Chapter Sixty-One – A Ghost Returns

I had tried to busy myself with some studying so Lara wouldn’t feel cornered. When she was ready to talk, I would be ready to listen with rapt attention.

I failed miserably at this mission. I mean, the girl was just lying there like thirty minutes ago she wasn’t heaving and crying.

“Lara” I called. The way she closed her laptop told me that she’d been expecting me to talk to her at any minute.

We both sat up on our beds, looking at each other.

“I’m guessing this isn’t the first time this happened.” She nodded in confirmation. “When did this even start?” I asked, bewildered. We’d been in the room together for almost two and a half months and she’d seemed perfectly fine. We even lived together at home and there was no indication.

“It started shortly after I moved in with you guys. It happened a few times and then it stopped. It has only happened once since school reopened. Then today it happened again.”

I was silent.

“Why didn’t you tell me though? I’m sure my parents could have got you the help you needed. There’s nothing normal about a panic attack.”

“Between your breakup with Sly and whatever it is with Boateng, I didn’t think you had the time. Besides, it’s not like there’s something wrong with me. It’s my dad coming that brought up some issues. I’m just scared when he comes, he’s going to try to reach out and make my life a living hell again.”

That was a reasonable fear where Lara’s father was concerned. I’ve never seen a man treat his children like a business deal quite like Mr. Johnson.

I guess reader, that you are wondering what became of my conversation with Boateng about my feelings and hate for Aseda. Well, it was decided that he wasn’t going to stop mentoring her and if they naturally gravitated towards a romance, then so be it.

I suppose that it’s a fair resolution. If I’m not ready to commit to Boateng, why should I stop him from committing to someone else. Part of the conditions for the rekindling of our friendship was that we were not going to be a hindrance in each other’s relationships and I was going to do my best to respect that.

***

Carl kept to his promise and duly loaned Mara the money she needed for her new business. School was getting a bit hectic now with tests and assignments piling up so she stashed the money in a polythene bag and hid it in the deep recesses of her panties bag so that not even the smartest of thieves could discover it.

During the weekend, she’d get round to going to the Madina market to pick her first consignment. Who knew setting up a business could be so easy?

***

I looked at my phone screen and realized I’d been in the library for almost three hours. Studying seemed the easier thing to do now. I was all over the place in every other area of my life. I was not about to add my academics to the mix.

I was about to place the phone down and go back to my books when my phone pinged to a notification from Alex, the guy I danced with at Carl’s birthday party. We’d added each other on Snap two days prior but I didn’t send a text and neither did he.

I half-swiped the message to see what it said. It was just a ‘hi’. I ignored it and was just about studying again, when it pinged a second time. The text read “why are you half-swiping me?”. I smiled. I hadn’t realized he was paying for Snapchat premium so he could tell when I did that.

I sent a laughing emoji and admitted that he’d caught me. That’s how for the next hour, I was on my phone instead of my books.

At this juncture, dear reader, I will encourage you to mute your phone in the library and tell the time from an old analogue watch. Distractions these days are so easy to come by and you have to save yourself.

That’s how in one moment you could be gearing towards a beautiful career in finance with a six-figure salary, fuel allowance and posh one-bedroom apartment in Tse Addo. Then the next moment, you are pregnant for a foolish bank CEO with a wife and two children and then you’re wondering how it happened. It’s all because you didn’t put your phone down and focus on your work.

Well, that was oddly specific but still very true.

After wasting the rest of my time on the phone, I walked back to my room. Once upon a time, I would have been skipping my way to Sly’s place but now I was just walking to my room – lonely and dejected.

I could have gone to Boateng’s place but he was helping Aseda prepare for her interim assessment. The same one I had helped Phyllis prepare for earlier in the day. She had grasped it very easily. My girl!

Lara’s was on the balcony frying sausages when I arrived. I tossed my bag carelessly on the bed, forgetting that my laptop was in there. I flung myself onto the bed as well, narrowly dodging the laptop, peaking out of the bag. I could be so careless sometimes.

I was about to pick my phone and continue texting the Alex guy when there was a knock at the door. Lara could be heard singing while her sausages fried so I walked over to open the door, thinking it was one of those vendors or evangelists.

I nearly collapsed when I saw who was at the door.

It was Sly.

I hadn’t seen Sly since the night we broke up almost five months ago and here he was at my door. He tried to smile and said “hi stranger”.

