Mcha Mungu si mtovu
(He who trusts in the Lord lacks nothing)
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Taji
Working out is honestly a great way to get things off your mind. I would however recommend prayer first, then that. I woke up with a certain urge to feel God's presence. I had been doing so well, but of late I was easily getting agitated by everything and anything. I needed another remedy to calm me down after I disposed all of my meds. I got on my music app and played a couple of worship songs. I then eventually found myself on my knees praying to God to be with me throughout the new week. I then joined Mark at the gym.
I really really wanted to text Raz but I honestly didn't know what was holding me back. She'd recently expressed her wishes for keeping things professional with me. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't respect her decisions. It's just hard to believe when she seems to get flustered everytime I'm near her. It's hard to stay away especially when she was being her true carefree self. It's hard when she literally called me her boyfriend and acted like a jealous girlfriend when that little red head was all up in my face.
I was glad my body was getting adapted to working out. Everything stopped aching and I was really enjoying it. I took a shower after my morning routine with Mark. I then got ready to go to that dreaded office and stare at a computer screen all day long. I sat on the benches outside the showers to collect myself first. My phone beeped. I would be lying if I told you that my heart wasn't in my throat at the expectation that it was my strawberry texting me. Well, it wasn't.
It was an instagram notification from some girl called Anita something with a bunch of unnecessary underscores. This was weird. I was on Instagram but if it were a room, it'd be filled with cobwebs since I don't even recall the last time I opened it.
x__Anita__x
Hey Taji. It's Anita, we met yesterday. Was just wondering if you'd like to come over to my place and watch a movie or something.
Or something?
I don't even want to know what she means by that.
x__Anita__x
Oh and come with the BMW.
It's an Audi!
Jeez!
I rolled my eyes and texted back
No thanks. I have a girlfriend sorry.
I then went to her page to do a little stalking. It was kinda creepy that she actually took her time to figure out what my Instagram handle was. But then again, you didn't need a rocket scientist for that since I used my real name on all my socials. As I was scrolling through her feed, I saw Jabari face on a couple of posts and I immediately put two and two together.
She's with him.
Could that be what was bothering Raz?
Another dm came in.
x__Anita__x
Whatever. *Mtaachana tu. (You'll eventually break up)When you change your mind, just slide in my dm.
What is wrong with women these days? What happened to faithfulness? What ever happened to the good old days when the men made the first move? Okay yeah, I'm traditional like that. But it saves everyone a whole lot of effort. I just rolled my eyes and exited the app. My phone buzzed again and my face lit up.
Raz: Hey
Taji: My girlfriend missed me?
Raz: Seriously though, does it hurt you to say hi back?
Taji: You and I both know that if this went on with hi how are you, the conversation would die real fast strawberry.
Raz: Whatever, I was just passing by to tell you that the next bible study is at my place. Bye.
Taji: Can't wait! Bye strawberry.
So she didn't reply. Either way, I was ecstatic to say the least. If this was how days that start with God pan out, I wouldn't miss a morning with Him for anything. I did what I do all the time. I called Tanya and narrated everything.
》《
The week was over before I knew it. My mornings with God had become an indispensable routine of worship, Bible, prayer then a quick look on the verse of the day notification my Bible app sent me. The monotony of going to work had been broken by morning sessions with God, gym and texting Raziya. She seemed to chip away the walls she'd been building to keep me away and just freely texted and called me every night.
It was finally Friday and I had somehow convinced her to include Tanya and Alex. She informed me that she'd need Lily and I to come earlier and help her cook. So I did as she said. I left the office at 4:30 and drove to her place following the pin she'd dropped me.
I got there faster than I expected, crossing my fingers that Lily got there before me. Something about being alone with her gave me goosebumps.
"What did you say was the colour of the gate?" I called to ask.
"Sage," she answered then giggled.
"What? You creatives make up your own colours. Say that again in terms of blue, green, black, yellow, you know, the colours that actually exist." She burst out into laughter and I could picture her eyes shut as she threw her head backwards with the phone in her hands.
"Strawberry!"
"Okay okay, it's greenish, lemme get out and look for you," she said in between laughs. I put my phone down as I chuckled, slowing down as I looked for a small female walking towards me. There were a bunch of guys staring at me and it honestly made me feel uneasy. I was in an expensive car with a really conspicuous colour. My thoughts were broken off by a knock on my window. I was so glad that it was Raz. She directed me to a green, sorry sage green, gate with her hands.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," she said as I stepped out. I would have mentioned that the eyes following me there gave me chills but how would that sound?
"Don't you ever say hi?" I said mocking her voice. She rolled her eyes then hugged me. She actually hugged me. I hugged her back but she pulled away quickly before I lost myself in her scent. I noticed that she had flour in her hair that had been braided into two large cornrows. I'd always wanted to learn how to do cornrows so I told myself that I'll ask her about it later.
"What are you baking?" I asked as we got into the sage green gate. She let out a sigh then said, "You don't even want to know what I've been doing for the past three hours."
The house was everything I expected it to be. The living room was simple but one could tell that she's the one who styled it. Everything was a shade of green, the seats, carpet, curtains and some decorative pieces.
