Femme Fatale.

09

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He grins in triumph for she is his woman now,without thought, without mind, senseless and drowning in the sea of love they swim in together.

"You're mine now." He smiles,dimpling.

"Yes,yours." Her voice soft,eternally female.

He looks at her as though she has offered him paradise here on earth. His soul in his eyes.

♥♥

Songs for the chapter:
i. Don't be gone too long - Ariana Grande & Chris Brown
ii. Company - Justin Bieber.

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Tanu is every inch a rich young Indian woman. She nearly staggers under the weight of the red folds of her sari, the diamonds and jewels in her hair, on her train, on the hem of her gown and laden around her throat and arms.

I mind the tone of my voice very carefully when I ask Tanu where I can find Nahar  for I would dearly love to have my books returned.

"Oh no," she says, hearing the lie the moment that it is out of my mouth. "He is gone. He has purchased land and built a house there. He plans to marry. You won't see him again."

I keep my face very still and I do not flinch or gasp. I am a pretender just like her and I can take a blow and still ride on.

"Back in India or here?" I ask as if I do not much of one way or another.

"Here in Kenya. He drove off to some little village called Jalori or Jilore," she says aimlessly. "Good riddance."

I turn my attention to the game of bowling in front of us and when Mayank, Tanu's brother, makes a good throw I clap very loudly and say: "Hurrah!" Someone offers me a bet but I refuse to bet against Mayank and I catch a quick smile from him for the little piece of flattery. I wait till the game is over and when it is clear Tanu will not give me more information I slip away from the crowd and go home.

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My room faces west and it is gloomy since it is still morning. I sit up on my bed and huddle the clothes over my feet and put a duvet around my  shoulders like a poor woman in a field. I am miserably cold. I tighten the duvet around me but it does not warm me. I remember the days on the beach, the small of he sea and the gritty sand under my back and in my clothes while Nahar touched me and kissed me.

In those nights I dreamed of him and woke every morning quite weak with longing, with sand on my pillow from my hair. Even now, my mouth still yearns for his kisses.

I had meant my promise to Shawn. I had said that I would not sneak around with Nahar, that I was, before anything else, a girl focused in her scholarship through and through; but now, sitting in the shadowy room, looking out over the grey slates of our hometown, Watamu, and up the clouds leaning on the roofs of Saint Mary's Primary School, I suddenly realise that Shawn is wrong and that I had been wrong, all this time.

I am not a nerd before anything else. Before anything else I am girl who is capable of passion, who has a great need and a great desire for love. I don't care much for the reward of a scholarship for which Rhoda has surrendered her desires. I don't want the arid happiness of Shawn's life.