Deep in my heart I wanted to melt into his arms and tell him I had missed him and what hell these past five months had been without him but I remembered that the only reason I had missed him and these past five months had been hell was because he broke up with me suddenly when we were doing so well.

I didn’t so much as offer a smile. The last time we spoke, I was a pathetic little girl, begging him not to break my heart. He’d done it anyway. I had had time to practice who I would be the second time around and I was not about to look pathetic again.

“Can I help you?” I asked coldly.

His face showed that he realized this was not about to be some amicable reunion.

“I tried calling and texting you but you’d blocked me everywhere. How are you doing?”.

The question shocked me. If there’s one thing a man has, it’s audacity. You leave me high and dry and ask me how I’m doing.

“What do you want, Sly?” I demanded, getting ready to close the door in his face.

“I just wanted to see you, Araba. I’ve missed you. Can we talk?”

I slammed the door in his face and left him knocking on the door and calling my name. Eventually, he got tired and left. I buried my head in my pillow and cried. I was proud of myself for standing my ground but it broke my heart all over again that I couldn’t just be happy to see him.

That’s how it played out in my head but alas, I’m just a girl. I didn’t want him to come into the room because that seemed a bit too friendly than what I was ready for so I stepped out, closing the door behind me.

He smelled so good, I just wanted to snuggle in his skin.

“I saw on Mara’s snap that you went for Carl’s birthday party. How was it?”

“It was cool” I said.

He persisted, resolving not to be deterred by my cold demeanor.

“Aren’t you going to ask how I’ve been? I’ve seen that Lara and Mara have both been watching my socials actively so I’m guessing you already know what I have been up to.”

If I could grow wings to fly, I would have flown out of there and moved to England to be one of those overfed pigeons at the beautiful parks there. Anything but whatever this was.

“Sly, what do you want from me? Seriously, you broke up with me and I am trying to move on. Then you just show up out of the blue trying to make us chat like we are besties. What’s this?”

He gulped. I could now tell that he was shy and this was a shot in the dark for him.

“I know it’s weird and I shouldn’t have come here. It’s just that I really miss you. I know that I messed up and I hurt you badly but I just thought that maybe after all this while, it’d be okay if we could at least be friends. I just had to try.”

“You’re the one who broke up with me, remember? I begged you not to and you did it anyway. All for the selfish reason of me not fitting into your new reality. So if that’s the case, how can we be friends? I thought I didn’t fit into it.”

It was Sly’s turn to be embarrassed now and he was beginning to regret coming over but it was too late to turn back. He’d known talking to me would not be easy but he hadn’t guessed it’d be this hard. He debated whether he should try to change the topic but he reasoned it would be futile, giving that I had responded coldly to all his small talk. He was fully committed now so he’d have to see this through no matter how uncomfortable it got.

“I panicked; you know. I really liked you. I still do but I was afraid that if I leave and you’re here with Boateng, he’d become everything to you that I once was. I couldn’t bear the thought of that so I thought breaking things off thinking would be easier for the both of us.”

I couldn’t believe my ears.

“I asked you, Sly. I asked you. You said you trusted me and that wasn’t why. I have never cheated on you. I put boundaries in place with Boateng. We were good for a whole semester. There were no more uncomfortable encounters. There was no inappropriate contact between Boateng and I. So I don’t understand you.”

“That’s the thing, Araba. I knew that I could trust you and all that but I was the one you’d come to after a paper or when you were tired from the library. I was the one you were mostly with. Me not being on campus anymore, I knew that you’d probably be going to Boateng instead. Sure, you’d be doing it as friends and you’d be respectful about it but still. How was I supposed to concentrate on my own future if my mind was being plagued by what you were doing?”

“You didn’t even give us a chance, Sly. You say you trusted me but you didn’t. If you did, you’d have given us a chance. But you just broke everything off in a panic. I don’t know why you are here and I don’t think I can do whatever friendship thing this is. I need my space. Please.”

I didn’t wait for a response and walked back into my room. As I sat on my bed I wondered if he was still standing there thinking or if he’d accepted that his trip was an exercise in futility and had already walked off.

I was still mad at him but at least maybe it was time to unblock him. I unblocked him on all the social media channels and sighed. I hate this so much.

Plus, I was right, after all. Boateng was the reason my relationship had come crushing down.