CHAPTER SEVEN

The next academic session of the Yankee University commenced after the holidays. Numbers of students returned to the campus and began to prepare for studies, filling the dormitories with the clatter of keys and faculties with murmur of conversation. Vivian went back to the campus. She could not get in touch with Charles, who had been posted by the federal government on National Youth Services corps in a well reputable library stocked with advance English language textbooks.

However, since Charles was away from home, she was beginning to feel uncomfortable since he departed. She felt uneasy all the time, because she saw nobody to discuss issues with. Loneliness became a prime thing in her life. These days, she lived a monastic life filled with loneliness and horrifying woes. A life cut off from everything except an ephemeral relationship by some of her departmental colleagues because Charles was never coming home. She could not stop worrying about herself. Sometimes the pain of his absence made her to go starving that she begun to thin-down. She said that Charles had pandered to lust; and lust is one of the seven deadly sins, which could create alibi of disunity and divorce in marital home. “Maybe he had been deceived by some of the Hollywood strippers” – she imagined.

She blamed women who strip their clothes off for men. Any woman that does that is a whore, because she didn’t had to take off her clothes for men or sleep with them for money. She confirmed that she would not do that, but it would be better for her to marry the second time. Charles had written to her two consecutive times, enquiring about her condition of health. He explained to her, how good he felt with the station where he was posted, in those letters.

In spite of that, he consoled her, so that she might not feel his absence much. Upon all these, Vivian eagerly expected to see Charles face to face. Charles had promised her in some of his impromptu letters that he would soon come home before the expiration of Yankee University’s vacation but did not fulfill his sordid promise since the session had already begun. She felt his absence still, and thought it had been years ago they saw themselves last.

Really, she had longed to see him since he departed but she had suspected that the bloom and regale of suburb life had influenced and confused him to the extent of forgetting home. All the day long, she would be embittered about why Charles would abandon her so soon and stayed away in the township with many other girlfriends that passed out from the university-who were posted together with him by the central government of Yale Republic. She had been thinking about that a lot, wondering why he hides his contact address from her. She could only conclude that her assumption for his ex-communication was undoubted fact. She suspected that he had company of girls. Otherwise, he might have come home to see her wellbeing, her state of health. What rattled her was the letters he had forwarded had no residential addresses. She read those letters and felt her heart lurch when she saw no addresses.

While on campus she presumed that Charles would one of those days visit her and brighten her situation, in which his long absence had kept her into. Since she had seen that his absence was inevitable, she resumed her old ways, in which she was moving with Charles when he was on campus; and led bad life with her friends whose lives were entirely spent on parties and discotheque. During their courtship Charles introduced her into such life. She prowled from party to party and party lives became part of her. She found in them an inexplicable pleasure, which added solace to her conflicts that came due to the absence of her groom. She read one time in a book that ‘a woman that lives in pleasure while the husband is living is dead’.

She dreamt one night like a moron and wept bitterly on the bosom of Charles who had been a distant partner. When she woke that night, she found out that Charles wasn’t in her bed; she flushed reasons to limbo what prompted him to behave in the way he had chosen. She imagined how his love had faded too soon. The expectation of the family they planned to start had never happened. That was just another thing she held against him and this affected her miserably. She was used to feeling alone when she hadn’t acquainted with Charles, but his silent departure to Rano state left her feeling even more alone than usual. She was embarrassed at his idea of going away. Of course, she had been always nice to him. Everything within her went into amazement, for no man had she ever believed to love and marry until Charles, and she had no idea that he would lock her into excommunication. She wanted his fullest attention on the building love within her, wanted him to focus on nothing but the marital vow they vowed to each other at the beginning.

For the mean time, she viewed at the effects of his attitude toward her, which appeared surprisingly cruel. However, she was already regretting the reason why she married such a person like Charles, whose love was temporal. She wondered what her friends might think or say if they would hear the story of her association with Charles, which had been a situation of lonely life and disappointment. Charles didn’t show up his dubious character in the beginning. She added with perplexity that people who knew her would criticize her at the back for making incompatible boast about Charles’ façade of nobility and large financial status, which she bragged about during the period of his courtship. She had known Charles for only six months but she had ample opportunity to observe him. There was nothing about him that made her uneasy except that she was alone like a lone wolf.

