Annette and Kwame...

Annette

The nurses were rude and hostile. But I expected that, welcomed it even. This was not supposed to be an enjoyable experience for me. The doctor walked in. As he stared at me I rationalised that I was imagining the expression of disgust on his face, the one that matched the look the nurses had given me earlier; the look that had raised Addie’s protective instincts and had her nearly cussing out the nurses. He started to explain the procedure to me, he said I was two months along and that meant the procedure should be simple though I would still require anaesthesia, I stared at his lips moving and fear gripped me. I couldn’t believe I was actually doing this. I wondered if I would die like those girls in the Ghanaian movies always did. I wondered if I would feel evil afterwards. I wished I would die on the table then at least I wouldn’t have to live with this choice.

I walked into the clinic reception. Taking halting steps, I couldn’t move faster if I wanted to. I saw Addie sitting in a corner and beside her, Kwame?  What was he doing here? They noticed me and walked over to me. “Is it over already? Wow that was fast. Why didn’t you wait for me to come get you” Addie peppered me with questions. 

Shaking my head I turned to Kwame and asked “what are you doing here?”

“You didn’t fool me in school, sweetie. I picked the tests from the bin you dumped them in. I followed you to Accra, and called Addie. I hoped to stop you before you did this, baby you didn’t have to do this, I love you and I would have loved the baby. I want to be with you. We would make it work, I’m sorry you had to...” 

“I didn’t do it, I couldn’t do it, I just couldn’t...” my voice broke as I started to cry 

“sshhhh its ok sweetie” he said gathering me into his arms “it’s ok. We will make it work, okay. I’m here for you.” I hugged him tight looking over his shoulder my gaze met Addie’s. 

She smiled at me with tears streaming down her face.  

Thoughts, regrets, worries rush through my brain. 

As she looks at me her smile is replaced with a puzzled expression. I smiled back tremulously. 

It was going to be okay. 

Somehow we would make it work, so what if the baby wasn’t Kwame’s. 

Annette and Adriana

Adriana

I sat in the car and waited for my best friend ever to walk out of her house. She went to school in a different city and I hadn’t really spent time with her since we started university. We still talked on the phone but it wasn’t the same. 

We’ve been friends since we were in diapers and have always been as thick as thieves. But lately it felt like we had drifted apart, with different priorities. She had a boyfriend now and new set of friends; basically a whole new life even I didn’t quite fit into so I wasn't sure how I'd explain it to her much less introduce her to it. But today it was going to be different; she had come all the way to Accra for my birthday! Initially she had said she couldn’t make it but she must have moved stuff round to make it possible, because out of the blue on Wednesday, she called to say I should clear my schedule on Saturday! She’d missed me as much as I missed her and with all that was going on in my life I really needed to talk to her. She walked out and skipped over to my car a wide smile on her face: a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes and seemed a bit strained at the edges. 

“Hey Addie, missed you like crazy, happy birthday” she exclaimed as she reached the driver’s side of the car. I got out and hugged her. “Looking good!” she continued holding my hand and turning me around “lost some weight, have you?” I stared at her and felt a sense of unease. I know this girl; she has been my best friend since I was three. She hadn’t come home because she had missed me but because she needed me and right now that was enough for me; and no I hadn't lost a pound .

“What’s up Ann?” I asked in a resigned tone, my voice peaking a bit at the end in anger. “Nothing, sweetie how are we spending today?” she said in a rush, walking to the passenger side of the car, I followed and grabbed her arm. “What’s wrong Ewurabena?” I asked in a calmer tone “You know you can tell me anything.” “Yea and I will, let’s just go somewhere else first.” She murmured glancing over her shoulder at the gate as if fearing that she would be overheard.

I took to her to Munchies. It had been our place since JSS and the waiters knew exactly what we’d order. She sat across from me and told me not only was she pregnant but she wanted me to go with her to get rid of the baby. My best friend, ‘Miss I’m keeping it till marriage’ wanted me to go with her, on my birthday to get an abortion. “Wow! I so didn’t see this coming. What happened to all your speeches about living with the consequences of our mistakes and all that crap you are always spouting when the issue of abortions and unwanted pregnancy came up?” I railed at her. 

“Will you go with me or not Addie; please I just need your company and support right now not your judgement.”  She said sorrowfully. I refused to be moved, she would not do this to me, and I would not allow her to. It was my freaking birthday and she wants me to help her end a life? 

