True Love's Bite

32 // At Loss

The thought of Silas and what he did made my windpipes close every time, I was struggling to understand his reckless and selfish actions.

Why would he sentence himself to death without even considering our son for a second?

Was the idea of spending his life with me so horrifying that he would rather choose death instead?

It would have been much better if my mother was also to blame this time, but she was innocent. He did this to himself, he did this to me.

Seeing that note only infuriated me, and I deleted it. I didn't want to know whatever story he cooked up to justify his selfishness and stupidity.

I exited the app and proceeded to dial my sister, hoping a conversation with her would somehow ease my nerves, but I was gutted when it sent me straight to voicemail without ringing.

Perhaps it was a network problem because of load shedding, that happened more frequently these days. I thought in an attempt to reassure myself, but my gut told me to check her on WhatsApp instead.

I was left puzzled by her 'last seen', she hadn't logged on for over three weeks, and when I checked her other social media profiles, she had not shared anything for a much longer period.

My mother had not said anything about her during her visit, knowing her, she would have invited Ivy over and give me an update in any case. A part of me wanted to call my mother and ask her about Ivy, but I thought it may be too early considering recent events, things were still a bit awkward between us.

I decided to call my aunt and let her know about the birth of my son, but I was surprised when her caretaker answered instead.

"Miss Ntaba, I was about to call you!" He said in an urgent voice.

I straightened up, my heartbeat increasing. "Edwin, did something happen? Where's my aunt?" I asked.

There was a long pause before he responded. "I was going to ask you the same thing, I haven't seen the madam since we returned from dropping you off. She wasn't home when I came in this morning, so I thought maybe she came to see you."

I removed the phone from my ear to check the time, and it was almost 6p.m., which was late for my aunt to be still out. She always concluded her business at 4p.m. everyday and made sure she was all clean and fed before settling in front of the TV by five.

Nonetheless, it was not unusual for her to disappear, she often vanished for days, but she would let her caretaker know a few days prior so that he would not be worried. This time it felt different though, the timing was just off.

"Did she say anything strange at all to you yesterday?"

"Well, she said I shouldn't come to work today, but then she called again very late at night and asked me to come in early in the morning because she wanted me to take her somewhere."

"Did she give you any clues as to where exactly she wanted you to take her?"

"No. What should I do now, Miss Ntaba? I'm worried."

"I'll see what I can find out, stay on the lookout and keep me updated."

The police couldn't be counted on, especially in my aunt's case. The fact that she always disappeared from time to time did not help, moreover, they would tell us to wait for forty-eight hours before reporting her as missing.

I was so anxious, I even ate up my dinner quickly so that I could take my meds because I knew they would partially knock me out. And soon, the lines between reality and nightmares blurred.