Tommy was never particularly a fan of love. In his opinion, love was a very unnecessary emotion. “A bloody waste of feelings”- he was fond of saying.
One would have thought that he came to this conclusion by reason of a broken heart or unrequited love. Might be worthy to point out that it was nothing of the sort. He just had never had the pleasure of falling for anyone and did not seem bothered by it.
However, one Sunday afternoon for some reasons, he felt the overwhelming presence of loneliness encompass his entire house. It was just half past two and the sun was very much out in all its heated glory, but his house felt dark and cold.
It was so quiet; he could hear his heartbeat. It felt like the fixtures and fittings in the living room where he was seated were mocking him. He had never felt this alone before.
“Would I be alone forever?” he thought to himself. He found himself wondering whether his inability to comprehend and feel love would mean a sad, lonely, dark life for him.
His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the chime of his phone.
It was Theresa. She had sent a message to check up on him and confirm that their date was still on the next day.
This was going to be their fifth date.
He smiled sheepishly as he read her message. Like magic, the cold and dark feeling had dissipated. Warm and fussy was what he was now feeling
Wait a minute, he thought. “I like Theresa”.
“I really like her”.
As he was about to respond to her message, she sent pictures of herself with the caption “Miss me?”. He smiled even more.
Even though they had only met two months ago, it seemed like they had known each other much longer.
“Guy, you no too well”, he thought to himself. Particularly because he was wondering why he just had that weird epiphany about loneliness considering he had a girl in his life who he was getting really warm & fussy for.
He shook his head at his absurdity and responded to her message:
“With all my heart. I can’t wait to see you.”
He was at her house by 5pm the next day with a pot of daffodils. The dinner was at hers, per her request. When he got into her house, the first thing he noticed was how cold and detached the ambience was; very similar to what he felt the previous day.
He would rather have had the dinner at one of the newly opened restaurants, but she had insisted that it was her dating ritual that the fifth date had to be at hers. According to her, if she liked someone enough to have gone on four dates with him, it was only right that she hosted him to the fifth at hers. He never really got the science behind it, but he was happy for any opportunity to spend time with her. So, he went with it.
Admittedly, he had noticed that there was something rather off about Thresa. Chief amongst them being the fact that she was not particularly a “sharer”. She barely revealed anything about herself.
It did bother him that after four dates, numerous telephone conversations, as well as text message exchanges, the few things he knew about her were her name, the fact that she was new to the city, and that she was in-between jobs. The one time he had tried to pry a little further he was met with an unusually cold stare and he knew to drop the subject immediately.
Dinner was over and they were snuggling on the couch watching a movie. Her head was gently nestled in the crook of his shoulder and his arms were wrapped around her. He intermittently planted kisses on her head- he had fallen face flat for her.
Her phone rang and she excused herself to answer it. He strained to catch bits of the conversation, he needed to be sure he had no competitor, but he could barely hear a thing and opted to focus on the movie instead.
Soon enough, she returned with a fresh glass of wine and smiled sheepishly as she watched him take a sip.
Next thing he knew he was sprawled across the floor of a room he did not recognize. His hands and feet were firmly tied and his head wouldn’t stop ringing. He tried to speak but no sound came out.
A man walked in, looked at him and muttered “this would do just fine”.
- Written by Oluwatelemi Ola-James
- Instagram: @scribbles.by.havilah
