Twisted fate

EIGHT

On his drive to Natasha's place, Tulani did some mental calculations in his head to determine whether Sean could really be his son. If the child was four years old, then there was no way he could be his since he had only known Tasha for four years and some months.
If indeed the child is mine, shouldn't he be about three years old or something? He wondered.
Tulani's doubts about the boy's paternity were crushed the moment he laid his eyes on him. He knew without a doubt that the boy was his; the eyes, the nose and the general shape of his head all screamed his DNA.
"There's something I don't understand," Tulani told Natasha as they stood outside by his car.
"I don't need to ask you the obvious question but," he was nervously rubbing one foot against the paved ground, his mind doing summersaults and not landing straight on anything.
"What is it Tulani?" She asked.
Instead of answering, Tulani raised his head and looked at her with a very puzzled expression on his face. It was as if he was searching for a passage into her soul.
"What is it Tula?" Natasha repeated. "Did something happen?"
"Let me ask you this," he said. "I know he's my child," he pointed towards the house where they had just come from. "...so I won't ask you something that obvious. What I want to know is; how old is he?"
"He is four years old," she answered incuriously.
"How come?" He asked, his eyes dancing about in befuddlement. "I have been raking my brain trying to make sense of everything but I haven't found anything that makes sense. The math doesn't add up."
Natasha laughed. "Maybe it doesn't add up with you but it does with me."
"Then help me understand." He threw his arms in the air.
"You remember when you first came to my company in San Francisco four years ago?" She started to explain. "At your welcome party, you remember you tried to chat me up and I kicked you in your nuts."
"How can I ever forget that day? You still haven't told me why you did that when I was just asking for your number."
"Well, today I will give you the why," she said. "You didn't come to San Francisco by chance. There was a lot of planning behind the scenes on my part to finally get my boss to ask your station to partner with us on that heritage project I had come up with."
"Why? How come?"
Natasha laughed again. "Because I wanted to get to know you better. I wanted to know who the father of the child I had just given birth to really was."
"Wait, wait," Tulani raised his hand.
"I know it's confusing, but wait for me to finish, it will all make sense soon."
"Okay," he conceded. "Explain."
"Do you remember your trip to Dubai in 2010?"
Tulani looked at her in shock. "How did you know about that?"
"Because I was also in Dubai at that time."
"What?"
She chuckled, "Yes, that was where you and I met for the first time, at Brandon Parker's birthday party."
"Hell no, no way!" He was scratching his head, desperately trying to resurrect the memories of that night. "You can't be serious. How come I can't remember seeing you there?"
"It could be because you were drunk, extremely drunk. I was too. The previous day I had just learnt that my husband had impregnated another girl so to cheer me up, the girls took me on a trip to Dubai, they said we should get wasted and forget the drama...and wasted we got.
"We had been moving from club to club when we somehow found ourselves at this house party. I noticed you standing outside the gents when I was on the way to the ladies with my best friend Megan and I made the mistake of commenting on your looks.
"Instead of heading to the loo to take care of our business she nudged me into chatting you up and wouldn't let me go until I talked to you. So, I approached you and you turned out to be very receptive. After chatting for close to thirty minutes, I learnt you were Zambian and that automatically sealed the deal for me.
"I figured, if I was going to have crazy wild angry sex, or revenge sex...whatever you choose to call it, wouldn't it be more fun if it was with a stranger from my home country?"
"How come I can't remember any of that?" Tulani asked.
"How the hell am I supposed to know? I might have been equally drunk that day but I still remember every bit of it...and of course I kind of had no choice since there was a reminder for the nine months that followed...and then for all the years that followed.
"Naturally, I expected you to remember me when my boss introduced us at the office but I could tell you had no idea who I was before that day. When you tried to chat me up later that evening, I couldn't believe it! I thought, is this guy crazy?"
"I swear Tasha, I have no recollection whatsoever of my meeting with you in Dubai. I only remember partying with the guys like it was the last day of our lives. A friend of ours had just been admitted to the Bar so we had made that trip to Dubai to celebrate.
"I don't know how we ended up at Brandon's party but I remember getting there, we were already half way drunk by that time but we still ended up drinking and smoking some stuff I had never allowed in my body before."
"Drugs?" Natasha asked, searching his face for an honest answer. "That could be why you couldn't remember anything that happened after. I didn't know that so I was mad, felt cheap and used...."
"Even though you were the one using me to get revenge on your cheating husband?"
"I never heard you complain that night."
They both laughed.
"I was alone when I woke up in the morning...." He said.
"That's because I regretted the whole thing the moment the alcohol left my body. As soon as I saw you lying naked next to me, I quickly dressed up and was out of there in a flash."
"Then why didn't you just tell me the truth when we met again in the US?" He asked her.
"How the hell did you expect me to tell the guy I slept with when we were both drunk...and please bear in mind, this guy had no recollection whatsoever of ever meeting me.... how could I tell such a guy that I had just delivered his son two months ago?"
"Well, you have a point there...but still Tasha, despite the amnesia, I was still smitten by you. When you realized my feelings for you, you could have mentioned it to me. I was with you all that time and not once did you mention having a son...and you certainly didn't look like you had just delivered.
