STORYLAND

VANILLA ICE CREAM

Sarah took a spoon of the vanilla flavoured ice cream in front of her and closed her eyes as she felt the divine sweetness go down her throat. Oh how she loved vanilla ice cream. It simply made her happy. Not chocolate, not strawberry, not any of those recent flavour combinations ice cream shops come up with these days. But just plain old vanilla. She savoured the sweetness for some seconds and went in for another spoon.
      "Baby, do you like it?".
      Sarah looked across the table at the owner of the voice. Dayo, her boyfriend was staring at her. He looked nervous, uncomfortable even. He had been behaving quite odly of recent. She had thought it was work that was making him behave that way. His work place was downsizing then and he had been very afraid he would lose his job. But that was over a month ago. It was all over now and he wasn't fired. But he was still acting strange. And secretive.
       Then there were the phone calls. He would excuse himself and step out once some particular calls came in. She started getting suspicious. One Saturday he had dashed out to quickly get his laundry when his phone kept ringing. Sarah could never forget the name that flashed on the screen. Bee. Her heart lept. Who the hell was Bee? His phone kept on ringing till he had 10 missed calls from Bee. She was mad, angry, sad. Was he cheating on her with Bee. When he returned, she simply watched him in shock as he picked the phone, saw the missed calls and excused himself again to go return the calls, practically running outside.
      Now as she stared at his round head asking her if she liked her favourite ice cream, she felt the anger again. She could see beads of sweat on his forehead which was quite annoying because the room was fully air conditioned. Why was he so nervous? Was she here? Had he spotted her? Sarah ignored his question and looked around, mostly at the girls in the room. They all seemed busy enjoying themselves and no one had an interest in their table. She turned back to look at Dayo with a scowl on her face.
      "It's good yeah?"  He asked, rubbing his palms nervously on his head.
      "Yeah, Dayo, it's good. It's vanilla. And you know I love vanilla." She replied in a flat voice. Dayo laughed nervously and started playing with his fingers looking down at his cup. His ice cream was untouched. Sarah rolled her eyes and took another spoon of ice cream.
      Something hard hit her teeth and she felt a strong vibration go through her body from her teeth to her feet.  She squeezed her face instantaneously. What the hell? Was there something in the ice cream. She put her finger in her mouth and pulled the foreign object out.
      "Oh my God look Dayo there's something in my ice cream!" She said as she pushed the object towards Dayo so he could see. But Dayo wasn't on his seat. He was on the floor, on his knees. What the hell was he doing on his knees. What was going on?  Sarah was confused. She looked down on the object in her palm. It was a ring.
      It was a freaking ring!