Poetherapy 2.0

The Call

What made me leave my phone at home was what caused the entire catastrophe. I rarely make mistakes – especially mistakes of this nature – but this one was lethal.

I thought of going back home the very instant I realised I had left my phone. My phone is as busy as a switchboard and I could not spend the entire day without it. What made it a mistake to leave it was not that it was busy but the nature of calls and he callers themselves. If I was not late for work, I would have sped back home but it was no longer possible.

I cursed myself throughout the day but there was nothing I could have done. I, however, spent the day calling my wife on my number thinking that I might somehow disturb other callers for it would be continuously busy. I knew for certain that Eunice would not spend the whole day without giving me a ring, being the father of her daughter as I was, although this was kept far away from my wife's ears. I knew she would call and wreck my marriage which was in its infancy.

Eunice, more often than not, threatened to call my wife whenever I angered her but I always did a remarkable job of smooth-talking her against the idea. I once thought of breaking up with her but her unpredictable behaviour made me think twice and the fact that she had my daughter left me with no option. Whenever given a chance, Eunice would love very much to talk to my wife and unearth our affair. Now that I, of all the people, had presented a platform for her to do so, I knew I was going to live long enough to regret it. I cursed the day I met her, if it were not for that bus which developed a technical fault...

I boarded a Bulawayo bound bus at the Harare Exhibition Park one late Sunday afternoon. I looked around before taking a seat close to the window, almost at the back of the bus where there was little to no disturbances since I wanted to read my book SON OF THE WANTED MAN by Louis LA'mour. It was an interesting piece which, once you start reading it, was difficult to put down. The bus lingered for a time before it finally took off.

When I lifted my head from my book, I noticed we were already in Chegutu. The bus had moved at a great speed and I loved it did, since I wanted to be in Bulawayo before 2130hours, kick-off time for the AFCON final match between Zambia and Cote d'Ivoire. I smiled at the thought of the match and wondered whether Chipolopolo would make it or the pendulum would go the Ivorians' way. I again gazed and glued my eyes to my book ignoring the conductor who kept on wandering about, the vendors who irritably kept knocking at my window, and the old rugged man who coughed unceasingly besides me. I even ignored Jah Prayzah who kept on blurring for the gospel vibes from the speakers over our heads. I kept on reading.

I was interrupted by a cranky sound as the bus developed a fault. It pulled off the road and as it did so, I yawned before folding the page I was reading. I checked the outwards and saw that it was pitch dark out there, save for a few lights which could be seen at one Conemara Restaurant in the neighbourhood of the same name. Passengers flocked out of the bus and headed for the restaurant to have some food as the bus was being repaired. I also observed that I was a bit hungry and so I headed that way too – big mistake.

I knew the tables therein could not accommodate everyone so I increased my pace hereby outpacing others to occupy one big round table at the corner, facing the door. I ordered a juice and some chips which were served after ages. As I sipped my juice, I gazed around the faces of the people I had been travelling with. As I looked around, three tables away from mine, I saw an angel.

I glanced towards her again. She had been looking at me and her eyes slid away as mine reached hers. She was just lovely, very much so. Large, dark eyes, rimmed by long lashes, a proud, gorgeous face with a touch of sadness in it and a hint of something else. I was going to try her, whatever it might take. Nothing was going to stop me. The Arabs have a saying, "The dogs bark, but the caravan passes on." I could not be deterred.

As I was deep in those thoughts, the man sitting next to me vacated his seat and headed for the door. I continued sipping my juice and as I lifted my head to check if my angel was still there, I got the bolt-out-of-the-clues. She was pulling a vacant chair beside me and she threw herself in it. My juice almost choked me!

She smiled at me and before I could think of anything else, she, with a voice which was the sweetest sound to my ears over the past decade, said, "My name is Eunice. I could see that you were eyeing me hungrily." Smiling stupidly, I stammered my name to her and I could see that she was not only the most beautiful of all women but a lady of mind, character, charm and tenderness. Sharing love with someone as wonderful as this one, I thought to myself, is to know the fullest meaning of what love is supposed to be.

Again, she caught me unaware, smiling again, she said, "I can see from your ring that you are married. I trust you are enjoying your marriage, especially as young as you look?"

Gosh! What was happening inside me was hard to pin down. From her looks, I could see that she was younger than me, but I knew that is ever an indefinite thing and perhaps the poorest way to estimate or judge except in wines and even there, one finds exceptions. My years were twenty-six then, yet fifteen of those years had been spent in bitter struggle to survive in a world of wealth and privilege, when I had neither. In fact, age was jus but a number.

I gathered my wits and tried as much as possible to have as clear a mind as water. We talked for quite a time, she doing the majority of it in the form of questions, the majority of which were difficult to answer. I did my best not to offend her, although she cared less, if at all, about teasing me. She looked up and, facing the doorway, said, "That is my father. He is the driver of the bus."

The man was standing at the entrance looking over our heads, looking for his daughter, I guessed. He was the darkest man I had ever seen, yet his eyes, unlike his daughter's, were bright hazel, and all the more startling under the black brows and the dark skin. His cheeks were lean and cadaverous, his cheekbones quite high. He moved with grace and ease of a dancer as he headed towards us. He was not the kind of man who would thank you for having his daughter. Fall into his massive hands and you will live long enough to regret it. I assured myself that even if he was not my friend, he was at least not my enemy yet. He reached us, threw a few notes on the able and said, "Find something to eat. The bus will be leaving soon." Before she answered, he had gone.

Eunice, as her father went away, ushered a smile revealing once again gleaming white teeth. She picked up the dollar bills and effortlessly lifted herself from the seat. We exchanged contact details and I could feel that the lion had made the kill.

The bus was finally roadworthy and we eventually took off. For the rest of the journey, Eunice was next to me and we got to know each other better. Since then, we started phoning each other until our relationship grew steady. One thing led to another until such a day when she told me that she was pregnant. This marked the sudden turn of events since I was not prepared for that. I wanted to focus on my wife who had just had a miscarriage. This was a menace.

After giving birth to a lovely baby girl, she became very arrogant. She knew she had tied me to her belt and became more and more jealous of my wife. Her behaviour, unlike her beauty, became worse with time and like the taste of celery, it defies description. Like her father who didn't like me, she wanted only cash from me. To them, life was only from hand to mouth, nothing more. I tried my best not to reveal my wife's number to her because I knew she would call her...

When I phoned home after lunch, I sensed then that the cat was out of the bag. My wife answered with a lower than usual voice which had shaky undertones of one who had been crying. Before I could think of a way to soothe her, she uttered the words I did not want to hear; "Eunice phoned."