The thing that upsets Vivian most about this was the lack of information on his whereabouts in the state of his posting by the federal government. He seemed to be stonewalling; he did not want to take the responsibility for telling her anything firm. Even her friends who were posted together with him, whom she saw return constantly, hemmed and hawed and refused to tell her the exact location of Charles. Of course, they did not know. She understood that none of them could know for sure.

Meanwhile, one mistake which Charles made was that he did not submit his residential address, neither did he submit the address of his office nor disclose his postal address to her, during his journey to Rano State, in some of his letters. Those letters which he wrote to her without postal addresses or his residential addresses opened suspicion for her against him. This in no doubt created despair to her. She was of the idea that there must be a tacit reason for him not to disclose his addresses to her. She said, “Men who commit sin intentionally always hide their identities.”

She further questioned herself out of endless resentment if Charles truly meant his word when he vowed that he loved her, and assured her that she measured to his wish. It wasn’t that she didn’t love Charles. To be more precise, she loved the Charles she had married. The Charles she loved had become a remote stranger. For him she felt nothing except a sense of duty over his none caring and evil manifestations. But, how much did she owe to a man who had nearly destroyed her life, who had abused her marital status and betrayed her before other women. It made her realize just how distorted her whole marriage was. She used to cling to the belief that had been good before he got in the way pleasing to him.

For Charles’ negligence, she suspected that he must have been affected by a new passion from one of those roving women of the town, or that he was now un-governable to have ended up in the laps of one of those street women, and had betrayed the vows that he testified before thousands of witnesses during their wedding. She suspected that all the humorous petting and pampering words of Charles during their courtship were mere deception. She swore a thousand times like a pagan that all the flattery words of Charles over her beauty must have been a mockery. She said that Charles married her and turned her life into an object of mockery and criticisms before neighbours. She did not get anything tangible out of the marriage many months ago. Instead of finding a normal life for herself, she perched on distant partner, while he abused her and treated her like shit beneath his feet. When he could not even care about her, she was just ridiculously loyal. He was not the man anyone can fall in love with anymore, and nobody can stay in love for long with someone who does not care about him or her. Having observed all these unbearable attitudes from Charles, she restrained her annoyance within herself.

While all these reasons were going to-and-fro inside her, she had made up her mind to divorce him and get married to another man, who would love to her wish. Someone who would acknowledge and bear on his shoulder the consequences of a loved wife, who would share the battle of warfare of love with his mate and whose character would be most admirable and wouldn’t neglect his mate. She counted her fingers many times and confirmed mathematically that five of her girlfriends had been divorce victims. Consequently, she lived in twilight world, not fearing that if she ever walked away, Charles might one day return home and find himself abandoned and alone. He would be alone without her. Every time she thought of that, the notion to divorcing Charles became almost unbearable but she must walk away, and find another mate because, he could leave her so utterly alone, and was regardless of her welfare.

She had planned to divorce him for her own good, but she felt like a failure for being unable to fulfill her sordid vows to Charles, and she felt as guilty as if she had abandoned him.

She felt defiant, knowing that her parents wouldn’t accept her divorce plans. They had tried to prevent it entirely, but her decision had overridden their advices and admonishment. Though, the neglect of Charles to their marital status terrified her more than she could explain, she believed in forgiveness, and she was finding it impossible to forgive him for the things he was doing. How could she forgive someone who acted as if no one and nothing mattered? A person who had abandoned his wife and lived in Diaspora? How could she tell the euphoria of a newly married wife? How could she explain the jubilation of being together with a new hubby?

Vivian had waited in vain for the arrival of Charles in the school campus as he promised in his most recent letters and was fading up in her hopes for his arrival. One bright morning, students of the Yankee University staged a party with the title Senior Debating Society of Friends (SDSF). The party was given a nationwide publication in various magazines, newspapers like in Daily times, Statesman, and American Democrat; and was announced through many radio stations including CNN. The university invited all the pioneers of the school, Alma Maters and some important men who walked on sixth feet. Vivian being a staunch member of the society with recognized membership certificate, had the ovation to attend and she invited some of her friends to the party.

