MEETING AGAIN
Amaka prayed silently within her that Tochi should not be seen anywhere close. But like a confessor in Legend of the Seeker, Bayo got grasp of everything.
"This is really you, Amaka" he murmured, as though trying to test reality in a life laboratory.
"What are you doing in this place? And at this time of the day?"
As he kept muttering those questions, the receptionist interrupted, "Sir" not knowing that he had just stepped into a crucial war between someone's past and present, "you said you want room 10, right? I have the keys now."
That didn't sink in with Bayo as he didn't hear him because his eyes were focused on Amaka without a blink.
She swallowed hard, with her voice barely stable. "Please. I need to be in my room now."
He looked at her closely. Not intrusively, but in a firm and quiet way he used to dictate danger before stepping into hostile zones as a soldier. His gaze was that of a protector, not a judge in court.
But Amaka wasn't prepared for all these. Not tonight.
Not when her ghosts of six years and the frightening terror of the previous night tangled inside her uncontrollably.
"I said I'm okay and fine," Amaka whispered.
"That's not true," Bayo replied, equally soft.
Her chest tightened.
"Bayo, please don't start."
His expression flickered again, this time somewhere between concern for safety and the instinctive anger of a man seeing a woman he once loved standing in unclear and obvious pain / trauma.
He took a little and subtle step toward her, but she flinched.
It was quite a tiny and barely visible
But he saw it clearly. And that broke something sharp and silent inside him.
His voice dropped a bit lower as he observed the bruises on Amaka.
"Who did this to you?"
Amaka looked at him abruptly and shook her head. "Who did what? Please don't ask me that."
"Amaka", Bayo called.
"Not now," she muttered, fighting for a better composure. "Please."
Bayo reflex pressed his lips together and nodded slowly, showing understanding of boundaries even when concerned enough to exceed them. He straightened himself with shoulders taut beneath his heavily rain-soaked shirt and made a little step forward.
Amaka wondered and at the same time disliked how safe and unperturbed he still looked. Always seeming grounded, calm and annoyingly confident.
Bayo has the type of calmness that wasn't silence rather it has touches of steadiness like that of a calm warrior.
His composure and articulations are one of a kind. The kind of calm she had once melted into without fear of been consumed.
She forcefully tore her gaze away, while signing the lodge registry with shaking and trembling fingers.
"Chioma Oke," she lied again.
After handing over the form back, Bayo's eyes flicked down. This time, he didn't comment or even react.
But his eyebrow lifted a bit so slightly at the name.
"Follow me," the receptionist said, fetching a bunch of wooden keys labeled RM 5.
Amaka headed toward the dimly hallway with the receptionist, while forcing her legs to cooperate despite the ache in her soles. As she walked, the floorboards creaked beneath her wet footsteps but she maintained her steez.
Behind her, she felt Bayo's lingering gazes. Though not possessively and judgmentally.
Rather Just watching like a lion watches its cubs.
in such a keen way as someone watching a wounded bird trying to walk on a broken wing.
Back into the hallway. Amaka's stomach turned vigorously as if her nerves are struggling to be released.
Her room, 5 is located towards the end of the lodge hallway, with a slightly chipped door having paint peelings at its corners.
The receptionist quietly opened the door as they walked in.
A single energy bulb flickered.
A small bed fixed in the corner, covered with thin grey sheets.
A wooden side table and chair.
A dusty and static ceiling fan.
A mirrored dresser with cracks running through its center due to over usage.
A temporal hiding place, though Imperfect.
But safe for now. She thought
"Do you need anything?" the receptionist asked.
Amaka shook her head. "No. Thank you."
"Okay ma." He retreated as he closed the door.
The small room was filled with silence.
For the first time since her purposed escape, Amaka exhaled fully.
Though her body is full of hurts. And her chest stung with breaths of fear.
She sat at the edge of the bed as her body collapsed due to high / intense exhaustion mixed with the pains she had intentionally ignored all through the previous night.
Her fingers shook violently while she peeled wet hairs from her face. She looked down at her mud-stained nightgown. Her skin vibrated with cold as the wounds on her wrist profusely throbbed.
She shakes uncontrollably as if the cold was coming for a revenge on her.
But her face, that very part of her she had learned to guard remained calm. Composed and beautiful even in her brokenness.
Presently, she radiated a kind of beauty that came from someone who had endured too much without been broken.
She squeezed her arms around her body.
"Oh!! God," she whispered, "please help me, I feel I should just disappear"
Thunder lightning flashed through the cracked room window, painting the room with a different color as the air consistently smelled like a mix of wet wood and dust.
Her eyes burned with compounded fatigue, yet she fought sleep like a plague.
