All About My Bruises (Final Saga)

Final Chapter

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The present

"Mama, Franklin wants Peter Pan. Peter Pan." He jumped up and down in front of his mother like a panther on a hill. He was a handsome boy. She, on the other hand, was still lost in her recollection. She has been going through the evening routine automatically as she was already used to bathing Frank, feeding him, and letting him watch peter pan by eight before he went to bed. Now, she has stopped to pick up the toy that Frank has learnt to knock from wherever it was standing.

She just realized when Frank spoke that she has been holding his lion king toy and sitting in one place when it was time for him to watch his Peter Pan. He was an intelligent boy and he knew his own routine. After watching the Peter Pan cartoon, he would start crying for bed. If she laid him on the bed, he would start requesting his lullaby, if that was done for him, he would pretend to sleep only to jump up and follow her the minute she was out of the door. That was the routine every night. Franklin was a handful. She was mostly glad that he did not know his father. I was also glad that Sam did not try to get close to Franklin. She would have slammed him with a restraining order.

After the big court fight, Adaeze moved to Abuja to live. She wanted to be away from Sam and his family, not that they could not find her if they tried. She also wanted to stay close to her work which was located in Abuja. She was working at Johnson and CO law firm and she was trying to prove that she was worth her salt. She got a house that was not more than a mile away from her work and not more than a mile away from where she enrolled Franklin in school. Her house was a blue and white storey building very close to Abuja government quarters. The compound was very large and it has a big backyard with guava and mango trees. She was happy now. She was fulfilled. Frank filled her world with laugher and her job filled with a sense of purpose. She would soon prove to them that she was the best.

"What did you say, sweetie?" She asked him with a smile. He smiled back at her. Frank had the full force of his grandmother's smile and hers. He was fair like Sam and also promised to be handsome like him with his big brown eyes. That did not bother me. He might have some of the features of the man who sired him but that was where it ended. That was where she would make sure that it ended.

Right now, he was wearing his kangaroo pyjamas and clutching his big orange coloured teddy bear. She could remember the day she bought it for him. They had gone to Shoprite to get things for the house. She was holding his hand and the next thing, he left her and went and plastered his baby face on the glass window of the PET store. I went back to get him and he refused to move until I bought the big fluffy white stuffed dog that he was pointing at. When I gave it to him, he gave me ravishing smile that made the dog worth more than the money I paid for it. I could have given him the world if it would make him smile that way.

"I said I want to see Peter Pan. TV Mama." He tugged at my pink nightgown and looked up at me.

"Say please, Franklin. I told you not to be rude." We headed to the living room as he continued with our conversation. He was still gazing up at me and walking at the same time.

"Please mama, what does rude mean?"

"Rude is when you are not polite. Look where you are going baby," she cautioned him.

He still looked confused but he stopped looking at her and so was in danger of running into the washing machine in the corridor. She could hear the next question coming. Franklin was a master in the art of asking questions. He would do this until his mother got tired and he would still go on.

"What does polite mean, mama?" We entered the living room. She had to use her hand and stir him to the living room as he made to enter the dining.

"Polite means when you are not rude and when you respect others when you talk. Why don't you go get the remote let me put it for you?" When she sat down, he climbed her like a tree and made himself comfortable on her laps. Her emotional recollection has robbed her of the strength to indulge him today even though she loved doing it.

She knew that he would ask another question if he was not distracted. That was distraction enough for him. He crawled down from her body like a little snake and walked across the brown rug on his baby swagger step to get the TV remote. He pressed it into her hands and asked her again to put the TV on for him to watch. She could hardly refuse and not make him cry, besides, it was how she wanted it.

Adaeze took the remote from him and used it to put the big plasma TV on. It was a moderate family size, not the mini cinema that Sam called television. He jumped up and down again in pure glee.

"Aunty, I have finished with the clothes. Is there anything I can do?" Ogechi asked as she came into the living room. She has been staying with me for the last two months as she waited for admission into the university.

She was a very beautiful girl with long curly natural hair, a nice shape, a tall body, wide eyes and a very handsome face. People said that she looked very much like her when she was that age. Tochi was not nineteen and at nineteen, Adaeze did not even look in the mirror at that age to know how she looked like. Adaeze was very glad that she came to stay with her. I was already calling in on favours that would help her get admission. She was wearing Adaeze's blue jeans and her green Glo top. They were the same size and Tochi was taking advantage of that.

Adaeze smiled at her. "There is none my dear. Your food is in the dining. Go and eat before Franklin finishes and decides that he wants your food."

"Ehe, Isreal said I should let you know he is waiting outside."

Israel did not need an official invitation to come to her house. He was Frank's godfather. He always came and stayed for a long time playing with her and Frank when she was not working on a case. Israel seemed determined to be with her and she liked him a lot. She liked the way he has given her space to do what she wanted and was always beside her even when she was wrong. When she moved to Abuja, he disturbed his boss until he had to transfer him to Abuja. When I asked him the excuse he used, he said simply that his family relocated to Abuja and he had to follow them. What was all this about waiting outside?

Israel has been the rock that has been holding her after the nasty divorce. He has been with her even when she was to bring Franklin into the world. That was why he called Franklin Uwa Nulu Onum. The way Franklin screamed when he came into the world was ear-splitting. He had healthy lungs and still did. She tried as much as she could not let him make full use of his lungs in that department.