“You said rape victims should have the baby if they got pregnant and give the baby up for adoption, and now you want to get rid of yours because it’s inconvenient! Because finally perfect Annette Ewurabena Afranie has made a mistake! And when you are in deep shit, again you come to me to help you clean it up for you.” “You think this is easy for me, you think sitting in front of you and telling you that I messed up is easy.” She said with tears streaming down her face. “You think deciding to throw away everything I believe in is easy. I have done a lot of things in the past year that I’m not proud of. But this takes the cake. But do I have the right to bring a baby into this world to suffer just so my conscience will be clear” “the baby won’t suffer, your mum...”  I tried to interrupt 

“my mum can barely make ends meet as is and she would be so disappointed in me. What about my little sister? I’m not even sure Kwame loves me, he says he would be there for me but who knows how long that would last?” “Well you should have thought of that before you had sex with him” I screamed, causing the other patrons in the cafe to turn and stare at us. 

“I made a big mistake, one time and this is the end result, you can either be the friend you claim to be and drive me to the hospital or you can walk out right now and I won’t hold it against you.” I stared at the tear stained face of my best friend of seventeen years and said “which hospital?”

To be continued ...

Kwame and Annette III

Annette

I woke up. It was morning I had no idea when tears had given way to sleep. My roommate was in bed. I wondered what time she had come back to the room last night. She was a bit off a slut; she probably hadn’t come back till dawn. “She’s the slut, a little ‘judgey’ for a pregnant lady, no?” my subconscious taunted me. I took a bath, grabbed the evidence from my locker and went off to confront my yellow livered boyfriend or rather to confess and stop him from spirally into a drunken depression.

I knocked on his door, got no reply so I banged until I heard a groggy “I’m coming” issued from the bowels of the room. The door opened. His roommate, Eric, peered at me through half closed lids. “Is Kwame up?” I asked. He stepped back, letting me into the room, my boyfriend’s bed was neatly laid, like no one had slept in it, but right beside Eric’s bed, lay a very familiar bra. “Well that solves the mystery of where slutty Ginny spent the night” I muttered, recognising it as my roommate’s. “Huh?” Eric asked, confused and still drowsy. “Just asking if you have any idea where Kwame is?” I asked quickly. “Err he didn’t come at all last night, I would know, I just went to bed like ... an hour ago” he said glancing at the clock hanging on the wall. I left him to return to bed, he needed the rest. I knew the workout my roommate could put a guy through. I had faked sleep through enough of her marathon sex sessions. What kind of God made girls like me pregnant, whilst girls like my roommate got away with only a frequently recurring UTI? “Well God didn’t make you pregnant, the boy you slept with did, and so you are not exactly innocent” my ever present conscience reminded me.

I tried calling his cell phone but the annoying voice kept telling me “The subscriber you are trying to reach is unavailable.  The phone is either switched off or out of coverage area.” I started to panic as I tried to reach him over and over again but got only the pre-recorded message. I went downstairs and saw a lone figure sitting in the middle of the hostel’s car park. I recognised Kwame’s red shirt. As I walked closer, he heard my footsteps and turned towards me. I saw his face, the anguish and confusion drawn on it, aging him dramatically, and I knew if I told him the truth it would only get worse. Nothing good would come of it. I had already abandoned my principles in so many other ways; I might as well do it one more time to spare him further pain. I could not do this to him, I loved him.

Kwame

I spent the night on the car park crouching on the ground; hunched over beside my car. The car I had bought with my own hard earned money. Money earned by working my fingers to the bone three summers in a row in England. The car I would probably have to sell to buy baby food and diapers. My dad would kill me. I would not be able to stand the look of disappointment on my mother’s face.

I slept off, driven by exhaustion and all the booze I had consumed. Woke up on the car park, wet from the morning dew and resolved to handle the situation like the man I had always wanted to be would. So I sat in the car park thinking about what to say to her, how to reassure her that I would be there for her. I heard footsteps, I looked up and saw her walking towards me; a look of determination on her face.

“Did you spend the night here?” she inquired softly in a voice tinged with concern. “Yea” I said, brushing aside her concern; I launched into the speech that had been brewing in my brain before I lost my nerve “I just want you to know that I’m sorry I wasn’t there for last night, my behaviour last night is not how I want to handle this...thing” “Thing!” she interjected incredulously, “No, no, not thing, err...situation. I’m going to be there for you. Whatever you decide, I will stand by you, and in fact I want to be there when you break it to your mum and sister, I love you and...” “I’m not pregnant” she blurted out.

“What!” I asked mouth gaping open like an idiot. “I am not pregnant” she repeated slowly, smiling slightly. “But saw you, heard you crying, you were upset!” I sputtered. “That was after the first test; got a false positive but the next two were negative.” “I will confirm at the hospital this weekend when I go home for Addie’s birthday, but I’m pretty sure it was just a scare so relax” she continued calmly as I stared at her stupefied. I felt relief course through me releasing me from my temporary shock-induced paralysis. I grabbed her and swung her round yelling out loud, all the time thinking “Yes! I don’t have to sell my car for diaper and baby food money!”

I put her down finally. She bent picked up a plastic bag “What’s that” I asked, “just trash” she replied with a quick smile. As we walked into the hostel hand in hand, she dropped the bag into the bin right by the staircase.