The day which started with a bright sunshine brought remarkable welcome to the guests into the campus ground set gregariously aside for the entertainment of the enormous train of guests of the Society of Friends. The wind blew mildly and the clouds moved swiftly across the sky. The birds of the air flew from one tree to another. The weather of the day was full of fine impact for joy as the throngs of people featured in the party with pleasantries and warm embrace. The noble men of peers attended in flashy cars, horses and buggies and helicopters.

Moment and upright, the party hosts introduced themselves to the guest. Later on, each person was able to come to the floor to attest his or her own ability, and make a brief speech concerning their trade, profession or profile and portfolio. Later, each person was allowed to converse with each other. During this conversation, Vivian came in contact with a very handsome young man whom she cherished his discussion. He was completely engrossed in conversation with her. He was half turned toward her, smiling at her, telling her, so far as he could gather, some stories about his regard toward her. As he spoke, he leaned closer and closer to her, seeming in his eagerness almost to impinge upon her, and she leaned as far as she could toward him, nodding politely, rather desperately, and looking at his round jovial face. She felt drawn to this man almost from the moment he started teasing her, sensing in him a truthful man. Anticipation filled her as John Hill responded to her words. At this moment, she did not particularly care whether she was disloyal to Charles, because it was him that ignited the fire that brought her disloyalty.

To prove the deep regard she had paid to all that he had said to her, she responded to his enquiries and interrogations with a delightful smile, which dragged her two lips apart. She in turn inquired into his background as he revealed his country’s accent, his professional acumen based on his big boast of private business, and high academic achievement. This lightened up her heart and she was enamoured of him. She did not want to lie to him. Her thought was totally down on marriage, because of Charles misbehaviours and she did not think she was mistaken if she marries this man. To avoid finding herself hog-tied to another careless man in a mutual conceived deception, she simply kept her relationship with Charles exposed. It was the only sensible way to do it. With John Hill, she thought she had found the ultimate way to have a safe relationship and a caring groom.

In the midst of all the frolic and wantonness, which this society has presently, an elegant dinner was served. The meal began with a plate of whitebait, fried very crisp in butter, and to go with it there was a moselle and fried chicken. She was watching John Hill. She would see him give a rapid furtive glance down on the table each time he dropped his head to take a mouthful of whitebait, and when every guest sat down to eat and drink, Vivian’s new lover placing himself next to her. She sat facing him and picked at the fried chicken on the table, as if she weren’t really hungry. Of course not! She wondered what John was going to say to her next. The only thing she knew with absolute certainty was that she hated Charles’ behaviour, and if John would be ready to accept second marriage, she would be obliged to accept him. Because for most of those months she lived with Charles, after wedding and honey moon, she was getting increasingly sick of his dishonesty and disregard. The delicate cheer and good wine soon banished all reserved; the conversation among the party train grew as lively as could be expected in a groovy party, and without taking too loose a turn these guests were highly moved by the music from the live music band.

Though this time, Vivian who was resting in the heart of John Hill had weighed and compared Charles with John. She immediately found out that John was more handsome than Charles in terms of competition; more valuable to control a woman’s problem. He had independent business and some projects planned for the future, which distinguished him from the score of other young men of his class. He was at the very top. A money man but Charles was only posted by the Federal Government on youth service, which she wasn’t certain if he would get a good job after his youth service, in the midst of the present gross statistics of unemployment data. He might be a hobo after his service. Although she understood that Charles father is a millionaire and Charles was yet. And since John had a big business that was going on successfully and a multi-millionaire, she made up her mind to abandon the former bond she had with Charles, and declared herself independent to espouse John if he spoke to her for marriage or for an intimate engagement.

