My Dream Marriage

Thank you Martha, the soup was delicious,” I say as Martha takes the plate off my hands. This is the third plate of food I am eating in a row after going to the toilet after taking each one. “It’s okay Neera, I understand perfectly well what you are going through. It is going to be fine. Have you started your prenatal checkups?”

“Not yet.”

“I don’t mean to meddle but is Edward giving you a hard time? He should let you go to the hospital regardless, the baby is innocent. What if you develop complications? You wouldn’t know and that could put you in danger, doesn’t he understand that?”

“I have tried reasoning with him to no avail. He thinks that I cheated on him,” and he is not changing his mind about that. “Give him some time, maybe he’ll come around.” She says, maybe I should give him the benefit of the doubt.

“Auntie Neera!” Rana calls as he enters the house. He runs to where I am and engulfs my legs in a hug. I touch his head and comb his hair back. He looks up at me with his big eyes and gives me the biggest and warmest childish smile I have ever seen, but then all children give the warmest smile, don’t they? “Hey Rana, you still remember me,” I thought the day I meet him again he would have forgotten my name. “I can’t forget you, the prettiest auntie,” he says, his dimples perfectly showing on his pretty face.

“Where is your sister and who are you with?” He is all alone and I don’t think he could come here all by himself. “No, my mom and dad brought me here.” “Where are they?” I don’t see anyone. Right on time, Dexter enters followed by his wife, Myra. They look formal and sophisticated in their designer clothes.

“Hello Dexter, hello Myra, it’s been long since you came here. You are welcome,” I say gesturing towards the couch so that they can take a seat but they don’t seem like they are interested. “Hello Neera,” Dexter says. “What can I offer you?” Martha asks. “It’s okay, we are not here to stay, we are only here because Rana insisted on coming over here so we are leaving now. As you can see, we are on our way to work,” Myra says and I can feel some pride in her statement. “Where is his sister?” I don’t think she preferred to stay at home, alone when everyone has left. “She’s gone on a school trip but Rana stayed home because he didn’t go.” Dexter says. “Dexter, let’s go, we are getting late. Rana, be a good boy and we’ll come for you in the evening, okay?”

“Okay but mom, I don’t want to go back with you today,” he pouts. “Why wouldn’t you?”

“Tomorrow is the weekend so I won’t be going to school and it’s only fair if I stay with Neera. I have missed my grandma and grandpa too. I promise I won’t be a disturbance to them. Mom please.”

“No Rana, I can’t let you..”

“Myra, it’s okay, besides this is my parents house so he will be fine. Rana, you can stay but promise to be a good boy. I will come back for you tomorrow. Don’t give Neera a hard time okay?” Dexter says.

“I promise dad!” He says raising up his little right hand.

“I am only leaving you here once. Martha, take care of my son. Dexter let’s go,” Myra says without even sparing me a glance. His son clearly wanted to see me but she doesn’t want him to be under my care. Am I blowing things out of proportion? No, she seems to have an unspoken problem with me.

“I missed you Rana,” I say. “I missed you too, I thought you would come to my birthday.” He says pitifully. “When was your birthday?” I didn’t know. “It was last week, I thought uncle Edward told you because I told him to.” Oh no. “Was uncle Edward there too?” “Yes, but he didn’t want to tell me why you didn’t come.” He says.

“Did he bring you a big gift?”

“Uh huh, he brought me my favorite hero.”

“Who is your favorite hero? Superman on spiderman?” This two tend to be almost every child his age’s dream. “No, my favorite hero is Ronaldo because I want to play football just like him.” For real? That was quite out of the box.

“Wow, awesome and I promise to be watching every match that you will be playing and cheering for you.” I can imagine Rana being all grown up and playing a football game. “No, you will not watch me but come to the field where I will be playing.” He corrects.

“Yeah right. So do you want something to eat or drink because I make the most delicious breakfast in the whole wide world.”

“I want some ice cream.” He says, awkwardly scratching his head. It only means his parents don’t always give him the privilege of having ice cream, I don’t know why. “Okay, chocolate for you.”

“I don’t like chocolate.”

“Alright then, strawberry or vanilla?”ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

“Both.” He is mischievous but cheerful at the same time.

I leave him taking his ice cream and go back to mine and Edward’s bedroom, the room that he doesn’t want me to stay in with him. Should I just leave and give him time? Or should I be stubborn and see if he was serious or not. If he is serious then I will have to ask him why he goes to stay with Valen leaving me all alone.

