Purple Bougainvillea

Ten

“Good morning ma” Jumoke greeted as she sat for breakfast that Saturday morning.
She bent her head and avoided eye contact with her aunt.
“Ehen, good morning, how was your night?”
“It was fine ma” she said and her aunt passed her own food to her. As she raised up her head to say ‘thank you’, her eyes locked with that of her aunt.
She looked away immediately, raising suspicions. Her aunt knew about her fight with Kelly, of course she did, she was Angel’s best friend anyway.
She didn’t know Jumoke’s part of the story and she didn’t even think it would affect Jumoke until this morning. She was staring at a red eyed Jumoke who also looked like she hadn’t gotten much sleep. She sat down beside her and said nothing because Vera was there. She didn’t want to question Jumoke in the presence of Vera.
When Jumoke was done eating, she said her thanks, washed her dishes and climbed the stairs up to her room. Her aunt followed her immediately she was done with her own food.
When she got to Jumoke’s room, the door was closed and she couldn’t hear any sound coming from there.
“Open up” she said knocking on the wooden door and Jumoke opened the door letting her in. She sat on the bed and signaled for Jumoke to sit beside her. She sat and crossed her legs staring at the floor.
Aunt Joke didn’t say anything at once; she studied her for a while until she felt that her stares were beginning to scare her. She held her hand in between two of hers and smiled at her to free her mind.
“Is everything ok?” she asked and Jumoke nodded
“You and I know that that’s a lie. What’s going on?? When did you start lying to me?”
Jumoke didn’t say anything, she didn’t want to. She was scared that if she said a word, she would break down in tears. And she didn’t want that, she was grown, she felt she shouldn’t be bothering others with her problems.
“What happened last night?” her aunt asked her and she muttered a ‘Nothing’.
“Don’t tell me that Jumoke, you obviously cried yourself to sleep. Talk to me, what’s bothering you?”
Then her lips started to quiver and tears started to form in her eyes “I … he…” she tried to say before she broke down in tears as her aunt hugged her trying to comfort her, telling her that big girls don’t cry and that she would be fine.
It took a while before she stopped crying and her aunt handed her a handkerchief that she used to clean her eyes and her nose.
Then she started to talk, telling about all the times that she had asked if he was fine and that he had said yes all the times she asked.
Then she talked about the nightmare that she had had last night.
“In that dream, he died and he came back telling me that I was a bad friend, since I hadn’t been there for him. It was scary, I was so scared that I cried till morning, I couldn’t sleep back; it was terrible” she said as her shoulders jerked up and she started to cry again. Her aunt held her and soothed her till she stopped.
“Am I a bad friend?” she asked still in her aunt’s arms and joke stared at her and nodded a ‘no’, surprising her.
“You made a bad decision, but that doesn’t make you a bad friend. We all make wrong decisions; it’s a part of life. But when you realize your mistake, you have to correct them” her aunt said and she nodded
“So you have to apologize to Kelly”
“You didn’t act surprised when I told you that Kelly had leukemia” she stated and staring at her aunt
“I’m his mum’s best friend, I knew already” she said and Jumoke mouthed an ‘oh’
“I guess I’ll have to dress up and go see Kelly then” she said trying to stand up
“No, you’re going to lay down on that bed and sleep; You need it.  There’s no way you’re going to see Kelly looking like that” her aunt said dragging her down to the bed and standing up instead.
She was about leaving when Jumoke’s voice stopped her
“Thanks aunt Joke”
“You’re welcome dear, catch some sleep” she said leaving Jumoke to sleep.

...

Jumoke woke up with a start, it was evening already. Suddenly she remembered that she was supposed to go over to Kelly’s house to apologize to him.
She jumped out of her bed and jumped into the bathroom to take her bath. Few minutes later, she was out and she focused on wearing her clothes and combing her hair.
When she was done with that, she walked down the stairs to find Vera and her mum sitting on the couch in their living room, watching a show on their television.
“I’m leaving” she said to aunt Joke and she nodded back at her, not diverting her attention from what she was watching.
Vera shot her a puzzled look and she ignored her. She was about shutting the door behind her when she heard Vera asking her mum where Jumoke was going this evening. She didn’t bother waiting to hear if she answered her or not as she walked straight to Kelly’s house.
She was scared, how was she going to face Angel? How was she going to face him?? She had messed up bad. She was searching her mind, thinking of the words she would say, when she got there.
And she got there very soon. She stared at the house trying to gather up courage to even knock.
She breathed in and out before stretching forth her hands to knock. Then she stopped and turned around instead, moving slowly to their backyard which the windows to Kelly’s room were facing.
She couldn’t face Angel, she didn’t know if she would want to see her. She threw the first pebble on his window; there was no reaction; same as when she threw a second and a third. Maybe he was ignoring her, maybe he didn’t want to see her too, she told herself as she turned to leave.
She walked to the front of the house so that she would find her way home, to the comfort of her aunt’s waiting arms and cry herself to sleep.
That was when she saw him, dressed in a black hoodie and black coloured joggers. Even in the darkness of that night she could see that his eyes were red and that he looked leaner than usual. Seeing him stand before her just made her realize how much she missed him. She wanted to run into his arms and hug him but she held herself back, for the reason that he might not even want to see her. They stared at each other for a while, no one said anything.
The crickets could be heard in quite a distance.
"Hi” she said in barely a whisper, breaking the silence.
There was this look in his eyes, it was unbelief. He obviously couldn’t believe that she was the one standing before him.
“Hey” he said lifting the awkward silence.
His voice sounded deeper than she remembered. Tears came to her eyes. She didn’t realize how much she missed his voice.
She didn’t know what to say, she wanted to run away from his unbelieving stare and that’s exactly what she did.
She turned around and ran away, not looking back.
As she ran, she cried. They might never be friends again and it would be her fault.
Her shoulders jerked as the tears ran down her eyes. She was trying to clean her eyes when she bumped into something, the impact pushed her back but something kept her from falling, it felt like strong arms.
She opened her eyes to see Kelly holding her from falling and she realized that it was him that she had bumped into. Before she could say anything, he pulled her into a hug.
She stood there, shocked as his arms wrapped around her small frame. He held her like that until she hugged him back.
“Don’t ever leave me” he whispered into her ears as he held her
"Promise me you’ll never leave again” he said, his voice broken from all the tears that he had shed.
“I promise” she said holding onto him tighter.