I stayed under the water for a while probably wondering what he would have been thinking of my weird behavior. After a while, common sense forced me to push my head out of the water since I didn't make much of a difference whether I was inside or outside.
"Hey!" Ubaro said and I just stared at him at loss for words which I noticed made him quite uncomfortable. I wasn't exactly comfortable with him being here either. And since when did he start to talk?
"Um... Hi. I am... quite surprised to see you here," I said moving water around with my hands.
"I am also surprised I ended up here when I should actually be in school," he said scratching the back of his head.
"So... How did you find your way to my house?" I asked him.
"I didn't find it... It's more like Ifeanyi brought me here."
"Oh!" I said pondering on his words. So Ifeanyi was also here?
"Why did you ditch school?"
"I am way ahead of the class so sometimes when I am too far ahead I just take a day off from school."
"So basically you are a truant. More like a nerd truant," I said and he smiled. He shook his head probably going dumb again.
"I heard you were suspended because of Chiamaka and I never really liked her before but now I am certain that I don't even like her one bit. It's actually nice that she also got suspended," he said and I only nodded in agreement.
"Can I get food inside because I am really starving."
"Yeaaah... Sure you can," I said dragging my words and slightly unsure why he would be requesting to eat.
"Once you go inside, you will find the fair lady that ushered you in here. Just tell her you want to eat."
"Okay, thanks. Which food is available? I am allergic to some foods actually."
"That's not a problem. The chef made four different foods according to what each person wanted to eat but if you don't like any of the foods, he could always make you something else," I said and he nodded before leaving.
As he left, Ifeanyi arrived and I had a feeling he had intentionally made an excuse to leave the both of us alone. I suddenly wished there was some secret passage I could swim through and find myself inside the house.
Forget about the situation I was in right now, it would actually be a wonderful thing to have an escape route in the pool.
"You're not gonna say hello?" He asked. I kept quiet for a while thinking it would be much easier to get guards to throw him out.
"I think that's pretty fair since I wasn't informed about your sudden visit."
"That was totally different. Ubaro kept insisting that he wanted to see you so I had to bring him here."
So he wasn't the one who actually wanted to see me? Wow! I kept quiet for a while not moving from my spot.
"Mind if I join you?" He asked and my eyes widened.
"Huh?"
"Can I join you in swimming?" He asked again. I thought for a while. That wasn't actually a problem.
"Your choice," I said shrugging. Some unwanted thoughts basically just popped up in my head and I basically had to mentally scream at myself for not just being able to forget things. At the moment I wanted more than anything to just leave the pool and go back to my room.
I pushed my head back in the pool in an attempt to drown out thoughts still wondering if it was such a bad idea to just bolt out of the pool and into the house.
I soon lifted my head out of the water and found Ifeanyi already in the shallow end of the pool seemingly approaching the end I was in.
"Can you swim? Because this end is really deep!" I called out to him.
"Of course I can. What makes you think I would step in here if I couldn't. Just like every other normal person, I have no desire to die," he said and I noticed that he was now swimming and not attempting to walk as he initially was doing.
I tried forgetting about the fact that he was in the pool as I stared at the small partition which housed the shower trailing behind the pool. I noticed that the door was slightly parted which indicated that someone was just there. 'How long had my head been in the water for me not to have noticed Ifeanyi using the shower?' I wondered.
By the time I turned back my attention to the pool rather than the shower, I saw Ifeanyi almost standing in front of me. 'What was he up to?' I wondered as I pushed my leg against the water's force taking a step backwards.
"What?" He asked looking amused.
"Nothing," I shook my head attempting to swim away when he caught me by my waist.
"Um... What are you doing?" I asked looking straight at him noting that I sounded unfazed even though I was pretty much panicking.
"Nothing actually... I just..." He kept quiet as his grip on my waist loosened. On their own accord, my legs moved upward wrapping themselves around Ifeanyi's waist as my hands found their own way around his neck.
Now it was his turn to look at me like I had lost my senses and if my subconscious was a person watching me, it would probably also be giving me a look. Like what the hell was I doing?
"What are you doing?" He asked confused.
"Just shut the fuck up and kiss me," I said the words sounding unfamiliar to my own ears. Like really I must have been drunk on some invisible alcohol. I really didn't care much at that point.
The time it took for Ifeanyi to finally press his lips against mine felt like forever and I cherished that moment in which his lips touched mine more than anything.
But it was highly short lived as I heard someone call my name. It seemed so distant that I made up my mind to ignore it until I heard my name again.
'Prolly another Alya,' I thought not wanting to break the kiss but eventually did anyway.
