Red Hibiscus

Dear Diary,

I am in love with life. I think there is a melody in the swish of the wind and the thump of our feet against the floor. I think the sun is too beautiful for this world and perhaps maybe I am too. The kaleidoscopic colors of everyday life is my palate and I am painting infinities. I am like a tree sapling yearning for the sun, I thrive on the happiness in my life. Love to me is the altimeter feeling and an effective antidote to unrest and bitterness.

Who can be bitter when staring into the eyes of a lover? Who drawn close would not feel the tempo of their racing heart slow as though in worship of the object that is love? One day after boarding a bus with my boyfriend I leaned in real close and told him it was really important to me that I get to feel love. He smiled, but I’m sure he did not understand me.

***

Dear Diary,

I just broke up with my boyfriend. You know the one I thought we were meant to be together forever? Yes that one. We had one of these little arguments that tend to burgeon sporadically and found ourselves swelling and bursting along with it. For the first time in a while I had stopped for a minute and looked at things between us critically. That stopping had prevented me from trying to salvage our feelings and our pride as I normally would.

Like on that Wednesday two weeks ago, when we went for an event and he seemed to pay more attention to the next girl than he paid to me. Last month, he put me on a diet for his attentions and left me wondering if it was right to beg to be loved always. I had no problem with begging to be loved occasionally, but always? Even I had a problem with that.

***

Dear Diary,

I have been reintroduced to the word loneliness in the most forceful and unfriendly manner. There is no explanation for my recent slide into depression, but a feeling of aloneness I seem to get when I do not have a man featured somewhere in my mind. The yearnings of my body pale when compared to that of my heart; hungry from mere weeks of unloving a man that wronged me.

When I walk down the streets of my Uni I see guys and girls holding hands and laughing together, or just laughing. I find I miss those days when we used to laugh together. The holding hands in the dark, because he was too shy for PDA and perhaps I was a little shy too. Right now he is miles away in another state and I do not have to see him. I wonder what I would do when I actually see him.

Cilia called me a sucker for love when she caught me staring fixedly at a couple. My mother asked how I was faring, and who I had replaced Chike with and I told her I am in no mood for a relationship now. She shook her head at me, that woman knows me too well.

***

Dear Diary,

Image source: Unsplash

It’s been a month since we broke up and I don’t know. I met Chike at the council meeting and we greeted each other like civilized people and faced our official duties. He was sitting right behind me! I could feel his presence but somehow it didn’t make me want to jump into his arms like I would have yearned to do before we separated.

Sitting there, it felt like there was just any guy behind me and I was quite surprised at the turn of events. Yes, seeing him made my heart jump a little but I had expected a thunderstorm and maybe some fire and brimstone. My reaction or the lack thereof made me question my former feelings for him and reminded me of what he said that night before I walked away from him.

“Is it so easy to turn it off?” He asked

“Turn what off?”

“The feelings, you loved me just a moment ago,” he said.

I did not answer him because I had no answer to the question except that he had pushed me to the wall and I couldn’t keep saying that again and again for fear that it would get old and die. Leaving me in that unsavory relationship.

Sometimes I forget the things he made me feel and stupidly yearn for our love. Especially when I see him walking towards me, holding my hand in an effort to convince me to return to him.

Yet somehow I seem like the villain, our friends ask my why I broke up with him. They do not believe it is his fault or perhaps they just think my side of the story will be more juicy for their gossipy palates.

***

Dear Diary,

I have made up my mind to move on. There’s nothing here for me anymore. Thoughts of Chike have grown stale and dangerous. Any moment now I will be running back to him for the want of company. I forbid myself to do that, only a dog returns back to his vomit and I am not a dog. I thought it would be easy for me to cope without him but it is hard.

When I think of a man I think of Chike, and it is exactly that reasoning I want to change. Oh! I thought I was stronger than this, yet my heart betrays me. They say hell hath no fury compared to a woman scorned but I didn’t expect my fury to putter out this fast. Lord help me, save me from going back to what continually hurt me. Bring me out of sickness and the swallowing of bitter pills and the smiling. All the smiling without actual happiness.

***

Dear Diary,

Image source: Unsplash

I met someone today. A handsome someone. A nice mannered, carefree and full of fun someone. The spontaneity of the two of us together is such that I began to miss him 10 minutes after we parted. I have never missed anyone after the first meeting. As I climb the stairs to my room I wonder at the absurdity of my current feelings.

I can’t just meet a guy and develop an instant crush on him, I am beginning to doubt my intellect. Who knows if he is a playboy, a thief or a serial killer? Why do I lose all care in my world when I step into his? I think briefly of Chike and discover thoughts of him migrating to the back of my mind.

I must not tell a lie, I relish this sweet forgetting him and this new remembered ache of excitement and the pulse of my heart falling in love at first sight. Gosh, he is handsome.

***

Dear Diary,

We met again today, his name is Gabriel like the Angel. I would have told him, “you do look like an angel” the minute it came to mind but every woman knows nothing good comes out from helping a man puff up his shoulders. I am sure he knows he is good looking. All good looking people know how desirable they are, I do after all.

We talked about everything and nothing and intelligent stuff. He is pleased with me, told me that he found in me a best friend he could have a good gist with. He touched my hand and I felt no aversion to his touch. Our fingers grazed each other and I became convinced I was falling in love with him. I realized I was being stupid again but I did not care.

