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Umar started texting me again immediately after I got off the plane in Montreal. I told him it was going to be a long week, because I had a lot on my desk, and was currently heading for a shoot at the Notre-Dame Basilica. He said he was going to be there for me all the way, and I told him the only place he could be was his apartment, all the way in Abuja—thousands of miles away from me. He replied with two laughing emojis and said he couldn't wait for me to return to Nigeria. To his aching arms.
⚫️The Aftermath⚫️
I go into the semi-tight locker room and change from my previous attire into my current one. This show will be my last in Montreal, and I am quite nervous because I want it to go smoothly. Fuzz comes in, sweating lightly, telling me I have been called to perform. I nod and rush over my outfit and make-up, dabbing the beauty blender unevenly over my foundation-filled face. Occasionally, I take a few glances at my phone, looking at the plethora of notifications that keep popping in. A few from Kathryn and Jarvis, some from the hotel management, one from Ekene, but most from Umar.
Umar.
He doesn’t stop texting me even after I tell him I can’t afford to do a video call until I am off my schedule. See, Umar is the type of man who wants to be updated on everything. Where I am, who I am with, and what I am doing. No. Not because he wants to make sure I am not cheating, according to him, he does it because he loves me. He likes to ensure that I am not in a difficult situation, or about to leave him for my job, or anything. But let’s be for real, 59 missed calls in less than two hours is just… psychotic. Pure lunacy.
I arrive on the stage in a Hakama three-piece suit, goth make-up, and boots high enough to make me appear taller than I originally am, knowing that I still haven’t replied to Umar’s recent messages. I look at the crowd, careful enough not to stare into my audience’s eyes, and eloquently deliver my speech before getting in front of the piano. My fingers are a bit jittery. It’s a large crowd of approximately 6,000 people from different races across the world—the largest I have ever done abroad. I focus on the words and music symbols in front of me, but to give it my best, I think of the first time I met Umar and let the cool sensation from the experience cascade through me. However, my mental pictures spiral into other images of us that I do not appreciate, so I try again. Visualizing the gentle way he caressed my skin. Like he was scared I'd break into a million pieces if he touched the wrong spot.
My thoughts drift again, and I slowly begin to think about the time he cried in my arms, eyes swollen from an outpour of heart-wrenching pain caused by the sudden death of his parents. It was the first and honest tears I have ever seen gush from a man’s eyes. From Umar's eyes. I think about his face, drained of will and excitement, and how he barely said a word as I struggled to get ice cream past his lips. I think about how the death of his parents broke a huge part of him that I’ve realised I won't be able to piece back in a thousand years. I think about when he was just my baby. Just my Umar with soft curls and kind eyes. I strain the keys harder as emotions and memories flood me, blurring my sight and exacerbating my anxiety.
Umar and I were close lovers from college. Wild, tender, and everything else in between, until his parents died in a car crash in May 2016. When he got over his grief, he got over the Umar that I once knew. It began to manifest when we were done with varsity. First, he told me to stop working because he was capable of working hard enough to provide for both of us. I laughed. I loved Umar, but I was never trading my dreams of becoming a songwriter and a pianist in exchange for his love. In exchange for something I thought was momentary. He became agitated at the realization that I wouldn't budge and accused me of never loving him in the first place. It was a very silly accusation, to be honest. The second was when he tried to check my phone, and I objected. I wasn’t doing anything sneaky, but he just wasn’t going to go through my personal stuff like that. No one was entitled to me in such a manner.
Sike! For peace to reign, I later gave in.
I do not want to dwell on the stormy section of our relationship, so I stretch my thumbs and pinky fingers over the instrument in front of me. I let the music and image of Umar's wet, unclad body in the shower envelope my mind, making my nipples firm beneath my grey shirt. I pin my feet to the ground and try to hold my breath, biting my lips to stop them from quivering, and my vagina from breathing. Umar's not physically present, but I imagine his lengthy fingers rubbing the soap narrowly all over my back like he used to. His lips wrestling against my ear as he struggles to stick his tongue in its entrance. He struggles because of the fine jewelry lined up on my helix, which I barely take off, not even to shower. After a short while of slowly rinsing the lather off my body, his fingers gently slide between my thighs as I part them to welcome him, moaning against his throat. His middle and ring fingers are curved up within me now, and the fluid between my legs is quite sticky, despite the running water. I press the keys with intensity, resisting the urge to moan aloud.
Suddenly, the scene where my Umar creates holes in walls with his fists and hauls the vanity at me interrupts my lustful thoughts. I can vividly see his inflamed eyes staring at me. I never thought he would be that violent again. The first time I saw him like that was when he slammed the table over breakfast one Wednesday morning. I thought it was because I told him I needed a break. I mean, losing your 'soul mate' can be really depressing, so I kind of understood. But he was too clingy. Umar… too clingy. I never thought I’d say something like that one day, but every time he had his bouts of grief, I suffered as well. It was like he wanted me to replace the hollowness in his heart that was caused by the accident. Like he wanted to prove to himself that he could love someone into living. Into staying.
In no time, the once placid air around Umar began to throttle even Jungle, our dog. He was always telling me what to do and how to do it. Told me never to leave him. Never to deceive him. Tried to restrict me from hanging out with my friends. Told me never to ghost him or else he’d hurt himself. That I was the felicity of his very existence. At first, the possessiveness felt like passion, but as time went on, I couldn’t afford to keep twisting myself into shapes that pleased only him. He was part of the reason I'd taken the gig in Montreal. Part of the reason I wanted to get as far away from him as possible. Part of the reason why I wanted to clear my desk, clear my head, and stop hating myself over the fact that the mere thought of him still made me pulsate.
The memory of the day Umar locked me in his apartment with a piano that he'd bought for me, so that I could stay at home and practice instead of going for my piano lessons, makes me jolt, and I nearly miss a key. I gasp silently and instinctively open my eyes, hoping no one noticed. Coincidentally, in the third row, the first person I lock eyes with is Umar. Sitting there in his usual calm demeanor, one he has when he’s up to some mischief. He’s dressed in a plain black suit and has that scary, familiar plastered smile stretched across the borders of his face. He looks cleanly shaven, and I look … frightened.
When my performance ends, he claps the loudest. Or so I think.
BY PRECIOUS NELSON ESATE
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