Written by Mofoluwake Omololu.
Neither of them brought up the whole Rio drama, both hoping that the case was closed on that day in the office. Lara was satisfied she had her husband’s forgiveness, just as he had hers, and that was all that mattered in the whole wide world.
Uncle Dede returned and, believing all was well, prepared to leave the scene since he had played his own role. He was oblivious of everything that had been going on in the house, they seemed fine enough to him and their usually frequent arguing had disappeared. It was strange but the ambience in the house was more welcoming than ever and that was what he wanted for them, to live in peace. He didn’t even ask about the baby matter or what compromise they had come to agree on. They seemed happy enough with whatever it was and he didn’t want to jinx it.
Lara noticed her uncle smiled more since their return, of course he had no idea what had transpired between herself and Kola while they had been abroad. He also seemed to not have the faintest hint that she was with child, she couldn’t blame him though, seeing as he had never experienced it up front or personal. She yearned to tell a neutral party what was transpiring in her heart and every time she was with her uncle she was tempted to say something but her uncle wasn’t neutral. He was her uncle, and even if he seemed cool headed and reasonable, even modern, she was sure the Rio affair wouldn’t seat well with him at all.
They did everything in stride, not referring to Rio, and it worked.
Then Sunday came, again, and they went to church. The service was very inspirational. It talked about being angry but not sinning, and not going to bed holding a grudge. The preacher spoke particularly to married couples telling them that it affected them the most, they should learn to forgive and accept each other as flawed in turn trying to strengthen each other.
Lara was inspired, the message had to have been preached for her personally because she did harbour a grudge she couldn’t quite explain or place a finger on against her husband. She decided to do away with the grudge and make deliberate efforts to heal and build the unaddressed broken bridges between herself and her husband. She prayed as led by the preacher and by the end of church she was joyously bubbly inside.
The pastor’s wife, with whom she had made peace after their last incident, was the first person to meet Lara. Since the Rio vacation she and Kola hadn’t been in church, so she played catch up with the pastor’s wife who seemed excited to see her. Kola was in a meeting of the men’s fellowship and the pastor’s wife didn’t seem in a hurry to leave so Lara happily told the tellable details of the trip.
The men were trooping out already so the women rounded off their gisting, the pastor’s wife, as she walked away, jokingly said, “I hope you people did not indulge in the sweet brews and deadly rums that they have there?”
Lara stood up quickly and went after the pastor’s wife, “excuse me, ma?!”
She, the pastor’s wife, turned to find Lara up in her face with a scathing look, she was shocked and tried explaining herself, “I’m sorry dear, I was referring to the brew you talked about, I was only making a joke”.
Lara knew she had overstepped, quickly apologized and hurried to the car where Kola waited for her.
At the sight of her Kola braced himself for impact. “What did you say, and to who?!” she barked at him, faking a smile for the church members loitering about and waving at them as they drove out.
“What are you talking about, Lara? What went wrong just now? You were happy after service now?” he pleaded with his wife.
“Don’t patronize me please, Kola, I was just talking with the pastor’s wife and she made suggestive comments as to the effects of “the brew”on us. She claimed it was a joke, but that comment was too spot on to be a joke. So tell me, Kola, who have you spoken to about us? Because I’m very sure I won’t be recounting that story to anyone in my tenth life.”
Kola, very confused and bitter, tried and failed to convince his lashing wife that he didn’t have the guts to recount such a story, especially not to the church members, talk less of the church pastor or his wife.
Lara wouldn’t have any of what he was saying and Kola finally knew how she was feeling about the Rio affair.