The Lying House

I remember the day I first saw him. I ran away. Not too far, just enough to avoid feeling too shy. It was almost as if the closeness of him made my shyness overflow like rainwater in a tank. I wanted to cry like the sky, because I’ve never felt this wanted in a while. But there’s danger in being vulnerable, in our world.

Being ill shows you the colour of a person's heart. It was another day after work and he was gone again. He would be on top of his skateboard with the wheels rolling against the tarmac of a park nearby, but I stayed tucked inside the house where the walls would not tell me the things that would break my heart.

And for a while I was grateful.

The bed in my mothers apartment knows my secrets. He would message attentively, because the love and desire was only budding pink. It grew into a cherry blossom tree and it widened and continued to grow, almost in line with my Afro hair.

I wondered if he liked the woman that I was.

There were chips of paint under my nails as I clawed at the wall, in the house we lived in together. It was another overblown argument, and I wondered where I went wrong. Our communication used to be so effortless, he would listen and apologise when he was wrong. But they were words typed with lying fingers.

I was the woman that he hated. Just like the men on YouTube. They led an army of lies, that every man who was afraid, drank like cold milk. I was a nag, even before I was considered a babbling child. Before I started to morph into the woman they all spoke about.

There was a lot he did not know.

I’ve never felt passion the way I did, against the wall outside my mothers apartment. He held my hands when I could barely walk. There was a parking lot outside the apartment, circular in the way it was carved. So we walked inside of it, hand in hand. It was like a movie but we were slipping away in quick sand.

*

We got married and then we separated after some time.

My bags were being packed for me, as the tears welled up. They were waiting for a moment when it wouldn’t be like this. When I would be loved and not just become the discarded wife. The tears wanted to go back where they were formed.

But the clothes kept on piling in, and I knew it was time to give him what he wanted.

He was sitting next to me in a taxi. His head facing his side of the window, and it felt like pain was driving the vehicle. I wanted him to look at me, hold my hand and tell me that this was only temporary. Right there, in front of the taxi driver.

That we just needed time to… think.

But I was back home in that apartment where we met. My old self peeled herself off the bed I was once in. And she hugged me so tightly, but her love wasn’t the one I wanted.

*

After my life unraveled and my mom threw me out.

There was a man training a group of people. I guess they needed exercise and I needed something to pass the time. They kept running up and down the path that led to the barred house that I stood outside of, I looked beyond them, then I saw someone coming.

He came running through the woods. Up a hill that threatened to render him breathless. I was thrown out once again, but by a group of alcoholics. They barred the house and then they left the other way.

We hadn’t seen each other for months, and my hormones were raging. But my heart watered it down after the second first kiss. Then I remembered, you’re the discarded wife and you will always be the second and the third.

I peeled my lips away from his, and he was surprised but I was numb.

‘Did you?’ He asked.

‘There were temptations, but no.’ I said.

‘Do you want anything, we… we could go to that place again, and you could pick anything you want.’

‘Buying your way, again?’

‘I missed you, I know I messed up.’

‘Did you?’

‘Did I, what ?’

*

We were back again in his mothers home. And I saw the kitchen I once cooked in. Meals I used to make for him from scratch, pulled back and locked itself in the kitchen. I could see the door with its light brown wood. A hanging of all types of seasonings behind it.

The glass in the door was carved with patterns on it.

His mother drew herself into me and my heart slammed against my back. I was wondering if she could be my mother again. Even if I was not quite the same.

Yes this was for the Second First Time Challenge.

A/ N: There are elements of this that are true. And elements that are purely fiction. Parts that were exaggerated for your reading and enjoyment. Thank you for stopping by. Please do leave me your comments and your hearts, if you did enjoy this. Thank you so much for being here and for reading 🤗♥️🙏🏽