. She took some of the food she had prepared to them. Antonio loved it especially. He mentioned that he had eaten it before but it wasn’t as good as Chorale’s. They laughed and talked a lot. It made her forget Kay for a little while and she was thankful for that.

They told her about themselves. Antonio said he had no family member that he knew of. Most of his childhood had been spent in foster homes. When he was fifteen years old, he ran away from his foster home because the children there used to bully him and their parents pretended to not have noticed.

“Sometimes, I’d go to dinner and they’d see the black eye but they wouldn’t say or do anything about it.” He told them.

Margarita had unshed tears in her eyes, and Chorale too.

 “So when I'd had enough, I ran away. A black man took me in, he was Ghanaian too.” He said and smiled at Chorale. She smiled back.

“His name was Kwesi. He taught me how to fight and defend myself. After a year, he died in an accident.” He looked out of the glass door, into space.

“After he died, I did all sorts of jobs. One day, Kwesi's friend saw me and asked me to come work for him as a bouncer at his nightclub. He had seen Kwesi train me several times in the past. I worked there for about ten years, until one man who used to come to the club noticed me and asked me to come and work in his hospitality company as a security guard. He offered a  better pay so I had to take it."

He smiled with some pride, "It’s not much, but I’ve been able to get a small place for myself and buy my basic needs.”

Chorale and Margarita were silent for a while before Chorale spoke up, “Promise me, both of you, that if you need anything, whatever it is, you’ll come to me, okay. I want us to be comfortable with one another. Heck! Be friends, even. It’s only us three in this big penthouse, right?” They both nodded. She badly wanted to tell them about herself too but she was sure that as time went by, all their questions would be answered.

She got to know a lot about Margarita and her family too. Margarita told her she was married to Miguel, her husband, for twenty years and they had two daughters. The older one, Esmeralda, 17 years of age, was in her final year in high school and the younger one, Carmen, 3 years old, was in preschool.

Chorale laughed, “Why that huge gap between them?”

Margarita added, “Carmen was adopted. After I gave birth to Esmeralda, I developed some complications which prevented me from ever getting pregnant again.”

“Oh I’m so sorry, Margarita” Chorale said and Antonio smiled sadly at her too.

“It’s okay” She smiled back, “Everything happens for a reason. If I hadn’t had those complications, I would never have thought of going to an orphanage to adopt a child. Then we wouldn’t have met Carmen. She’s such a lovely and wonderful little girl. I think she was born for us.” She said and laughed.

“When Esmeralda had grown up a bit, she started feeling lonely, as an only child and so Miguel and I used to take her to the orphanage to play around with the children there. Around that time, Carmen had just come to the orphanage. Her mom had left her in front of the orphanage and run away. She was such a cute little baby and all of us took a great liking to her. Something just told us she was the one. So we finished the adoption process in less than a month, and we brought our little baby home. Esmeralda gave her the name, “Carmen.” It means ‘God’s vineyard’”

“Oh this is so beautiful. I’m sure they’re lovely girls!” Chorale chipped in.

 “They’re the sweetest girls ever. And I’ve already told them about you.”

“Wow….so when do I get to meet them?” Chorale asked. She liked children too.

“It’s Carmen’s forth birthday this Saturday. They asked me to invite you to the party. But if you’re busy, I could just tell them…”

“Oh come on Margarita. Of course, I’d love to be there. Just send me the address”

“Thanks so much Chorale”

Chorale smiled back at her. “So what do I get the birthday girl? Does she like chocolates?”

“She loves them! She has such a sweet tooth, sometimes I get scared.” They all laughed.
 
Children loved sweets. Chorale had been a Sunday school teacher so she knew a lot about children. And even in the hospital, she had had some children patients too. Thinking about children reminded her of her own baby and it brought tears to her eyes. Margarita noticed.

“Is everything okay, Chorale?”

She smiled a sad smile, “Yes, Margarita.”

She asked them where the nearest park was. To her disappointment, Antonio told her there were no nearby parks. The closest one was in the next town and that was quite far away from where they lived.

“Thank you. I’m going upstairs to get a few things done. Please let me know when you’re ready to go home” and with that, she left.