I stared at the world below. The cold was getting worse and each time the wind hit my face at the balcony, I felt a sharp a pain in my chest. I didn't want to give it attention. Finding out things I didn't want to find out was never my likes.... I hate surprises. I believed that keeping warm was the only way out and so I tried my level best.
"Felly", a woman's voice similar to my mother's called from the house. Her friends had the same voice as her so it was difficult to tell who was calling me and the worst was that they both enjoyed shortening my name.
"Yes.... Coming", I was sick and tired of that short name. The house was warm and cosy. It was much bigger than the one we stayed in. I loved the garden, the parking though I didn't have a car. I loved the swimming pool and the tress grown in the compound. The tinted blue windows were just perfect and bringing out the magic of the pool. I had to agree with my mum's choice. This place brought me the peace I wanted.
"Darling where are you?"
"am here mother ". I was then sure that it was Lucia, my mother.
"come close hunny. I want you to say hi to Peter, my boyfriend ." I stood at a distance as I let her words sink. I looked at the so called Peter.
"Hello Felly...am glad to meet you". The nerve...the nerve of the stranger to call me Felly as if he had known me for twenty years. He stretched his hairy hand to shake mine. After few minutes of staring at each other blankly he took his hand back and faked a smile.
"Mum, why don't you tell your boyfriend never to call me Felly. It's enough that I hate it so the last thing I want is this stranger using it as if he's my father."
"Is that how say hi?,....is that how I taught you Felicity?, to be so rude to visitors? ".
I looked away. I didn't have to answer to that and she knew that whenever I refused to answer her back then it wasn't important to me .
"sweetheart she's just a girl... She and I will get along and maybe become best of friends later on. "
"I am disappointed Lucia. I am much disappointed, mother ."
I gave him a last long look then left.
"What's love?
What madness is this so called love that makes everyone old to be young??... What does Lucia see in such a young man like Peter?" . I questioned myself beside the pool. Pain cropped in my heart. Intense pain tore my heart into tiny pieces. I was angry. Disappointed. Hurt and felt vulnerable. Each time I tried to get close to Lucia the more the rift that has always been there grew. I spent all of my childhood in boarding school and when I was through with my high school she sent me abroad to study . How could a woman carry pregnancy for nine months only to reject her later on in life?.