A resting woman was a vulnerable woman. She thought
And she couldn't afford to be found vulnerable. Not again.
A sudden wave of nausea washed over her as she closed her eyes firmly and tightly.
Followed by a memory stab on her.
Tochi's face with his wild eyes, slurred voice, and shaky hands before he threw the wineglass.
She jolted quickly upright, with breath slicing her chest.
"No," she whispered. "Not again. Not today."
She stood up quickly, pacing the small room as if motion could silence or extinguish the ugly memories.
Her hand drifted to the envelope, the only thing she had risked everything to have possession of. She placed it carefully and quietly on the table.
Her mother's handwriting glared back as the ache behind her ribs increased.
Before she could sit again. A soft knock on the door.
Three slow, measured and consistent taps.
Her heart clenched painfully.
"Chioma?"
Bayo's voice.
She closed her eyes, swallowing hard splits. Fear and uncertainties collided profusely inside her.
She walked close to the door but didn't open it.
"Yes?" Her voice was steady and calm, remarkably steady for someone trembling like a leaf not quite long.
"Are you warm enough? Or do you need something?"
She waited a bit. Then replied, "No problem, I'm fine."
"That is not the question I asked you."
Her lips whimpered.
Even after six years of silence between them, Bayo still had his way of perforating lies and slicing through pretenses.
Silence eschewed.
Then he spoke again.
"You know I won't push If you don't want to open the door. But you really look like someone who hasn't slept in quite a number of days. Though am not trying to intrude. I just want to know and be sure you're safe."
Her throat tightened unannounced as she flashed back the last time she spoke with Bayo six years ago.
How she married Tochi, thinking she chose security over love while ditching a very important part of her without an explanation. Yet he is ever caring and concerned as he has been.
The guilt of her actions hit her like a sprawling wave.
"Bayo," she whispered. "Please stop. I can't do this right now."
This followed with another pause.
Then softly and calmy. "I got some hot water from the kitchen. And a towel. I'll leave them by the door, okay?" Bayo replied.
Her breath rhythm increased as such kindness cracked something in her.
"O-okay, thank You" she said quietly.
He didn't move for a second.
But she heard the soft thud of items placed on the floor.
His voice dropped, gentler and calm.
"If you need anything knock on my door. Room 10."
Amaka kept mute as Bayo's footsteps retreated down the hall.
Silence returned the room.
She placed her forehead against the door, with her trembling hands as it rested on the door woods. Her eyes burned with unshed tears rushing to gush. As she pondered
Why him? Why here? Why now?
Her body slowly slid down the door until she sat on the floor allowing few tears.
Then she wiped it, jaw clenching with renewed resolve to face the battles ahead. Then, she opened the door and collected the towel with hot water flask, while whispering quietly "thank you once again" even though he was gone.
On the other side of the lodge, precisely in room 10.
Bayo sank onto the edge of his bed, with his elbows on his knees, and hands clasped tightly together.
His mind raced and reiterated something it hadn't done in years.
Having trained his thoughts to obey him. To stay silent until it is summoned.
To avoid dragging him toward nightmares from his military experiences or memories best buried and forgotten.
But tonight is different, his mind was in chaos.
What is Amaka doing here?
So soaked.
Bruised.
And shaking in fear.
Her eyes, God, her eyes still carried that quiet charm, that softness wrapped in steel yet hot. Even when drenched in fear, she moved with a calm that belonged to a woman who had learned to survive storms quietly.
He remembered that calm he loved many years ago.
Though he had also feared it, once because it depicts that she carried burdens she never wants to share.
He exhaled deeply as he pressed his thumb and forefingers on the bridge between his nostrils.
Should I just ignore this and not get involved? He thought.
Having left Abuja to fade into anonymity, leaving his past behind.
He was only passing through this town on his way to a three-week consulting job up north.
Not asking for anything from anybody. No expectation of complications or ghosts.
Coincidentally, the greatest mirage of his past had just resurfaced his way and staring at him with bruises, terrific, vulnerable and even with a different name and identity.
Clenching his teeth firmly he pondered. What might be the problem with Amaka? Who wants to hurt her? And who is she running away from?
These thoughts tightened his chest enveloping it with a protective boil within which he believed was once buried long ago. But his instincts triggered firmly the more, just as one who is trained to assess danger and expect threat very promptly and quickly.
He needed to know what is going on. And why she was alone at 2 a.m. in a remote and strange riverside lodge looking like someone who escaped through fire for her life.
He stood abruptly with his hands hovering near his room door.
But he abruptly forced it away. "No," he muttered. "I need to give her space."
It takes more effort and strategy than emotions before stepping into battle.