It was true that nature had given such great blessing of wealth accumulation to John, but he did not show that he was in possession of a dollar. One other vital thing she liked about John’s manner was that he wasn’t pompous, and doesn’t puff-up; unlike others who would show braggingly on their biographies and résumé. To be precise, he attended Oxford University London. He was properly educated and you would not notice whether he was educated or not, because educated men were not always humble people. But he was humble. Time and again, she had found him knowing just what she was going to say. Not thought reading, but what they call intuition. Vivian had added that if John would give love for her love, which she gave to him at sight, and give unshaken promise of marriage, she would at any moment of time pack up her traps and divorce Charles and violet the vow she made in her epistles to him, and would break the bond that unified them together.

When the party had ended, people in the party hall began to leave to their different homes with joy in their faces, and with echo of noises of pleasure from men who were amazed with drink. John Hill himself was not quite satisfied with the brief conversation which was held between him and Vivian during the few minutes’ liberty of introductory remarks and self-explanations of one’s constitutions at the beginning of the party. Before the introductions that went between them, he was charmed by her incomparable beauty and her air of audacity. He had never in his life acquainted with such charming and beautiful girl. While Vivian tried to enter her limousine car to drive off from the party ground, a wolf whistle rattled into her ears. Vivian who was about to move stopped judiciously at a halt. John Hill came forward to her, and demanded explanations.

“Since I met you in the morning when the party tossed up to introduction remarks by personalities, there was something in me that loved you. My heart had been meditating and battling on how to approach you with this demand, for your approval. I don’t know why you wear that wedding ring. Have you been married and divorced by any rough man? I asked because many women were divorced today by unfaithful hubbies”.

Vivian smiled with joy and appreciated the demand of this young and handsome man, which ignited happiness that paraded the joyful area in her heart. She knew he had begun to embark upon very special topic. The signification of her heart desire. All she could do was to stare at John and wonder why he was bringing her wedding ring up. It did not have anything to do with him, and it was as if there was something scandalous or newsworthy about her situation or maybe some people who poke nose in people’s affairs might have criticized her at the back. She didn’t know whether to get into her car and leave or simply tell him to stuff his head where the sun didn’t shine. But, whether or not she divorced Charles or Charles done the same is irrelevant.

Nearly a full minutes passed by while she fought for control. Her breathing wanted to come in ragged gasps, and her hands clenched so tightly that she could fell her nails cutting her palms. But what she couldn’t do was just start her car and leave. She couldn’t let the mere mention of divorce and wedding ring frustrates or wins this man’s love demand or any hearsay or cynical criticisms spoil their new acquaintance.

John was embarrassed why she couldn’t speak to him for a moment but as soon as he saw her up in answer to his query, he felt a fled joy coming back to his heart. He had no idea on earth that her ex-hubby was, but he was indeed appreciating to know about her wishes towards him, biography and all about her. She told him in the party that she was a student, so he figured her for a waitress; maybe a college student, although she seemed older than that, to judge by her conversation. It was interesting to speculate, but he had never asked personal questions on love gesture or had she asked any about him during the introductory remark. It was as if the two of them wanted to remain ultimately anonymous on love issue, even as they shared some of their deepest feelings.

“The same magnetism of love for you charmed my heart when I saw you first,” started Vivian. “And if I refuse to answer your questions that deserve explanations, it would seem I disliked your requirements. And it would seem the act of ignoring a strange love from a strange lover… but I would feel so good to lean against you and feel your strength. So good to feel your arms close around me and know that for these few moments I am safe. I almost feel as if I could stay here with you forever. But I suspect the love of men in a party; it starts in good and ends in fiasco.”

“Vivian,” John began. “A strange love from a strange lover should not be instantly rejected and neither would the request of the one who offered the love be rushed at. Love is a delicate thing, meant to be nurtured, and man-woman attractions can ruin it. But all of me want your love as much as I have ever wanted anything significant. I can see the glimmer of love in your eyes – which no foe of love can hinder.”

“Our first time to acquaint with each other, had been a time nature provided for us to meet each other, but so far as you have loved me at the first sight, and hadn’t gone wide to obtain information on my native characters, I would render to you my love, I can’t exchange your love with any stranger who might be charmed by my excellent beauty. But one thing I must impress upon your agreement: that you would marry me, and that had been my desire which if we marry, would bring us too close to make good relationship and add more veto to the wishes of our love possessions.” Vivian admitted.

