His Scandalous Bride

17: Now

". . .and in the end, you're no different."

Saddiq presses hard on the pen in his hand until it breaks leaving a ghastly imprint on the document he was signing whose two pages had cost him almost three hours just to read and understand its content which even to him, seems beyond absurd.

It was just few lines on a two-page document; the final edited contract for an AI company he'd recently acquired after they declared bankruptcy. The document, like every other document before reaching his desk, had been reviewed by his team of professional lawyers even though he likes to pore and ponder over them before signing— it has nothing to do with lack of trust. He has always been extremely cautious. Why, pray tell, was those hours wasted on such meager task?

". . .and in the end, you're no different."

Aisha.

It is all her fault. And his. Mostly his. What the hell had happened three nights ago? He must have been possessed. What else would explain what he had done? He still can't believe he had kissed—

-Aisha.

His frustrations thickens and it has nothing to do with how the last three days were spent, for the lack of a better word, pathetically. There is no convincing explanation either.

What does she mean by he's no different? Different from what actually?

Why did he kiss her again? Saddiq wants to scream out loud somewhere, anywhere. He was tired of listening to her berate him even if it was in his head for something he had done for a reason he wasn't quite sure about yet. Why, just why, does he have to be categorize into only God knows for something he had done for a reason he wasn't quite sure about yet?

He stands abruptly as if stung, pulling some papers with him which crashes on the floor and in his haste to avoid further damage, jumps and ends up on the floor after stepping on the empty disposable packs of takeouts he had been piling beneath the desk too lazy to properly dispose. The fall was painful but he didn't mind the pain. This pain he can understand. It was this sadness breathing down his neck that he doesn't understand. And that's why he sits there lacking the will to do anything else. Everything suddenly seems vain. He was tired of how everything which should annoy and anger him leads to sadness. Why should he be sad? It just doesn't make much sense.

It was crazy how a person could disrupt your life so bad you couldn't even begin to make sense of the anomaly especially when all he had been doing since he met her was think, hurt and burn. Again, and again, and again. It just doesn't make sense.

His phone began ringing disrupting the flow of his thought but he makes no effort to pick the call. It was nothing new. He has been avoiding all his calls since that night; he has avoiding everyone since that night. No news was good news, he figured. It couldn't have been anything urgent if his caller, though persistent, hadn't made any effort to find him, he had concluded too.

It wasn't exactly a secret that he was hiding, even the blind could see that after spending a minute with him, but like always, his method of hiding hadn't changed; he had chosen to hide in plain sight. Saddiq was simple like that. Even when he wants to run, he runs where he could be easily caught. He doesn't believe in wallowing somewhere out of reach. And that's why his caller doesn't worry him. If they were truly looking for him, they would have found him already. It was no secret he has been cooped up in his office trying, though failing, to work. Three days. Three night. He hadn't left his office for three days today. But that isn't all he had not done in these three days.

He hasn't slept. He hadn't been able to swallow anything if it isn't water. He hasn't been able to do anything productive either. He just sits there; staring at papers, sitting on meetings and signing things without really caring, without really understanding. It would seem he was still in that moment when Aisha had slammed the door at his flabbergasted face. He might have grabbed his keys and left the house in a fit of haughty anger but it does nothing about how he feels about the whole absurdity. He simply couldn't abide. And whenever he thinks he is ready to face her, face himself, he remembers the disappointment in her eyes and it kills him all over again.

The phone rings again. He hadn't even realized it had stopped until it begins again. However, there was still no effort on his side to pick. It would seem he was stuck in his thought. Eight years of nothing. Eight years of stillness. Eight years, no, thirty years of living couldn't compare to the last two weeks of his life. There hasn't been a quiet moment ever since that afternoon he had met and marry her.

". . .and in the end, you're no different."

When Saddiq was in his primary four, his class teacher had advised him to go with his first choice. Apparently, he has this weird habit of second guessing each and every decision he makes. Academic. Personal. It doesn't really matter. He would nitpick each and every detail until in the end, all his choices are an echo; of things he thinks are expected and not what he thinks are right.

"Your answers are always right the first time, Makama." Miss Nkechi Okoye, the tall, dark-skinned teacher with the warmest eyes and easiest smile he had ever seen would say to him on those days she would find him creasing his forehead and chewing his nails which he had slowly realized was the way he gets when he picked at his problems. She was, still is, his favorite teacher. Miss Nkechi had been the first person to make a real effort to know Saddiq Makama.

If it wasn't for her, Saddiq wondered how alone those years would have been; living a flawless life with a soul who loses its shine, slowly, everyday. It was rather strange how no one could see his loneliness. He must really have an old soul like his grandma teases. Why else would someone whom had received as much as he had be as lonely as he had been growing up?

"I don't know everything, Makama, but I know you're one of a kind." she would compliment him in her thickly accented English smiling like the sun decides to rise on her lips whenever he makes a mistake and gets laughed at by the others—he was a slow learner in his early formative years, "Just don't forget to thank me when you do stand on those brightly lit stage, okay?"

He never forgot her.

Habits are scary, Saddiq frowns as realization dawns on him. He was sitting in a pile of paper in his office like a crazy person with a three day old stubble nipping at his nails and second guessing each and every decision he had made ever since Aisha waltzed into his life and he realises not much had changed from that boy of seven in Miss Nkechi's class. What would she say to him if she were to see him right now?

"Your answers are always right the first time, Makama." Her voice echoed from somewhere in his consciousness  managing to scrape a smile in the process. Not much has truly changed. She still makes him smile.

So, if she's right—and she mostly is, what does it mean for him? He wonders slowly as he began gathering the papers like a reflex around him with his creased forehead a bit loosened. His decision to meet Aisha was right. His decision to marry her was right. His decision to live with her was right. His decision to kiss—

That would be pushing it too far, he shakes his head. It was too soon. Far too soon.

There must have been a reason which wasn't exactly clear right now but he was done hiding.

". . .and in the end, you're no different,"

He is different.

Aisha is wrong.

What did she say again? 

"I thought you said 'I have no intention of sleeping with you', yet here we are. . .I guess in the end, you're no different."

He didn't lie. He has no intentions of sleeping with her. Not then.  Now, he wasn't entirely sure. He wasn't entirely sure of anything.

"Let's end our marriage. It's fake anyway."

And there it was, the reason. The real reason why he was in hiding. She wanted a divorce. It was not even ten days but she wants a divorce. Why?

Saddiq stands as if bitten as his initial anger resumes in full force. How dare her toy with him? Does she think he's a joke? She had turned his world upside down and now, what? Divorce? Who is she kidding?

However, he loses his footing once more and fall right back where he was, only worse, the door opens and there she was, Aisha, looking as beautiful as ever in an army green Ankara Pinafore dress with her hair wrapped in a white thin veil and an absurdly gorgeous army combat boots. 

"Found you!"