WHEN LOVE WAS NOT ENOUGH.

 She wondered if she was ready to give up all she had laboured for all these years. Her heart needed release but her mind told her no! She had more reasons to stay than to leave but the one compelling reason to leave was so she could live. For what really was a life less lived if not full of woes and regrets?

"Life is a tale. Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" as said by Shakespeare made so much meaning to her as she stared. She had never really known the meaning till this fateful day.

She was more confused than anyone could imagine. There was no remedy in sight but her heart urged her to keep faith against all odds and so she did!

She loved her children. She loved their father but was in love with another. She was sure of her husband's love for her. He had proved it in the over 25 years they had lived together. Their three children were grown and had fled the nest. There was an echoing emptiness in their home which had found expression in her empty heart. She yearned for that heady euphoric rush of a new love she had shared with him at the early stages of their life. She wanted to look at him through untainted eyes and see her prince charming with the smile that melted her heart and made her want into rush into his arms. Oh how she yearned for the naughty texts they shared when the day was ebbing to prepare their mood for eventful nights spent exploring each other. She missed their endless romps in bed when it seemed like their kisses were an aphrodisiac and their strength would never wane.

But as she looked in the mirror, the crow's feet that encircled her eyes and the wrinkles that creased her brow made mockery of her desires. She raised tired eyes to look at him and what she saw was a tired old man with half his remaining hair combed in a very poor attempt to disguise the bald patch. She saw the dandy love of her life trying too hard to remain a boy with his veined knees sticking out through his ripped jeans. It was hilarious that a man in his late 50s was trying to keep up with the ripped jeans trend even her last son considered too juvenile. He cut a pathetic figure as she looked at his shirt with many undone buttons exposing his hitherto luxuriant mat of silky hair gone grey and scraggly. She sensed a discontent in him and knew that she would never attract him the way she used to. His rheumy eyes didn't see her again as it was fixed on the bottom shaking teenage girls younger than his last child. Love didn't live in his heart for her anymore and it killed her to think she was no longer his 'omoge'.

Her reminisces seemed to help her decide. She had stayed too long wishing he would look at her with impassioned eyes again. She had done all she could to get his attention all to no avail. She had registered at a gym, joined a food club, scrubbed her body with honey and brown sugar. She kept her hair as fashionable as possible without going overboard as her age demanded and wore beautiful dresses that hugged her still lithe frame. She was still a stately woman at over 50 but alas his eyes would never rest on her again in that barely concealed lustful gaze.

And so when the young man in his mid thirties made a pass at her, her initial shock at his effrontery gave way to grudging awe at his assured confidence. He was cocky and seemed to know what he wanted. He wasn't scared of her age, or her graying hair. He said he was attracted to her varicose veins and wanted to kiss her wrinkled brows. He said he didn't care that she had nursed a daughter his age and it didn't matter that she was rich. He threw the key of his G-Wagon before her to prove that he could pay his bills and didn't care what her bank balance was. She saw in his eyes that barely concealed urge to strip her naked and make sweet love to her and her panic gave way to want.

And so that evening, as she sat and watched her dandy old husband spruce and douse himself in strong expensive perfume in preparation for hunting young nubile flesh, she knew she was gone never to return. Immediately he mumbled one sorry excuse of needing to attend a meeting and left, she in turn got up, picked up her purse, took one last long look at the home she had known for over 25 years and drove away into the night. He was waiting for her at his gate and she walked into his strong arms and her new home and knew that at last she was where she belonged.

Photo credit: Yusroh Akinwunmi

Music credit: YouTube

 Akwani Jane
May 19th 2016