"Alya!" I finally heard clearly as the glass door swung open and immediately recognizing the voice surprised me so much that I didn't know when I let go of Ifeanyi and almost drowned if he hadn't steadied me with his hands.
I had unwrapped my legs from his waist and really willed the water to swallow me. After a while, I managed to force my head up and look to where the door was located.
"Hey gammy!" I said before my grandmother cast me a look and realization dawned on me. "I mean... Good morning grandmother," I said.
"Good morning," she said in a voice that showed she was everything but impressed. Ifeanyi also greeted her as I began swimming out of the pool thinking that drowning would probably not be such a bad idea.
I soon saw Stephanie join my grandmother before leading her back into the house. As I grabbed my towel I actually wondered how my grandmother had suddenly just arrived and of all days to arrive...
I couldn't recall clearly the last time I had seen her. It was at least a couple years ago and I didn't hear much about her after then since she wasn't on the best terms with my mother.
Last I heard about her, she was in Germany visiting her son, an uncle I never knew about. After that, I had easily forgotten that I had a grandmother.
I wrapped my large towel around myself as I made my way into the house. I saw Ubaro in the sitting room with Kylie trying to talk to him which was weird to me for some reason.
He offered me a smile as I raced to my room grateful that my grandmother was no where in sight. I changed into a dress that my grandmother would approve of as being ‘decent’. A corduroy dress I hadn't worn since it was first purchased, I didn't even know I had such clothes.
The dress was well past my knees and looked really funny, I had to wonder how it ended up in my wardrobe. More surprising was the fact that out of a thousand hoodies, jeans, crop tops and designer dresses that I actually wore, I found this dress without even making it past my wardrobe door.
My hair wasn't in braids so I just pulled it into a ponytail. I took a look at the mirror cringing heavily at the reflection in front of me. It was true that I never really dressed like a slut and wore a lot of baggy clothing but I had never for once looked as hideous as I did in this dress.
I contemplated just putting on jeans. I thought to a large collection of awfully distressed and ripped jeans and how hard it would be to find a jean that didn't have a single tear, baggy or not.
And I really didn't know how much gammy had seen in the pool scene that she had embarrassingly witnessed earlier. She already hated her daughter, I really didn't want her to be disappointed in me since it seemed she had quite an amount of love for me.
She probably demanded to see me first on her arrival which led to the pretty unfortunate event that just took place. So it really didn't matter if I looked like trash and Ifeanyi would see me looking like that but who cared anyway?
After one more glance at the mirror, I went down the stairs feeling like crying. When I got there I first noticed that both Ubaro and Ifeanyi were missing which was a relief although I felt bad that I didn't get to say goodbye to Ubaro or even give him a proper welcome and this was the first time he was coming to my house.
I found my grandmother arguing with my mother as Stephanie stood in a corner looking uncomfortable and Kylie just stared for a while clearly confused.
"What are you even doing here anyway?" My mother asked clearly annoyed by her mother's presence.
"I came to visit my daughter who doesn't care to know if I am alive or dead and also see my granddaughter as well. Actually I came for my granddaughter and not you so don't flatter yourself. I would rather not see your face as that is as good as a ruined day for me..."
"You have the option to leave and spare yourself from ruining your day any longer," my mother snapped interrupting her. Honestly, that was the second time I was seeing Ami Tara showing her anger. The first was in the principal's office.
"You can't get rid of me that easily so go take a seat," my grandmother waved her off.
"I am..."
"Can you guys stop fighting already!" Kylie said interrupting my mother. My grandmother turned to her only then noticing her presence.
"Who is this fair stick and where did she come from?" Gammy asked referring to Kylie as 'fair stick'. The look on Kylie's face as she heard Gammy address her as a stick was really amusing and I fought the urge to laugh.
"What did you call her?" My mother asked with anger and disbelief present in her voice.
"A fair stick. Isn't that what she is?" Gammy asked and I had a feeling that Kylie would have already started hating her.
"No, she is my daughter and definitely not a fair stick!" My mother said. Gammy looked at Kylie and then back at my mother.
"I can't have a stick for a granddaughter. I only have one granddaughter and that is Alya. You might have been generous enough to pick up this thing from somewhere but I am definitely not generous enough to accept it as my granddaughter. Plus she looks an awful lot like that crazy guy you were together with at some point..." Gammy stopped talking as realization dawned on her and she figured out that Kylie was Mr. West's daughter if he was the one she had addressed as 'that crazy guy you were together with at some point'.
"Point of correction mother, that crazy guy is now my husband," my mother said and Gammy's mouth fell open in surprise.