"I only got to hear about your son a year after I left, and I remember you had mentioned him by accident because you immediately changed the topic. I didn't want to probe because I was jealous that things were going well between you and your husband."
"It's not like I never tried to tell you Tula," she said. "I tried to tell you, so many times but then you would pass comments about how much you hated kids and about how some woman tried to trap you with a kid."
"That was Cynthia my ex-wife I would talk about." He explained.
"How was I supposed to know?" She said. "All I was hearing was how much you hated being confronted with such kinds of situations. I didn't want you thinking that I was out to trap you."
"What about your husband? You told me you were married but on separation when we were working together."
"That was the truth. Marcus was raised Catholic so his family never believed in divorce...even though they strongly believed in adultery. When I told him about the pregnancy and asked for a divorce, he refused. He said we were now equal-equal, we both had kids with other people so what was the point of divorcing.
"He wanted me to give Sean to my parents to raise once he was born so we could continue living as a happy couple. Of course I didn't want that but he was firm in his refusal. We eventually agreed to go on separation and during that time none of us tried to contact the other.
"Eventually, whatever little feelings we had for each other fizzled out and we got divorced without drama...although I think it was more to do with the fact that Marcus had fallen in-love with some other woman."
"When you asked me to meet you at that restaurant close to my place, you told me you were getting back with him. Why did you lie to me?"
Natasha took a deep breath before responding.
"That day was crazy," she said. "I never set out to break up with you. I started off from home determined to tell you about Sean...I wanted to surprise you, to just show up at your apartment with a photo album of Sean's growth.
But, when I entered your house, I found a naked girl in your living room wearing nothing but your shirt, a shirt which I had bought for you."
"Oh shit," Tulani said. "Oooooh shiiiiiiiit."
"You can say that again," Natasha said.
"You got it all wrong Tasha, dammit! Why hadn't I thought of it that day? I clearly remember asking Jordan who she had been talking to when I came out of the bedroom because I thought I heard voices. She nonchalantly told me that some girl said she got the wrong apartment and left."
"So her name is Jordan." Natasha said between clenched teeth. "At least you still remember her name despite the years that have passed. Some of us weren't so lucky with your memory."
"The only reason I still remember her name is because I still talk to her....."
"I don't think you are helping the situation Tula." She said.
"No, you didn't let me finish. Jordan is married to Henry, you remember Henry right?"
"The crazy guy from the next apartment?" She asked.
"Yes!"
"Wasn't he married to someone called Beverly?"
"He was, but they divorced...because of Jordan."
"I'm lost," Natasha said, and she clearly looked confused.
"That day you came, gosh, I didn't even know it was you that came. That day Henry's wife had come back home from her parents unannounced. She knew Henry was cheating on her so she wanted to catch him red handed.
"When Henry heard the door opening, he quickly helped Jordan whom he had been in bed with to go over the window and come to my place. Thing is, she appeared on my bedroom window commando so I grabbed the first piece of cloth I could get my hands on and sent her out of my room.
"I was in the bedroom dressing up when I heard voices in the living room. I came in to inquire, I thought perhaps Henry had been found out but it turned out it was just someone who had the wrong apartment. I feel so stupid right now!"
"I can't believe that's what was going on that day. I had no idea. I was quick to believe the worst...considering our past." Natasha said, regretting her quick judgement of him back then.
"I always wondered why you never trusted me, no matter how much I tried. All these years I blamed you for treating me unfairly. I had no idea you felt the same way about me. Does Sean know about me?"
"Of course he does, he knows everything about you...except your face. He is one of the major reasons we came back here; I told him he was going to meet his father."
"I guess I did after all deserve that kick in my nuts." Tulani said, laughing.
"How did you find out?" Natasha later asked him.
"I think my sister did some background check on you but it appears it wasn't as thorough as it was supposed to be. She actually thought I was aware of Sean's existence and keeping him from my parents because, according to her...I knocked you up while you were still married."
"Technically, she's right about knocking me up while I was still married." She was laughing. "I just modified the sin before it could fully blossom."
"I want to meet my son Tasha, officially."
"You don't mean now do you? Have you seen the time?!?"
"How about tomorrow then?" he suggested.
"Let me talk to my parents first and see what time is convenient for them since we never miss church on Sundays."
"I can't remember the last time I stepped into a church. I bet God would be shocked to see me enter his house after such a long time."
"I can promise you, he's been expecting you all along. I will invite you to a service after we have all the introductions out of the way. Mum and dad have been anxious to meet you. They only met you once but strangely enough, they still remember you. I guess it can't be helped since they have to look at your prototype every single day."
"I am going to call Henry from here and give him a piece of my mind. He costed me four years of my child's life! Wait, it's not even four years...I missed all the kicks and the cravings for nine months."
Natasha was laughing at him. "Henry didn't do anything. Those drugs you took in Dubai are responsible for the way things turned out."
"I should be the poster boy for the Drug Enforcement Commission. I am living proof of the dangers and consequences of drugs and alcohol abuse."
"You were a kid, who can blame you?"
"Try telling that to my son."
They both laughed.