CHAPTER 31
Alero heard the door to her room swing open and click shut. She heard the tread of determined footsteps that marched right up to her bed. She felt the dip of the mattress as the intruder took a seat uninvited. Then there was the silence of waiting. There was the itch of a determined stare of someone who would not be ignored and the scent of lilies.
The sound of the door opening again had Alero whipping her head around, all effort at ignoring her mother’s intrusion forgotten. Today, she was apparently bringing out the big guns. Her dad walked into her room, a heartwarming mix of caution and concern on his care-worn face.
“Your mum is concerned that we might need to get you to a therapist.” He said with a smile.
Alero could not help the answering chuckle. Her father so rarely allowed his humour through that it was always a pleasant offering when he did let it loose.
She shook her head to refute her need of a therapist. The mattress dipped again as he took a seat beside her mum on the bed.
“Are you coming out of hibernation yet?” he asked.
A smile touched Alero’s lips again. She opened her mouth to respond and found she had to clear her throat and that her voice had cracked from the disuse of the last few days.
“Were you sacked from work?” her mother asked.
“No!” Alero answered sharply. “I just took a few days off.”
“All week?” her mother asked in surprise. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Dear.” Her dad’s tone was cautionary. “Is it the Adediran chap that has you so down?” he asked Alero.
Tears stung Alero’s eyes unbidden. She swiped at them with unwarranted venom. She thought she was all cried out.
Numb.
That was how she had felt all week. She had gotten in from the hospital that day and cried like she had never cried before in all her life. She had felt gutted by what she had seen at the hospital.
Pity.
The other girl, Emily Olaoye, daughter of legal luminary Bolanre Olaoye and a lawyer herself, an up and coming star in the profession. She fit the bill better.
Alero ruthlessly suppressed the sob that threatened to burst through. She could not understand what had happened. Had she, Emily, and Banjo been seeing each other secretly? What had happened?
She made a shrugging motion as if doing so would drop the heaviness that weighed on her heart.
“Some of it.” Alero responded. “I just needed a break.”
“She has been moping since before the accident happened.” Her mother interjected as if to buttress to her father that it could not be Banjo at the root of her moroseness.
“Have you been to see him then?” her father continued.
Alero sighed as she shook her head. “I tried to but…I guess it wasn’t necessary in the end.” Her face became so forlorn that both her parents looked at each other in some alarm and then turned back to her.
“How isn’t it necessary to visit a hurting friend?” her father asked. “I thought that you are both friends at the very least.”
“I’m not sure what it was we were doing.” Alero answered in a voice full of tragedy.
“Haba! How can you say you are not sure what you were doing?” her mother asked. “You were dating him were you not?” she queried.
“Dear, are you trying to help or do you want to make matters worse?” Doctor Bekere asked his wife who huffed and drew her mouth into a tight line.
“Did you two have a disagreement?” her father asked gently.
Alero sighed. “It’s not as straight forward as that.” She said and then gave a summary of what had gone on from the night of the accident to when she had driven out of the hospital grounds.
“So you saw his family with his ex-girlfriend and you just drove off like that?” her mother asked incredulously. Her father gave her a quelling glare and turned back to Alero.
“Did you at least try to speak to any of them?” he asked.
A prickle of unease had begun to climb along Alero’s skin even as she shook her head shamefacedly.
Doctor Bekere sighed. “That was too hastily done of you.” He rebuked gently.
“Hah! Alero! You are always hot! Your body is always hot! You are too quick to…” her mother had started in on a rant.
“Ochuko! Please go! Leave me and my daughter to talk!” Edosio Bekere barked.
“Have I said anything untrue? She always has been the child to react first and think later. To jump into things with both legs at the same time. No caution what so ever. No…”
“Ochuko! Leave!” her father nearly yelled. Her mother left in affront and Alero would have thought her totally insensitive if she had not seen the sheen of tears in her mother’s eyes as she slammed the door behind her.
“Funny.” Her father mused. “You get the very traits she berates you for from her.” he chuckled. “Your mother worries. Sometimes much more than she should.” He patted Alero’s hand soothingly, apologizing for his wife’s outburst. Alero could have told him it was not necessary. This was her mother they were talking of. The woman had been a rock and bulwark to her children too many times, much more than they could ever count. An occasional lapse could never erase that.
“What do you feel for that boy?” her father asked his voice more brisk, as if he were now coming to the point.
Alero thought for a short moment and then lifted her face to her father. “I love him.” she said grudgingly. “I wish I didn’t. It might have been so much easier if I didn’t.”
“Why? Is he such a distasteful character?”
“No!” Alero refuted, surprised at her father’s deduction.
“Then why do you say it would be easier if you didn’t love him? Why is loving him so difficult?”
“It’s not. That’s…He…I don’t think he…” Alero floundered as she tried to find the word to explain what she was beginning to fear was folly on her part.
Her father patted her hand again. “Start at the beginning.” He advised. And so she did. Beginning from the very first time she had met him at his coming home/graduation party to her feelings of misgiving after she had dreamed her dream. Her father listened carefully with nary a reaction till her tale was complete. Even then, he remained silent a few minutes more until Alero began to fidget.
He drew in a deep breath and turned to look at her more fully.
“It never did run smooth, the path of love.” He shook his head and took a peek at her. “You did say that you love him didn’t you?” he asked in clarification.
“Very much.” Alero agreed. “I did think. I have done nothing else but think all week. I love him. I wonder if God would have allowed this love to grow in my heart if it were wrong. I have searched and searched my heart and…it’s him. It’s not anything that he or his family represents. It’s not the money or the fame or the connections or any of those things. They are a part of him. He’ll always be an Adeniran. He grew up with all the privileges that coming from such a family could bring but he is still human. He is still Banjo.” She turned an impassioned look on her dad. “Am I even making sense at all?”
“More sense than you’ve made since I walked into this room today.” Her father smiled at her. Then his face got serious again. “Do you think he’ll forgive you?”
Alero sighed. “I…what if he was toying with me dad? What if he decided Emily is a better fit for him?”
“I know I only met the young man briefly and have only seen him irregularly, but I think I have a knack for reading people.” Her father smiled depreciatingly. “If he said he loves you, he doesn’t strike me as the sort of man to say such things carelessly.” Her father concluded.
“So you think I was too hasty?”
“I don’t think you were too hasty, I know you were! You did not show me my ‘Alero’ spirit at all.” He teased in mock exasperation. “It does not mean that you had no cause to be alarmed. Obviously you had some underlying misgivings that you needed to resolve in your own mind, but you could have kept your
cool and heard it from him definitively first. But if you want my honest opinion, I think you’ve wronged that boy gravely. I hope that you both can work it out but if not,” He drew his daughter against him in the warmest of hugs, “you pull up your big girl trousers and move on. No matter what, we’ll all be here for you.” He assured. Alero sniffled against his chest as the enormity of what she could possibly have done hit her.
Her father patted her back and murmured soothingly to her. The embrace went on for a while as each of them resolved to take certain actions in their mind.