A year after the birth of Franklin, she went into a full relationship with Israel. He was a very attentive boyfriend but he was not being very attentive now. If she did not know better, she would think that he was avoiding her. He was always in her house before seven and did not leave until nine or later in the night. For the last three weeks, he has been staying away from her and she did not know why. He did not come to take her out on Sunday. He did not get any gift for Frank. He did not "drop in" where she was working with lunch as was his habit. He did not even call her on the phone. I did not blame him entirely. I was also very busy with a very nasty case that simply refused to be solved. He only called yesterday to arrange a date.

"I shall go outside and know what he wants to talk about that cannot be said within the walls of my house. Stay with that young man. Don't let him touch the cookie or the remote and please, don't let him near the bookshelves. And Israel is not your uncle. I told you that before."

"Don't worry aunty. I know the drill. You are going outside the gate, not to America. And even if you are going there, you will let me follow you to look after Franklin," Tochi said with a smile and a wink.

Tochi has been trying to bribe her way into following Adaeze for her vacation to America. This was why whenever she said jump, Tochi would ask how high she should jump. And she was not subtle in her pursuit for it. She hinted at it at every opportunity she got. Adaeze has long decided that she would take her but she wanted the girl to work for it. Tochi did anything that Adaeze asked her just so she would still consider her for the vacation. It was good that way.

Adaeze put on her house slippers and went to see the man she has come to love and trust and respect. She did not care that she was wearing her nightgown. Israel has seen her with less clothing. She was a little nervous as she was going. It was not like Israel to behave the way he has been doing for the past three weeks. He has been patient enough, giving her all the time she needed to heal and more.

She saw him standing beside his new car. He was still very tall and handsome and, God help her, very sexy. He wore a green shirt and white trousers. He liked the colour white. His last vacation to Dubai was still showing on his face as he was darker than he usually was. He looked healthy, handsome and nervous. She did not like the idea of Israel being nervous. She did not like it at all.

"Good evening Israel," she greeted as she walked down the last of the steps that would get her to where he was standing.

"Adaeze, longest time. I have missed you."

He was wearing simple T-shirt and black trousers and he looked good in it.

"Are you alright Israel? You are not acting as your real self. Is anything the matter?" she was a little confused by the way he was acting. She used to be able to read Israel like an open book but, she did not know what he was up to. He came over and took her hand and rubbed his hand over her hand. He was looking at her like he has not seen her before. She did not like that look. It was the kind of look he gave her after she brought Franklin into the world. He smiled suddenly. She returned his smile nervously.

"Nothing is the matter, my dear. I just wanted to see you. I just came to claim the date we arranged. Hope you have time?" He gave her one of his devastatingly handsome smiles.

"I have the time. I will just go in and tell Tochi to help put Franklin to bed. I will be right back." Adaeze went in to tell Tochi to put Franklin to bed and to change into a better cloth.

*******************

Israel took her to the new eating joint that was opened not far from where she lived. they had been there a couple of times and she liked their food. Israel requested a private boot but they told her they didn't have any available but they had a semi-private one. Their table was not really private. It was in a quiet corner in the room and covered with potted plants. Immediately they gave their order to the cute waitress, Israel rushed in for the speech that she suspected that he has rehearsed and rewrote and rephrased.

"I promised myself that I would give you time to settle but I cannot go on like this Adaeze. That is asking too much of me. I love you. That is an open secret and I know that if you do not really love me, you can learn to live with me. When you finished with Sam, I wanted to ask you to marry me but I saw then that your feelings were very raw. I did not ask you. Then you gave birth. I saw how much you loved him and how you did not want anything to come between you and him so I stepped back again. But I cannot go on like this Adaeze. I feel and know in my heart we are meant to be family. This idea of seeing you and Franklin only to leave you at the end of the day is killing me. I know you have some feelings for me. But I want to be open as to what that is. I know you like me but I want to know if you can come to love me?"

He breathed at last. He looked winded. She knew it took him a lot of courage to lay his feelings bare for her on the ground to pick it up and nurture it or to march on it and throw it to the dogs. Adaeze knew that she practised that speech and it was adorable.

After her experience with Sam, she was very wary of all the feelings that have nothing to do with her son and her family.

But marriage, that to her was very risky. That, to her, was asking too much. But she knew that she has to take that step one of these many years that were ahead of her. She loved and trusted him and that should be a very good start. She did not have that with Sam. I have known Israel for more than five years. That was long enough to get to know someone. I have seen the true him and I liked what I saw.

She decided then that if she was to marry anybody in her lifetime, it would be Israel. She married Sam when she was just a foolish teenager. Now she was more mature and she knew what love was. She took his hand in her own and gazed into his eyes from where she was sitting.

"Israel, I love you, too."

She never knew that she would say those words to a man ever again and was frankly surprised that she meant it. Isreal seemed to be surprised too as he wasn't expecting an outright proclamation of love. he smiled from ear to ear as his world was finally complete.

"Thank you Adaeze. You do not know what gift you have given me. If you love me," he said as he stood up, drew her up with him by the hand then got down on one knee in front of everyone and asked her, "Will you marry me, Adaeze?" For the second time in her life. But this time, this was a happy will-you-marry-me.

All she did was smile