"You coming or what?" She asked in a low voice as I stared at family portraits on the walls. She seemed a bit queasy about showing me whatever she was cooking. I walked into the kitchen and all I saw was white.
"I was trying to make chapatis but clearly, they don't want to comply," she said lowering her voice again. I chuckled at how cute she looked as she tried to hide her embarrassment. I remembered her sister making fun of her cooking and started laughing. She looked up at me with humiliation written all over her face.
"No, I'm not laughing at this, I just remembered something," I assured her. "Lemme help," I said as I walked towards the kitchen counter.
"Excuse me! Wash your hands! Who knows what kind of virus you picked up on the way here," She said pulling me back towards the sink and handed me a bottle of handwash. From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of her staring at me. I smirked to myself about how much female attention I'd been getting recently before I realized that she was staring at my wrist. I regretted not wearing a watch that day.
Please don't ask about the tattoo.
"I've been meaning to ask,"
Here we go.
"Why do you have a barcode on your wrist?"
I wasn't going to narrate that story, yet. "Why not?" I answered shooting her a smirk. She chucked and I quickly changed the subject as I poured flour into a bowl.
"Your red haired friend sent me a dm." She raised an eyebrow at me as she handed me sugar and salt and I added them to the bowl.
"We're not friends!" She hissed as she grabbed her phone and played some music.
"Relax, what's with the attitude?"
She sighed then said,"Long story."
"We clearly have a lot of time," I said as I looked around and spotted where they kept their spices. I reached out to look through them and her hand grabbed my wrist stopping me.
"What do you think you're doing?" She asked.
"Looking for cardamom. I always add it when I make mine,"
"Well don't touch our stuff with your messy hands," she said handing me the said spice. I added it, then oil and some warm water she'd boiled before. I started kneading as I hummed to citizen of heaven by Tauren Wells playing in the background. I looked up at her after a while then asked,"Are you going to tell me the story about her or what?"
I knew I shouldn't be pushing her to answer my questions, considering that I was hiding so much from her. But I just couldn't help it. She sighed then gave me a brief story about how Jabari had been her best friend for four years. "So," she continued, face down to hide her discomfort," I caught feelings and he didn't. I found out that he'd been seeing Anita that Sunday when you and Lily went to the charity thing. He.." she stopped and bit her lip. I really understood what she felt. One sided relationships were nothing new to me. I stopped kneading and leaned on the counter to focus all my attention on her. I wanted to put my hand on her shoulder but I was certain that she'd complain that I'm messing up her T-shirt. She shuddered at an unpleasant memory then looked up at me, biting back the tears forming on the corners of her eyes.
"It's okay, I-" she cut me short and continued."He actually kissed her right in front of me. I ditched you guys to watch that, to help him move in with her. He didn't even have the decency to at least send me a cab. He doesn't care about me, probably never has..."
I didn't care how she'd react anymore. I grabbed her wrist then pulled her in for a hug. It was just unfathomable to think that a normal human being could not see how much of a treasure she is. She wrapped her hands around me and the music around us was accompanied by sniffles.
She suddenly stepped back and muttered something like "I can't cry in front of you".
She then took out a pan and prepared everything else we needed and looked at the dough then at me, indicating that we needed to start cooking. I threw my arm around her shoulder and rubbed flour all over her hair to purposefully piss her off but mainly change the mood.
She screamed and giggled at the same time as she fought to free herself from me. When I let her go she furrowed her eyebrows and shot me something like a puppy face, just a bit more annoyed. I laughed and started rolling the dough. She took off the rubber band holding up my hair and did the same to me. I turned to pick up flour and start a fight before she stopped me warning me that her mother would kill her if we continued wasting her flour. We both continued laughing and got down to business. She tried rolling as I cooked them on the pan, but we eventually switched places after several attempts to make perfect circles turned into continent shaped chapatis.
We went on talking about our weeks. She told me about a client she had who made her repaint a room thrice to get the exact shade she wanted and I told her about my new gym life.
My attention on her was pulled away when she dashed to her phone to change a song immediately it started playing.
"Why'd you cut it short?"
"It's not... I don't really know honestly,"she said, mumbling the last part. I snatched her phone from her and played the song, ignoring her protests about spreading floor all over her phone. I then gave it back to her with a grin. We then continued talking as I listened to the lyrics.
Heaven made your hand
To compliment my hand
Like heaven made my heart
To compliment your heart
Heaven gave you love
To compliment my love
So one day we will love
The way that God intended for us
Nothing could match up the authenticity of what we both felt at the moment. Maybe I could be wrong about her, but deep down, the song felt like something I was living in at that moment. I assumed she felt it too because she completely avoided eye contact with me through the whole song.
The playlist went on with a couple of Tori Kelly's songs. She started singing along and I joined her with my frog voice. Bad voices, wrong lyrics and exaggerated runs, this was the second best feeling I've ever had, after giving my life to Christ.
I watched her finish up the last one and I felt something whisper to me,
Something brand new...
The verse was haunting me, but I finally got what it actually meant.
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The wedding song - Matthew Mole