It’s impossible to forget how I fell in love with her. The
first time I saw her handwriting, I knew, I just somehow knew. To say it was
the most beautiful handwriting I had ever seen wouldn’t do it any justice at
all. My sister was studying form Emma’s notes that she had prepared 2 years ago
when Emma was doing the same course. So it wasn’t something that needed to be
written with any dexterity at all. She wasn’t making an effort to write well,
that’s how she always wrote, so consistent, elegant & beautiful.
I knew I had to get to know her, I just had to. It was
unlike a passing craze or something that just sparks up one day and then fades
away the next. But as things in my life go, this girl was something else, for one she
was way beyond my league, famous, well known and well loved by just about
everyone. It was difficult to not love her, the bundle of joy that she was. I
kept my distance because I knew I was setting up myself for heartbreak. I
really know how to pick them though, it was practically impossible to get a
line on her.
We lived close by and
we belong to the same parish, so seeing her wasn’t all that difficult. It was
so long ago that the memory feels like a dream, the rush of adrenaline, when
your knees turn to rubber & your breath seems to leave you, conveniently,
at just the right moment. It always took me by surprise, that anyone could make me feel like that, like a breath of fresh air, after your nostrils have been blocked the entire day, and it didn't get better with time. I felt like a teenager all over again, little did I
know, all of the insecurities & naivety would also follow. I knew what it
was and but I didn’t know what to do about it. I knew I wanted to talk to her. It had been more than half a decade and I knew
that I was defiantly over my first true love, my first love. I finally decided
that it was time, whether I would find love again was yet to be determined.
Things started getting complicated when my mama started
taking about her at home because Emma, my mama & my sister were in some
Church group together. Then, the unthinkable happens I actually got a chance to
meet her. My sister was running an errand for the church group and she had to
cart 10 kgs of onion & potatoes somewhere, I don’t even remember where I was
supposed to drop it off. She calls me to pick up the groceries and I’m on my
way. Not even in my wildest dreams did I imagine that she would be there. I was
standing there in my shorts and a raggedy old T-shirt, cause who dresses up to
go buy groceries? She was there, in all her beauty with her hair tied up in a
neat little bun, standing there in her peculiar graceful nonchalance. My brain
turns to mush, my heart is doing somersaults & I’m trying so hard not to
freak out. I take the bag and all I want to do is get as far away as possible
before I lose all sense of myself, but my sister being the woman that she is
introduces me to her friend and to Emma. I shake her friends hand and I wave at
Emma. I didn’t trust my hand to stay still while my entire body was shaking
like a leaf in a windstorm. I leave quietly and I was just smiling to myself like a mad man,
all I remember about the rest of that day was how happy I was. I was just so
happy.