“I am interested in every request you have made. Your wish is my command. If it is love, I love you; if it is marriage, I will marry you, I had not given such promise to any other woman, because marriage without love is hellhole itself.”

Her heart began to pound in joy after John Hill admitted her request. She turned to look at him, trying to read his face, but it was love that registered. His love was looming, threatening to break free of the constraints she had put on it. The constraint was that he would refuse her demands, but there were no impassiveness on his face but a declaration of acceptance. Now, in spite of herself, she felt a smile lifting the corners of her mouth. Even John looked faintly amused. No man had spoken to her on cordial relationship since Charles departed to Rano State. And this had been a single opportunity she had to discuss intimately with a man whom she speculates would take what Charles rejected.

“Here, sir,” began Vivian. “According to your question so instantly laid down before me on the issue of wedding ring I wore, I guess it would help if I explain. I should not stop to inform you of my most risky condition: I would add, however that I got married to a man, a graduate few months ago, who left me and started roving and had abandoned me in loneliness. Ever his edition of flinching and ever the essay of his excommunication, I dwelt in maladies and upset became my food. No male companion who would soothe me in my distress. But at this point, I did not even have male friends on campus I could associate with. Charles had driven them away with his pretended jealous love and since his departure; I hadn’t made any effort to find new ones. Many men looked at me as small fry, second handed girl, married and dumped by a rough man, but what really bothered me, though, was how much I found myself caring. How much it hurts that he had suddenly put his distance between us; and how he set the limits on our relationship for a while, which the stories were floating around the campus now, among my colleagues that I was responsible for his departure, but my thoughts and hands were clean and pure like the martyred saint Stephen of the Bible.”

“According to the practical maxims of my life, I ought to brag of my birth, since I owe it to pure love without marriage life; but this I did know, that it was scarce to inherit a stronger love to that cause of men desiring to marry any kind of women that comes their way, and they would be eager to abandon her as soon as his love waxed cold. Whereby you wanted my love and marriage, I would avoid the conditions of your first matrimony and abide by the rules of your heart. Sometimes the man you think that loves you would disappoint you at the end and dislike you to the extreme. Because those we love aren’t those we put confidence upon.” John Hill accepted and expressed.

“Yes,” began Vivian. “And to say the truth, my liking for Charles was so extreme and excessive and it was distinguishing for my neighbour to deny that I love him. Those undergraduates especially in our faculty envied and emulated the good manifestations of our love. They always wanted to be in our shoes. Though I had loved him in his faults, my happiness, however, with him did not last long but found an urgent end from his impudent neglect over my personality and over his high interest on every little beautiful woman that comes across his eyes. All that glitters is not gold. I didn’t have to plan my life around Charles’ needs any longer, because Charles was never coming home to see my welfare. And no woman would trust a man who doesn’t care about her.”

“There are men who model their choice in marriage and divorce. They would espouse women, and quickly loose the first love which binds them together, and when months run into years, they hate the manners of the women who loved them with all their hearts. Frankly, what your ex-hubby refused to acknowledge is that you loved him so much, so you let him mistreat you in many ways. I found out that your marriage was a living hell without him around you, and I understood that your devotion to him seemed a hopeless cause. Maybe he had found another woman to love, because many men don’t stop at marrying one woman. I still believe that love is a tendency towards simplicity, which cannot be violated with any fuse. How could a woman exist without a man? Unhappiness is the food of a woman without a husband.” John Hill instructed.

“If there would be any solemn price offered for marriage, it would be pure love, purest love that would find its place in a marriage bloc. As soon as Charles left me in this state of mind, I began to feel very bitter over the severity of his separation and isolation. For this condition, my university’s contemporaries gave me the best advice to waive the memory of him out of my brain, least I could go mad, and their instructions calmed my agonies which his absence entangled me into. The overriding impression was that it was difficult for him to communicate me. My guess would be that he was wound up on the laps of one of those roving Hollywood women,” Vivian said bitterly.