I go to the closet and see if I can find some clothes for the future because with my body changing everyday, I won’t be able to fit in these clothes anymore very soon. I ransack through the lines and drawers of my clothes and that is when I stumble over the album and the little box that I had taken with me when I went to collect my parents memorabilia. I had even forgotten about them. I leave whatever I was doing and set them down and sit comfortably so that I can memorize every image that I come across in the photo album.

I decide to start with the box but it is secured with a padlock that looks like an ancient one because I have never seen one like this in my life. I don’t have the key to open it and there is nothing that I can use to force open it. So I put it back in the drawer and put clothes on it so that no one could find it easily. I will check on it later.

I open the album and the first picture is of my mom when she was still a girl, I think in her twenties. She had such long black hair that was so healthy and stylish and I wish I could know the products that she used for her hair routine. More and more pictures of her when she was with my father when they were dating, their wedding and even with me when I was still a baby.

As I continue checking out the pictures, the familiar faces I know are done so it’s only now of two young men in black and white who look familiar to me but I don’t know where I have seen them. I bite my nail to try and recall and that is when I remember that I saw the same picture in a photo album back in Marina. Some are of three young men and I wonder why a similar photo that was in Edward’s photo album could be in my father’s. How are these two connected? That one aside. Another photo is of one of the young men with a young lady in what looks like a wedding attire and I only wish that there was someone who could help me in recognizing these faces.

One of the men looks oddly familiar in another photo. I can see a picture of my dad when he was still small, resting in his arms. He really resembles my dad. Could it be my grandpa? Who are the other two men and the young lady? I could have asked Edward but we have issues. Some other time. I am done looking at the pictures but something is really bugging me. I really want to know who the men are in these photos and what makes me more curious is how a picture that is the same as this one doing in that album that was in Marina. I remember that I couldn’t find it when I looked for it the next time I wanted to see it.

One of them seems to be my grandpa but the other ones? Could one of them be Edward’s grandfather and the other one their friend? I really think so because I don’t see any other person that could fit in. My dad said that grandpa was also an only child so that can’t be his brother because they don’t even resemble each other, all four of them including the young lady.

Wait, how long has Martha been working here? I think she told me some time ago that she used to work for the Lawansons even before Edward was born so she could know something. I take the photo album and run out of the bedroom, down the stairs and back to the kitchen where Rana seems to enjoy the time of his life with a big jar of ice cream. How long has he been eating ice cream, I think since I left to go to my bedroom? Now I know why he wasn’t sure if we could give it to him, his parents must have limited him from having ice cream.

“Rana, where is Martha?”

“She is outside.” Oh, so he took advantage of her absence.

“Rana, you have had enough ice cream for today okay. The rest you can take tomorrow.” He should stop now. “Okay, but can I just finish this one, I promise it’s the only one and the last one,” he says blinking his puppy eyes at me. He won. “Okay, when you are done with that one, no more until tomorrow.” “Okay auntie.” I need to find Martha.

I find her talking to the gardener. “Hi Philip.” “Hello ma’am,” he greets me back. “It’s Neera. Martha, I need to talk to you.”

“Okay Neera, what is it?” She asks, following me back into the house. Curiosity is killing me now. I don’t even wait until we get back into the house before I ask. “Martha, look,” I say opening the photo album, “can you tell me who are the people in these photos? Can you recognize them?”

“Let me see,” she comes close to me and looks at the photos. She opens her eyes wide and looks at me. “Don’t you know them?” She asks as if I am unable to add two plus two together. I shake my head, she seems to know them and I want clarity so I decide to play dumb.

“This one is your grandfather and this is old Mr Lawanson,” she confirms my suspicions. I open the other page where there are now the three men and the young lady and show her. “What about them?”

She gasps, her hand reaching for her heart and looks at me with horror in her eyes. I don’t understand why she is scared of a mere picture. “Martha, what happened?”

“Neera, where did you get these pictures from?” She asks.

“Why? Is there any problem?”

“You need to take them back where you found them right now.” She is starting to worry me. “Can you at least tell me who they are?”

“No Neera, I am sorry but I am in no position to tell you that. I also need to tell you this, no one in this family should know about this. They should not know that you have these pictures with you and I advise that you put them in a place that no one will find them or better still burn them.” She whispers and I can sense from her tone that there is more to what meets the eye.