A heartbreak had just rocked my world, I knew I was playing with fire but I couldn’t stop myself. My heart was proclaiming that it belonged with Gabriel and I didn’t want to deny it again. I was prepared to jump right into a relationship with him, tired of all the skepticism which had not profited me the last time. I had wasted one year of my life getting to know Chike only to break up with him after realizing I didn’t know him at all.

***

Dear Diary,

It’s been three weeks since I met Gabriel and tonight he asked me to be his girlfriend. I thought about it for a moment. Yes, I like him very much. Yes, sex with him was good. Yes, he seems like a good man(emphasis on seemed. After Chike I am not vouching for any man ever). I told him yes and we were happy together.

I woke up feeling terrible today, runny nose and a general air of being ill. I took some pain meds and had a hot bath. I am working on a new project now, it promises to be exciting and to take a lot of my time. It will not be easy juggling it and school because exams are fast approaching but I have to try.

***

Dear Diary,

I just missed my period. It was supposed to come in the 1st of this month. Today is the fifth day and I haven’t seen anything, yet I keep having these mild cramps in my lower belly. I went to the chemist and was given malaria drugs and pain relievers. I am scared out of my mind. The possibility that I might be pregnant is eating me deeply.

I cannot comprehend being in a state where I would no longer possess complete monopoly of my body. Scratch that, if I am pregnant my life will go downhill fast from here on out. I’m scared, I fear the outcome of the pregnancy test results.

Dear Diary,

Image Source: Unsplash

I am pregnant. The two lines on the test strip glare pink and devastating. I collapsed on the sink when I saw it. I realized those lines defined my life now. I felt my body for another presence and found none. How long would it take before it began to show? How long for my shame to be brought out to the world?

***

Dear Diary,

Image Source: Unsplash

I want to release myself and this baby. I recognize that no one would understand my stance. Everyone would certainly think me an evil person, a murderer and a killer of the worst sort. Yet all I want is freedom. These days I feel my body’s change and a hand seizes on my throat and takes my happiness with it.

There’s no manual in this world on “how to suffer through your pain alone” yet I am suffering by myself for fear, great fear of telling anyone and becoming an irresponsible, a proposed murderer. I do not want people to see me and utter ugh in disgust nor do I want people to huddle together and talk about me in pitying tones with light laughter dancing and bubbling around their bellies.

I do not want to be anyone’s sad story, anyone’s moral lesson and means of admonishment. I am just a girl. Let me be a girl please. Am I just a girl now?

***

Dear Diary,

I am considering my options and counting the days. How do I let this baby go that it would be gentle for both of us? I do not relish going to expose my body in the hospital. I dread the feel of iron forceps inside me and the entire process of scraping out my baby. I am overthinking. I overthink everything these days and I grow tired. My friends are concerned about my health. They say I look a bit ill and tired.

I have grown very beautiful and pretty. I believe I am the prettiest mommy alive. I have named my baby Bella because I am sure she is a girl. I plead with her to forgive me most of the time. Is it difficult to hear I love my baby? Sometimes I cup my belly and fantasize.

Then I drag my hand away and begin to hate this judging world again. The major reason why I cannot keep my baby is society and It breaks my heart everytime. I walk around with a broken heart and Gabriel notices. I tell him it is the stress, I tell him it is the work.

***

Dear Diary,

I have found a way out of my dilemma. Fast, easy and non-intrusive. Tonight Gabriel told me about how he wants his family to be. He painted such a pretty figure that I thought it mightn’t be so bad if we married someday. He went in to say that if par adventure I got pregnant he would take all responsibility for it. It was at the tip of my tongue to tell him but I didn’t. This baby wouldn’t be ruining his life afterall, it would be ruining mine.

***

Dear Diary,

I have completed the procedure. Since I am just four weeks along it was relatively simple. Just some cramping and a little blood, nothing to worry about. The great relief and happiness I feel now is mine to take. I have been faced by great odds and have come out triumphant.

I might stop writing here soon, now I have my life to look forward to again. I will fulfil my promise to Bella and live for her all the days of my life. I will be a strong mommy to her everyday because I know she is watching me and waiting for the day when we both can be together again.

***

Dear Diary,

My pregnancy symptoms have returned. The nausea and the water retention are back again. It didn’t happen, I still have my baby inside of me. What a strong gorgeous baby I carry. I am weirdly proud of her but I wonder why she is finding it hard to understand that she has to leave now. I am in my sixth week already and she is growing. I do not want her to be grown. I want her to still be blood and tissue when she leaves me.

Oh Bella, could you understand your mommy for a minute? I just want the best for the two of us. Oh Dairy, I am lost, fumbling at my wits end.

***

Dear Diary,

I am faced with option B and I am prepared to take it. Expensive as it is, I would gladly choose it over having to live a life I do not want and did not bargain for. I love Gabriel, he is so sweet on me. I cannot tell him.

***

Dear Diary,

It has started, I hurt all over. It is tasking to move. I am remembering my old self, the happy girl who delighted in, and glowed with happiness. I am relearning to be her as I lie here. It is a sweet kind of knowledge. I feel like I can reach out and touch her now. I feel like a flower, a red hibiscus. Beautiful and fragile.

I and Bella are going to color the world red tonight. I am saying goodbye, it is bittersweet to know that soon I will stop existing and start thriving again.

***

Dear Diary,

I am sorry. I lost the baby.