Her voice was unnaturally polite. She remained standing beside and slightly behind John Hill, and there was something so unusual in her manner and the way she stood there, motionless and erect, that John found himself watching her with a sudden oppression. Her beautiful face had a frosty, determined look, the lips that look like parenthesis compressed, and rosy chin was out, and the hands were clasped together tight before her. She opened her eyes and looked at him, wondering if she sounded crazy, but John was nodding, and he had an arrested look, as if he had just thought of something…

“Yes, I would believe you; two can’t work together except they agreed on a bond of love. If the bond of love that joined them together fails, every other promise fails too. You did everything necessary you could for your ex hubby. You were loyal and under the aegis of sobriety. There was nothing else you could do for him. You devoted to the marital status. Few months of your life, to a hopeless cause: your man didn’t want to admit that nothing you ever did would make it better for him to understand your patience and waiting for him to return to you. But, whatever vexation you may have would certainly break down your health, and create dislike and incredible choice of giving your love to another man who would engage you for marriage,” John advised.

“Look John, I fear the sweet words of men to the new girls they found, but do not think that I could change my mind from the offer that you have made. Neither all women’s love reforms nor do all men’s love changes. Before Charles separation from me, I shunned the company of men friends in which there were no hopes coming from them. I rejected their offer for second marriage and indulged in egocentric solitude, and centered on some tender meditations on a man from anywhere with a strong promise of genuine love. But my intention to get a new husband increased my problems, and consumed me. I was yet worse when, yielding at length to the insupportable irritations of Charles distancing me, and his disdain to our marital status created for me a curtain so broad enough as black as a night, and constant meditation and how people looked at me as a small fry, and laughed at me with counterfeited glee.”

“Hey! Vivian, I cannot disappoint you; though men were prone to disappointment. Love is the key to marriage. I am expressing concern and assure you that I am sparing no effort in reciprocating to your passion. I will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you. I do not think that you would disappoint me too. If I content with your mutual love, it would bring us together and stop your constant longings for a new groom. Holding you close fills me with deepest sense of contentment, as if every unsatisfied yearning is suddenly fulfilled,” John Hill said, looking into Vivian’s lustrous eyes.

“Sir, I will admit your request so far, only on the ground that you will love me forever. It would be a type of Agape love that wouldn’t mind any problem of life, because love covers all wrongs and conquers every enemy,” Vivian solicited.

“I will give credit to your request. The more we love each other, the better we cement our union. Don’t you mind about your ex-husband? Things weren’t adding up between you and him. It appeared to me that he had ignored you and you were furious with him. I feel so good to have a promising person like you, someone with whom I can be so comfortable. Your palm is warm against mine, and I squeeze your fingers, wanting you to know how much I appreciated your touch. Here is my business card that contains my head office, residential and postal code, you can look for me with it,” John Hill submitted and ordered.

“Thank you sir”, Vivian thanked John as she extended her right hand and received the identity card printed in black and white. She was more confident now. She immediately entered her limousine car and was ready to drive off; and John Hill too, entered his car and drove off in a furious pace.

While he was about to enter his car, Vivian ventured to look, observed his figure, which was well formed and that of a very handsome gentleman with a pleasant face, with a good height, not a dwarf, about thirty five years and older than Charles; dressed in a suit of plain clothes with a sweet perfume tempest, and with a large diamond ring on one of his left fingers. The lustier of which reflected in her eyes as he waved his hand while biding her bye, and which raised her notion of his significance. In a short sentence, he might pass for what would be called a commonly black man, with air of distinction, natural to his birthright, and background: wealthy, finding profit in the development of private business than the low income of the government payroll. Yes, he had the money, more than enough, and providence has given big money in his possession.

When Vivian drove into her car park, in her apartment, on campus that night, she was unable to sleep. She felt the tears rolling her eyelashes on remembering Charles abandoning her. She wiped the tears that bedewed her face with a scarlet handkerchief as she drew a shaky breath. It would be so easy, she realized to love this man, named John Hill. Too easy! Besides, it was her fault for not having known that something wasn’t quite right about her from the very start, when she starts dating John Hill while under Charles. She had found the biography of John exciting, and the strange notion she took to divorce Charles was unimaginative. It had never occurred to her that there were harbingers of something worse: the defaultation of marital law.

