**** MY WEDDING*******
EPISODE 8
Dayo moved quietly to the be-d side where Foluke knelt. He sat on the edge of the be-d, folded his arms across his che-st and sighed de-eply. de-ep inside him, he felt a bit of relief to know that at least, no third p@rty has heard about the pres£nt storm in their marriage yet. He sighed again, then cleared his throat noisily.
“I know you must have something to say, Foluke spoke suddenly, her voice startled her husband. “I know you do”, she reiterated, “iam sure you must have an explanation for this mess, so speak up, Iam all ears.”
Dayo’s heartbeat rose again. He
bec@m£ so nervous. He opened his mouth and closed it again. He wasn’t sure of how best to start off. He just did not want to annoy his bride.
He so much valued their relationsh!pand he would never let go of her. At last, he found the courage to speak, “Foluke, I nee-d you to help me, I am in a mess”, he surrendered.
“Yes, I know, we both are in there”, Foluke concurred.
“No! Dayo countered, I dragged you into this mess, you are innocent of everything, plea-se forgive me. “Dayo, this is not the time to ask for forgiveness, I nee-d to know how and when that lady c@m£ into your life to the extent of wanting to destroy our marriage, our relationsh!p, what we both toiled for all these years, how?”
Foluke interrogated in a trembling voice, she was really
scared. She wished Dayo would tell her the plain truth, noting but the truth.
“Foluke, plea-se listen to me. I will tell you nothing but the truth.” “Okay, go on, I am listening,” Foluke replied hastily.
Dayo continued, “I met Faith during my Youth Service. She was also a Corp member then.
Though we had different Places of Primary as-signments (PPA), but we lived in the same house. My own room was next to hers on the same wing in a ‘Face to Face ap@rtment’. We bec@m£ friends quic-kly because we were the only corp members living in the house. I bec@m£
so fond of Faith because she seemed to be the kindest person I have ever met.
She did help me out with stuffs like writing my lesson notes (we were both teachers), purchasing foodstuffs for me in the market,
fetching water for my bath and so on. Most times, I would not cook because each time, Faith cooked, she prepared the meal for both of us. I thought she was just being kind all along, but she had her intentions…
I grew so fond of her that my day wouldn’t be complete if I hadn’t set my eyes on her. Though we were just friends but the friendsh!pwas getting dee-per by the day. One afternoon, after cooking a delicious jollof rice, she brou-ght my portion into my room. I was excited as usual, more so I was famished. She brou-ght hers along too (that had been her usual custom), we both ate together, either in her room or mine.
I was eating the delicious meal when my cell phone rang. You were the one that called. We talked that day and at the end of our conversation, I said ‘I love you and I miss you’, which of course was my normal practice. After you ended the call, I noticed Faith’s facial expression changed totally, her smile vanished, she wore this forlorn look on her face.
I questioned her change of mood, but she simply said nothing was wrong. Since then, I started avoiding Faith. I knew instantly that her mood changed because my Fiancee called. It dawned on me then that I was pla-ying with fire. I tried to create a gap between us but it wasn’t that easy.
The mistake I made was that I was too careless to have allowed such an inti-mate relationsh!pto grow between us.
Though I did not really talk about you whenever we were together, but she knew I had a fiancée. The aspect that made
avoiding her so difficult for me was that she had a spare key to my room. She collected it from
me on one p@rticular day like that her reasons being that I sometimes come back late from work, so she would have to put my food in a warmer and drop it in my room in case she would be going out later in the evening.
I decided to change the key to my room. I was so desperate about putting an end to our intimacy. The very day I brou-ght another padlock and key to replace the one I was using. I got home that afternoon and met my room unlocked.
I knew someone was in there alre-ady, ‘of course that must be Faith’, I thought. I opened the door slowly and entered my room, where I beheld the greatest shock in my entire life………..
TO BE CONTINUED