When Jaida Met Kadeem

35

Chapter One Hundred and Six

I stared up at Kadeem in disbelief my eyes scanning his facial expression to detect any trace of humour because this had to be a joke. I blinked at the sincere expression plastered across his face and the expectant look in his eyes. I frowned as I realised...he was being completely serious."Hold on," I blurted out, my eyebrows furrowing as I processed the fact that Kadeem was proposing to me, my eyes darted around my surroundings, Kadeem was proposing to me in his living-room, my eyes then shot down to his hands - with no ring - my eyes then swivelled up to meet his eyes again, this twenty-one almost twenty-two year old university student who was working part-time at a gym was proposing to me, this was clearly not thought through and he said he has matured. I scoffed. "So now we're not going back in time but we are looking into the future?" I enquired as Kadeem held my gaze. "Kadeem..." I continued before stopping, raking my fingers through my hair as I exhaled deeply. "We are not even together," I shook my head. "What did you think was going to happen when you asked me to marry you, did you honestly expect me to say yes?"

"I thought this is what you wanted," he frowned causing me to gawp at him in shock.

"Are you serious?!" I exclaimed. "You think I want a rushed, half-hearted proposal, after everything I said to you in Portugal you concluded that what I wanted was marriage, Kadeem?" I asked, almost laughing in disbelief, I shook my head once more my eyes never leaving his scrunched up face, his expression a mixture of confusion and frustration, he scratched the back of his head before looking up at me once more, "So you don't want to marry me?" he asked his tone lacking emotion.

"Not like this I don't," I immediately responded, shooting Kadeem a quizzical look, wondering what was going through his head, he looked away focusing his gaze on the wall behind me, looking deep in thought.

"Why, though?" he suddenly asked, glancing back over to me after a brief silence. My eyes widened when he asked me this.

"Honestly, Kadeem?!" I said. "You're really asking me that question. Is it not obvious?"

"Nah, not to me," Kadeem answered. "If you love me like you say you do, you'd want to be with me,"

"I do want to be with you Kadeem," I moved closer towards him, looking up at him so he could see the sincerity in my expression, I met his doubtful gaze and sighed. "But we have to work our way towards marriage, now matter how many years we've had feelings for each other, there's still so much we don't know about each other, we haven't lived together or been in a relationship for longer than a month, if you think about it, all these years we spent going back and forth was just that, going back and forth, how do you know you're still going to have feelings for me in a couple years time? Maybe these feelings we have only exist because we hadn't reached the ultimate goal of being together. Everyone knows that it's human nature to want what we can't have. Kadeem, we can't just get just get married, things are guaranteed to turn sour because it was rushed and not thought through -"

"And because it's us," Kadeem sighed, interrupting me. I opened my mouth to respond to this but then I realised, I had no idea what to say, I clamped my mouth shut and stared up at him apologetically, he held my gaze and nodded slowly, his face holding no expression, I detected he was mad at me for rejecting his proposal. This caused me to frown as several questions started to circulate my mind.

"What's the rush?" I blurted out. "I don't understand..." I confessed, shaking my head and frowning. "One second you're acting all distant, the next you want to marry me, it just sounds like a spur of the moment thing -did you just propose to me on the spot?" I asked him, raising an eyebrow.

Kadeem hesitated. "You know it's been on my mind, Jay," he responded carefully.

"Yeah, but you said last year that one day we were going to do this relationship thing properly. Is this properly, Kadeem?" I questioned, folding my arms and glaring at him accusingly. "What is this really about?"