She knew that they had met in university, and things had been good enough for both of them that a little wildness in one another had seemed like part of all the rest. When Charles was on campus, his suspicions of students making love with her which she was innocent of had always been unjustifiable, and his sudden interest in beautiful students had seemed like a lark. When his desires on girls increased after they married, even when his acts began to worsen, she had been able to explain it away as a vagary.

But the figure of John Hill became every moment vision that passed before her eyes. She questioned her soul in a rival grief: did John Hill mean what he said when he said that he would give credit to her request? Does he like to marry a girl who had married few months ago to a man – who had eloped from the girl that loved him? She didn’t think that she would divorce Charles at the beginning of their engagement, and now she was in such an emotional turmoil that she couldn’t even know what to do. At this point, she couldn’t be sure what catastrophe was worse: the rejection of her parents warning to marry John Hill or the rupture in her relationship with Charles. Either one seemed equally dire.

For these risky thoughts, she had imagined what her father and mother in-law would think if she eloped and got married to another man. She meditated wonderingly what her parents too would do after the cause of her second marriage. She imagined where youths of the society whom she associated with would classify her attitude. What would Charles do if he comes by the painful news that she espoused another man more handsome and wealthy than he? She knew that she was facing a fresh problem; she had decided to risk it. What she was really looking for is a permanent hubby, not a rover. She wanted a new home to live in and settle down. She needed where she would be free from fear, worry and loneliness. She also needed where it would be easy for her to relax, be herself and make friends and communicate her groom all the time.

The morning sun had started peeping through the parapet of her apartment when she brought out the business card which John Hill gave to her, the sun rays illuminated on the italic characters printed in black and white, and she read more of its contents. Finally, she made up her mind to elope and flinch to John Hill, and decided to marry him after some months of her patience reserved to see Charles return from the township became abortive. She said that she would explain to him in a letter the danger which his long absence had caged her into.

She could not even ignore the yearnings that John Hill was awakening in her: an invocation of new marital bloc. Marriage to Charles had eventually become celibate, and since she had passed the decision to divorce him, she had been living like a widow or a nun in a nunnery. She had, in fact, begun to believe that all her needs and desires from Charles had vanished somehow. Now she knew otherwise and wasn’t at all sure that she was glad of it.

This was one complication she hadn’t imagined would come up in their marital bloc. It had never occurred to her that she might actually give herself away to another man while Charles would turn out to be her enemy. Now she discovered that she had twin pangs of guilt, one for Charles and one for John Hill. In different ways, she was cheating on them both. She owed it to Charles to be faithful – although it was getting harder and harder to remember why she had made that vow to herself – and she owed it to John Hill to be completely truthful to him whilst under Charles. She felt guilty about having a proposal to have a new mate and because she had talked herself into believing it was okay since John Hill was just unmarried man. Because she had fooled herself into believing that Charles distancing her somehow kept her safe and pristine from her second marital agreement. She believed that since he had been away from the State, she wouldn’t live like a nun in a nunnery any longer, but would seek for a man who would soothe her distresses; one who would be a go-between in her qualms.

All of a sudden she remembered her chats and kisses with John in the party, and how it had made her feel. Guilt immediately surged in waves, casting upon the memory of Charles on the shores of her mind. And she knew she should say no to Hill. And she could accept or reject any intimate interaction from any man outside her hubby. But she opened the channel of communication with John Hill. This was getting dangerous. Dangerous not on her plan but dangerous to Charles. The closer she grew to John in real life, the more likely it was that their marital relationship would spill out into the community, and now that they had taken the step of marrying, that would be very dangerous to her first vow. But deep inside, she knew she was taking a dangerous step down a dark road. Divorcing Charles would create hatred, caricature, criticisms from friends known and unknown and both from parents and in-laws. She concluded that if she married John Hill, it would end her loneliness, and living with a careless hubby.