LOVE NOT

By Eric Kalunga

The clock on the table it read 10pm. She stared at it a moment longer as if by sheer will she could change the time.

How could he make her do this? How could he humiliate her like this? She felt rage rising inside her. It rose from her stomach, a burning wave of fury, that rose through her chest, scorching her heart and then settling on her head... overpowering everything else there.

But in the next second the anger was gone and what came in its place was hope and understanding.

He was going to come, any time now. Suddenly she was sure that she could hear the doors of the lift, at the end of the corridor outside, hissing open and then closing. She could even hear the soft chime that the lift made as it opened its doors.

But it was another false hope. No one came to the door knocking. In fact no one even so much as passed outside the door.

So hope was gone and its place came the fear this time. Something had gone wrong. He was on his way to see her at the hotel and has had a terrible accident. Right at this moment he is lying in a bed in a hospital, perhaps Muhimbili, breathing through tubes...
Oh My God...

And his wife, she was probably there too and their children. And here she was...

But this scenario suddenly left her head to make room for one even more terrifying. That he had simply decided to ignore her. He had left work but instead of driving here to the hotel he simply decided to go home to his wife.

Panic closed its fingers around her tummy and squeezed. She let out a small gasp and had to go back and sit on the bed.

She had switched off all the lights in the suite save for the one in the bathroom. This one spilled out through the open bathroom door and formed a pool of light right before the main door.
Joy, a lawyer with one of the biggest law firms in the city, lay back on the bed and closed her eyes, trying to decide what to do.

She should just leave and forget the whole thing. Yet as her her hands felt the soft sheets on the bed she couldn’t but imagine what would be in store for her if she waited and he came.
Joy, its been three hours... a voice spoke up inside her head. She looked at the clock again. 10.08 it read.

Only eight minutes had passed since she looked at it last but it seemed hours had elapsed.
No she would wait here, she decided. She would wait until he came because HE was coming. And when he did, when he knocked on the door, she was going to cooly open it.

He was going to reach to her and start apologising but she was going to brush him away like an annoying fly. She was going to enjoy the look of surprise and hurt on his face.

Then she was going to pick up her purse of the table, slowly walk to the door and walk out...
No wait....

She was going to walk to the door, open it and then pause. She will turn to look at him, smile and say: “Go back to your wife Mike, we are done.”

Then she is going to walk out and close the door on him and their relationship. It felt good thinking like that.

She looked at clock again, 10.09, it said.

So she was going to wait... but not because she was desperate and wanted to feel his arms around her and their warmth and...

Stop it...

She was going to wait because she wanted to let him know how disappointed she was with him and that she was ending the affair.

You could just call him... now...

That annoying voice again... no, she was not going to call him. that did not have the same power as saying the words to him face to face.

The thought that she was not calling him because she was afraid of what that might reveal bubbled to the surface of her mind. For a brief moment she thought of it: she pressing the numbers and pushing call, hearing the phone ring on the other hand, and ring... and then the abrupt silence as he rejects her call... because he simply doesn’t want to talk to her or see her night.

Suddenly the initial anger returned. She was a lawyer for goodness sake, prosecutors tremble when they face her in the courtroom, judges treat her with respect and powerful men in the country beg her to take their cases...

She should not have to go through this. Suddenly Justine Timberlake began singing Cry me a river. It was her phone. She frantically fished it out of her purse and blindly accepted the call before pressing the phone to her ear.

“WHERE ARE YOU?” she cried.

“Uh? I am at home dear, is the seminar over?” a confused male voice.
Then she understood and felt irritation creep over her, “No, why are you calling?”

“Well, the children are asleep and you said you would be back by 8. I was worried,” he said.
Now she was just mad. “No, just go to sleep Jonathan. I will be very late.”

“Well, ok dea_”

She cut him off. For a moment her thoughts were not on Mike but at her home on her children.

They were asleep. That was good. She will see them tomorrow morning. Martha would need....

At that moment the unmistakable chime of the lift floated through the air and reached her ears...

This time it was for real, someone was coming. Excitement built up inside her. The bastard was coming. She was going to give him a piece of her mind and then walk out of here.
Footsteps came to a stop outside her door and there was a knock. She walked over and opened it. He walked in and scooped her up in his arms.

His lips fell on hers and hungrily fed. She fed too. He led her towards the bed.

She was going to give him a piece of her mind... just as soon as this night was over. first she was going to let him...

Oh that felt so good.

“I love you,” she whispered.

He lifted up his head and smiled, “I love you too baby,” then the head went back down.
And there her thoughts ended as her body screamed with pleasure.

Tomorrow, she was going to end it all tomorrow.

END