One night in Addis Ababa

II. Is it really you?

A surreal feeling washed over me as i exited Bole International Airport when i realized that it had worked and any minute now I would be in the arms of the love of my life. Would we jump at each other in joy? Would we kiss? Would we cry? It had come as a surprise that there was no one at the arrivals terminal as they were not permitted inside the airport but across the yard where they would see their loved ones descend the sloppy terrain to come meet them.

"I am outside now." I texted him.
"Where, Nana?" He replied immediately.

I was the first to spot him as he looked across to the arrivals door where i had emerged from a few seconds ago but i was already in the midst of the people waiting for their loved ones. He was wearing an open checked shirt we bought in Fategunj and a grey T-shirt inside. He was also wearing the red chuckies i liked, which pleased me. He kept on watching the door as I approached him from behind then he suddenly turned around and let out a pleased startle. We stood frozen like that appraising each other, not quite sure if this is real and not quite touching lest we break the spell and we wake up to find that this had all been a dream. We finally moved to close the gap between us and fell into a deep embrace which seemed to have lasted for a while judging by the thinning of the crowd after we finally let go of each other.

Neither of us talked during the taxi ride to his motel room for we had somehow agreed non verbally to go to the same place where he had slept the previous night and forfeit my $70 per night hotel room. As i laid my head on his shoulder and he showered kisses on my forehead he finally said the first word,

"Is it really you?"

I looked at him, and pondered at his ridiculous yet critical question. I felt the same way, i could not believe it - that he was here, with me, holding me, kissing my forehead and asking me a question. The last time i saw him i was pushing a luggage trolley into Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport not daring to look back at him scared that I wouldn't be able to continue going but instead rush back to him and forfeit the journey. But the journey had to be taken, for it was as equally important as staying here with him. I was going home. And he was going home too! Just from a different airport, unfortunately. He says his agent had booked him to exit through Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Dehli instead of Mumbai as i was doing then and the only reeediming thing was his flight had been 5 days after mine so he could accompany me to Bombay before going to Dehli. This was June of 2018 but I had already started to moan our departure in January of the same year.

See, me and him where from different countries - i being from Zimbabwe and him being Ethiopian only bound together by the sneaky fate of cupid. I fell in love with him the first day i met him in June of 2017 when we had been brought in as third wheelers at our mutual friends' date. Unfortunately the odds were not in their favor relationship wise and their relationship did not last a fortnight while mine and baby boy's seemed to thrive like mushrooms. We were so much in sync we easily accepted what had befallen us and sooner we were parading our little relationship at the University campus were we both where doing our Masters degrees. He stayed in campus, while i and the aforementioned mutual friend shared a two bedroomed condo at a beautiful estate called Dove Deck and every morning he would make a show of waiting for me at the University gate and walking me to the Medical Science and research faculty were he would kiss me goodbye and after lessons he would come to the faculty to get me and we would have a long lunch together which would lead me to forfeit my afternoon lessons then he would walk me to the campus gate where we would stand waiting for the "next after this one" tuk tuk to take me home as we didn't want to let go of each other. This often led to us to decide that we go together and he would come back to campus before curfew which often led him to sleep over. Our love was so pure we couldn't bear to not see each other daily, to walk around not holding hands and on the weekends when he was supposed to be attending IELTS lessons for immigration purposes he decided to stop going entirely to which we then resolved that i would meet him in town at many of the cute pizzerias in town after his lesson on Sundays, go for mass then come back home together.