Falling For A Villain

Chapter 2.

  Jack took Rachael on a getaway in a luxurious hotel near the equator. Inside the hotel room, he had finished with her. All he wanted was for her to vanish from his life. On the contrary, Rachael felt like the luckiest woman alive. She envisioned their family with Jack. Our babies will be so cute, just like daddy. She thought looking at Jack and smiled. Jack stared back in an awkward manner. He was ready to sprint.

'I have to see someone before I go back to the village.' He excused himself and left Rachael to go home on her own.

The following day, Rachael went to look for him. She had to apologise if she had done something wrong. She met Jack, with his luggage. He was leaving the village. 'I got an urgent letter to go back home.' He lied.

'Then give me your postal address.' Rachael pleaded.

'No, don't write to me, I will write to you.' Jack rejected vehemently.

When Jack fell off the face of the earth, Rachael was left wondering, where did I go wrong? Did I say something I shouldn't have? Then, the dreadful realisation dawned on her. The Casanova was out to exploit her. Although the experience was so consuming, Rachael decided to sober up, and forget it.

* * *

It was three months since Jack disappeared on her. The shocker was, the biology she had learnt in school seemed to prove he had left a part of himself with her. A life was developing inside of her. It felt so special that her heart was galloping at the thought of it. She picked a mirror and smiled to herself with a little smile. 'I'm going to be a mummy. Will the baby be light chocolate like me?' She murmured to herself, her small captivating bronze eyes battering with excitement. Smiling about the issue was short lived. The nightmare of the juicy secret being out in the open was staring right at Rachael. Kimathi's residents would soon be baying for her blood.

Rachael knew her mother wasn't as conservative as the villagers. She wouldn't compare her to the serpent in the garden of Aden. Furthermore, she had always been an optimistic woman who saw a glass half full and not half empty, and besides being her mother, she was also her friend.

However, Rachael was considerate of her mother who could barely feed her dozen siblings. Her only source of income was from doing manual jobs in government tea plantations. It earned her less than one hundred Kenya shillings a day which was used to buy food. Clothes came from well-wishers while medicine was herbs or other home remedies. Anything more than that was considered a luxury in the family. Her burden was too heavy to bear. Life had weighed her down so much, and the last thing Rachael wanted was to disappoint her.

With her pregnancy growing every new day, Rachael decided to take a bold step. She was leaving that village. It wasn't wise for her to sit and wait for the villagers to cast their first stone, to 'this sinner' or throw her to the lake of burning Sulphur.

I should tell my elder sister, Wanjiru, to help me get a job. Rachael thought. Wanjiru lived in another province: The Rift Valley.

'That would be awesome.' Wanjiru welcomed the idea of Rachael leaving home to try making a life of her own. Through her contacts, she secured Rachael a job in a motel.

Rachael stayed with her mother in their rectangular kitchen the eve she left home. It was a wooden hut made of logs fastened together, and sacks filled the big cavities on the wall. One side had been left open and served as the entrance, and a piece of sack dangled there to barricade the wind. The roof was flat and made of iron sheets. The hut had been raised up from the ground, so that water would not ingress into the hut, during the rainy seasons. They used a traditional method of three stone cooking fire, and used a tin lamp as a source of lighting. It wasn't an ideal kitchen but it served the purpose.