📷 Adrian McDonald Photography
If he thought he looked dapper the night before, then he was dashing that Saturday morning at the church. It was a typical wedding with all the fanfare. For most of the workers, it was the first time they heard Papa’s name in full –“Patricia Adele Perpetua Atim”. The priest had said it all out fully during the vows to ask her if she did.
She said “I do” and so did Simon; and they became Mr. and Mrs. Simon Obalim.
Later at the reception, when everybody was bidding everybody else goodbye, Simon excused himself from Papa for a minute to look for his Uncle. He found him in the parking lot, and he thought he might faint if he did not hug him. He trembled under the weight of his anxiety and his demons. It started with the tearing in his eyes before he gave himself to full on bawling. The hug was so tight he wished it could numb the sharpness of his piercing conscience.
“What if I hit her, Uncle? What if I ever lose control and I hit her?”
Well, everybody agreed that he had hit the jackpot with his wife-to-be, and he knew it too. Her name was Papa and she never grew up. Papa had been born to her parents in their older years as they neared retirement- about the same time they got their lives together. You might say she grew up in the bosom of their enjoyment.
She was utterly spoiled like children raised by rich old people tend to be –but in a good way; and while she had the tendency to be childish, emotional, impetuous and extremely demanding, her charm lay in the ease with which she could be quickly placated. She neither harbored nor induced in others any such feelings as envy or fear. She tended to be painfully naïve sometimes, but she had an army of people willing to fight for her; the people for whom she radiated a perpetual light and those who she infected with her playfulness, kindness and grace.
Everybody cried at her wedding, especially the workers at her parents’ house. The cook in particular could not be consoled, because Papa had tutored all her three children during her holidays and according to her, they now read and wrote English “perfectly”. The eldest of these had just completed his senior four. Of course they would miss her, but they found solace in the man she married. They were hopeful that Papa would be happy. Unlike her spoiled and pampered self, Simon Obalim was ordinary, pragmatic and simple. His approach to life, they all agreed, was exactly what was needed to balance out the flawed parts of Papa’s gem-like virtues. So they loved him.
Everybody agreed she had chosen well. He would be a perfect fit in case she ever needed to buy some rare vegetable, cookware or other strange contraption she saw off the internet like she often did. Also if she threw a jolly tantrum like she was prone to do, he would tear through her irrational thoughts with his pragmatic outlook to life. For example, if she complained that she was fat, he would pick a tape measure and say, “Look, your waist measured such and such centimeters before” Then he would pass the tape measure around her waist before continuing, “Now it is this centimeters. You know why? Because there is a whole two kilograms of baby in your waist. Darling, you are pregnant.”
The night before the wedding as he tried on his suit, Simon stood in front of the mirror and looked at himself as if for the first time. He observed the sharp lines the razor had cut at the boundary between the hair on his head and his measured forehead. He smiled and turned his head to the side for a look from another angle –the one where he could see the artistic fade of the trim descend from the top of his head to behind his ears. He smiled despite himself. He was not given to these extremes of being fine-looking but he was pleased with what he saw. Perhaps he would keep this up even after the wedding.
His Uncle who had been standing there quietly with him in the room the entire time moved over to him from behind and placed his two large hands on his shoulders -the way Uncles who have been a father to you from the time your parents died, do. Or at least like it is portrayed in the movies.
“You’re a good man, Simon. “You will make a good husband and father,” his Uncle said.
There was silence. They had had this conversation before.
“But my demons, Uncle. What will I do with them?”
His Uncle squeezed and patted his shoulders reassuringly. He spoke to him while they both looked in the mirror in front of them.
“First of all, they are neither ‘demons’ nor ‘yours’ Every person suffers some form of affliction. We all have them- these so-called demons. Secondly, this is 7 years later, Simon. You were in therapy for 3 years, and this is 4 years since therapy. For 7 years, you have steered clear of any romantic relationship and worked towards becoming this emotionally healthy and strong young man that you are. You have done well by yourself. You have done well by her. You deserve what you have got.”
He paused, and without intention, it created effect.
“Do not mistake the shadows of your past for demons. Those died. You healed, my son. You will be a good husband for Papa. I can vouch for that, and what I need you to do is to believe it for yourself. To believe it for Papa.”
Now at the parking lot, he was frantic when he asked again, “What if I hit her?”
His Uncle pressed his large hands onto both his shoulders and reminded him that while a lot of people resign themselves to their fate, he had created his own life by his better choices. And that while his creation was not perfect, it was beautiful nonetheless.
“You will not hit her. You will not lose control of anything, because there is nothing to lose control of that you have not worked on hard enough to have it lose its control over you.”