To be continued...

Kwame and Annette- II

Kwame

I sat on the stairs outside her room and took another swig from the half empty bottle of cheap gin I had bought on my way to the pharmacy. 

I couldn’t sit in that room and watch her do the tests, I couldn't  take the tension and uncertainty that would coagulate into despair as she took each test. Because I knew she was pregnant. 

When I walked into the pharmacy and got the test I knew this was not a scare, or a hoax for attention on her part. She was pregnant. 

The tests were going to be positive and my life was over.  She was so pro life, so adamant in her stance on the evils of abortion. I remembered her as she argued with righteous indignation when they had had that discussion in class “I mean you have already committed the sin of fornication, would you really compound it by killing the only innocent party in all this, the poor baby! It could grow up to be the person who would cure AIDS or bring world peace!” There was no way I could convince her to have an abortion. Plus I’d always promised myself I wouldn’t be one of those boys that coerced a girl into getting rid of an unwanted pregnancy. I would stand by her no matter what she chose.  But please let her choose an abortion I was not ready to be a father.

I heard the sound of weeping coming from her room and my worst fears crystallised.I dropped the now empty bottle of gin and crawled to her door. I sat down by the door listened to the sounds of her tears. Felt something wet on my cheeks and realised I was crying too. My life was over.

Then I noticed that the crying had ceased. I staggered up to the door and creaked it open. She was lying on her bed, her back to the door and curled up in the foetal position. I started to walk up to her then turned around.  I walked out of the room; continued walking till I reached the car park.  My drunken haze had disappeared. I had been scared sober by the realisation that I was going to be a father. I wished I could have stayed with her, comforted her but right then, at that moment she was the last person I wanted to see.

Annette & Kwame - Part 1

Kwame

“I’m pregnant”

I stared at her in shock, positive it was some kind of joke. “You are what?” I asked.  “I said I’m pregnant, or at least I think so”. I took a deep breath, “She’s not sure. It’s possible it nothing. she’s just late because of stress or whatever it is that affects  girls’ hormones” I thought to myself, my mind scrambling for answers, explanations, alternatives ... hope I guess.  “After all we always used a condom, ok maybe not always but I never come in her! Never!” but even as these thoughts ran through my mind I remembered that night, the night of the party, in the car, the hurried caresses, how intense everything had felt, finding my release in her softness, I couldn’t have pulled out if someone had put a gun to my head. But she said it was safe! Damn! God please don’t let my first born, the child who will probably ruin my life as I know it and chain me to a girl I don’t plan on even staying with after school, be the result of a drunken indulgence in the back seat of a friend’s car.

“We should find out for sure though” I told her. I really looked at her for the first time since she had uttered those life altering words and saw the panic in her eyes. She was just in first year, I had been her first; she had to be totally out of her element. “Do you want those home pregnancy tests or you...?” “Home pregnancy test” she interrupted me in a firm voice “Get three of them so we’ll be sure”. “Okay” I said then took her into my arms “I’m sure it’s just a scare”. I lifted her face and kissed her, fervently praying that my words were the truth and not just a drowning man’s attempts to clutch at straw.

Annette

I watched him race out of the room. He said he was going to get the tests but judging by the speed with which he exited the room, he thinks pregnancy is contagious. I was in shock, I had watched the movies and read the books, you know the ones where the innocent girl gets pregnant after her first sexual encounter. Yet, if I am pregnant it was not from my first encounter and I was far from innocent but I couldn’t be pregnant. I don’t deserve this, I took precautions every single time and the one time where Kwame got carried away I took a pill the next day without even telling him. This cannot be happening to me.  One mistake cannot ruin me, my life, forever. University was for finding yourself, first year for mistakes so why the hell should I pay the ultimate price.

He came back an hour later reeking of alcohol but he had the tests. I had spent the time he was away downing bottles of water so I got right to it. I went into the bathroom and peed onto the first stick, when I came out of the bathroom he had left my room so I sat and waited the requisite five minutes for the results on my own.  My phone beside me; the stopwatch application ticking down like a bomb. As a little pink line appeared my vision blurred as my eyes filled with tears. I grabbed the box and read the instructions again “a pink line appears if test is positive, Congratulations!” I went back into the bathroom and peed on the next stick, 5 minutes later I tried the third test but I had run out of pee so drunk all the water in my fridge and tried again. It was the longest five minutes of my life. I fell on the bed and wept my eyes out.  After sometime the tears dried up to mere whimpers. I got up and gathered the empty boxes and the dreaded tests, put them in a bag and shoved them into my locker. I went back and lay on the bed. I heard the door open but didn’t turn if it was my roommate I didn’t want to answer the questions that my tearstained face would provoke, if it was him then I did not want to see him, in fact right now he was the last person I wanted to see.

To be continued ...