The Waiting Game

chapter nine

“Hi, mum.” Joshua greeted, he let himself be drawn into a hug and he caught a whiff of her signature flowery perfume. Despite his resolve to remain unfazed throughout his visit, he found himself being comforted by his mother’s hug.

She let him go a few seconds later than she usually did, her eyes roamed his form, something like concern in the pinch of her forehead and Joshua did the same assessment. Dinah Phillips looked well, beautiful even in her off-shoulder, flowing gown.

He took after her in looks, he had her dark, smooth skin, gap-teeth smile and build – she was taller than Remilekun had been – but Joshua had never for once felt like he knew the person his mother was. That in part might have been because he’d been raised by nannies being the last child. He’d never formed a bond with her, didn’t know if he loved her. He wasn’t even sure what she thought of him either, she was distant but she called him thrice a month, she had no expectations of him. She just received him as he was which Joshua thought was very strange.

“Korede, how are you?” She always referred to him by his Yoruba name.

“I’m fine.” He answered, shrugging off his jacket as he strode past her into the lounge-room. Unsurprisingly, the room was different from the last time he saw it. Dinah was one for spontaneity, she was always redecorating. The last time he’d been home, the walls had been a robin egg blue, now it was beige. The walls and the rugs, the sofas were brown.

He slung his jacket over his shoulder. “I’m sorry I’m late, I had a bit of business keeping me.” He had the habit of calling The Orion Project business, it was a poor disguise of the truth but his mother would rather ignore that Orion existed.

Dinah gave an elegant shrug of her shoulder. “I see.” She didn’t care, unsurprisingly. She liked to pretend The Orion Project didn’t exist; it was one thing he’d always wondered about. His mother had once been Orion affiliated; it was how she’d met his father. But she’d left the organization when she had her first child.

Joshua took a seat; she stood watching him until he felt uncomfortable.

“Is anything the matter?” He asked, raising his brows.

Dinah laughed. “It feels like forever since I’ve seen you.”

He blinked. “You saw me a few months ago.”

Joshua was instantly wary, his mother wasn’t cold by any means but she wasn’t like normal mothers, she didn’t tell him how much she missed him. She never even told him she loved him.

“Are you sick?” He blurted out.

There was a beat of silence, then laughter. His mother was laughing.

“Korede, only you. I’m allowed to miss you,” She said when she calmed down.

“We don’t have that kind of relationship,” He reminded her.

“What kind of relationship do we have?” She asked him.

“Why are we talking about this?” He asked, he was trying and failing to keep his impatience in check. He was tired and he needed to sleep more than anything.

There were phases to every visit to his mother since Remilekun died, he spent the many hours he could sleeping, then came the awkward dinner – his sisters spent the hour glaring at him. They knew he’d killed their father and they hated him.

Dinah didn’t care, she and Remilekun had been privately separated for twenty one years. In public they acted the perfect couple because of Remilekun’s political career. She had no love lost for her now dead husband.

“I’m going to sleep, I’m jetlagged.” Joshua stood, he walked to his mother and gave her cheek a kiss; a silent apology. He didn’t despise her and he hated to be rude. “See you at dinner tonight, happy birthday.”