After Love

Chapter 7 - The Trouble With Faith

It's been three years since I was last here.

Everything looks the same. The sand, the sun. I remember the day we laid Oarabile to rest. I was amazed to see so many people there to celebrate a life that was short-lived. He could hardly form sentences yet everyone had so much to say about him and what he meant to them. It felt so fake.

The condolences and smiles, many didn't want us together as a couple and losing Oarabile was the cement they were happy never dried.

Even though Namisa and I had dated for years, this was the first time our families were really in the same place. We never paid damages for him, scheduling the negotiations was always a problem and so that was the first time our uncle's met.

He went from being our beacon of hope to someone we mention in memories. His death took everything from me. Her family and mine parted ways, my friends and family distanced themselves from me. Kyle, Tsebo and Nhlanhla didn't know what to say to me. Then again who was I to judge, I hardly had much to say. I spent most of the day comforting Namisa and doing small talk on her behalf. Now here I was on my own, staring at your tombstone, trying to find words and wondering if you even understood the role I was meant to play in your life.

"Hey OB... It's me... Your dad. We used to play together. It saddens me to think you are nothing more than a box in the ground, a body that has probably decayed. I don't know if you heard but you have a little sister now."

They say the dead should not communicate with the living but I took the whistle of the wind as a sign that he was listening. Maybe he was and maybe I was just that desperate for him to exist somewhere other than my mind. In her healing, she gave away all the things we bought Oarabile, so I didn't have anything to remember him by other than his baby pictures.

I was left with his baby pictures and a deep dislike for Winnie the Pooh. I used to love the cartoon but seeing Winnie on his tombstone made the sight of the teddy bear unbearable.

I was also the one left with all the questions. 'How did he die?', 'Was he ill?', 'How is Namisa taking it', 'When will you be ready to have another child?'. Namisa got time off school, time off from the world. She had three weeks to rest, and just shut off everything. Her communication was limited to myself and her immediate family. I, on the other hand, was thrown into the world.

I still had to attend lectures, be social, I had to still be happy for everyone. My mother was falling apart, my cousins were hurt and I had to be there for them all. I had to keep their world together and pretend mine wasn't falling breaking apart. A man is strong, so the death of my son shouldn't have phased me. After all, a woman has a natural clock and a man can have a child anytime. A lot of people felt I should have leaned on Namisa but whenever I tried to open up to her, she would burst into tears because I would just bring the pain back for her, so I would put my emotions on hold so that I could comfort her. In the end, I realized that their 'lean on her' was just their way of saying I should be there for her because this is harder for women than it is for men because they are more connected to the child.

Putting Namisa first, the questions and being forced back into society with no support; I don't know how I made it through and managed to retain some part of my sanity.

Namisa and society aside, it wasn't that the questions weren't valid, it was just that I didn't have answers myself. She couldn't tell me what happened. She said something about being at a family friend's place, that he was fine when she last checked on him and that when she checked again he wasn't breathing. Some people said maybe her 'cousin' rolled over and suffocated him, others suggested he was poisoned and others said it was just God's will. With all the confusion, an autopsy seemed insensitive. I asked Namisa for one and she asked if I blamed her or her cousin for what happened, that I suspected them of foul play. She brought Oratilwe to me because she didn't want to leave her with anyone who wasn't immediate family, I guess a part of her blamed her cousin too.