“Can I help you with that?”I heard someone ask from behind me, I turned to look. I had never met him before but he looked familiar and I did need the help.
“Yes please,” I proceeded to hand him one of the bags I was carrying but he took them both from my hands.
We went up the stairs in silence but deep down I was thanking God for sending me an angel to help me with those heavy bags. He followed me as I led the way to my house.
We got there and I took the bags from him and thanked him for the help. To my surprised he knocked at my neighbour’s door and said good bye as I locked my door just as they were letting him in.
I unpacked my groceries and put them away before I sat down to enjoy my pizza while watching a movie.
It was a Friday night so I could stay up late since I didn’t have to go to work the following day. Half way through the movie, there was a knock on my door.
“Who is it?” I asked from my seat since I wasn’t expecting anyone that late into the night.
“It’s me Cathy,” Cathy was my next door neighbour. She and her husband almost if not always had a party every Friday night that went up to Sunday mornings.
“Hey Cathy,” I said opening the door for her.
“Hey Mel, Jack and I have a few people over, it’s his best friend’s birthday, who also happens to be my older brother and I would really like it if you could join us,”
“Thank you for the invite Cathy but unfortunately I can’t join you today,”
“Please just for a while, two drinks then I’ll let you leave,”
“Make it one,”
“One and a half,”
“Okay, let me change into something more comfortable,”
“No need, you are okay just the way you are,” I put on my crocs and followed her to her house.
“Have a seat over there,” she pointed at where Jack and his friend were seated and signalled him to give me the seat so they stood up and I went and sat there.
The music was loud, some people were dancing, others were shouting over it as a way of talking, and there I was totally out of place.
I felt more out of place when Cathy brought me my drink and vanished back into the kitchen after her friend came and called her back.
As I looked around I caught the eyes of the guy that helped me out earlier but he quickly looked away and I just smiled. We kept exchanging glances for some minutes before they switched off the lights and music.
“For he’s a jolly good fellow, for he’s a jolly good fellow…” a lady came in singing the song while carrying a cake filled with candles and stood next to the guy I was looking at.
Someone had already placed a table in front of him so she put the cake down on it and he blew out the candles when people stopped singing.
The lady who brought out the cake scooped some icing with her finger, applied it on his lips and kissed it off him. People wooed at this. I felt really disgusted, not because they kissed but because the guy had a girlfriend and here he was flirting with me.
“Happy birthday baby,” she said kissing him again.
“Thank you guys, all of you, for taking the time to come help me down all this alcohol, you all know Jack and I aren’t as young as we used to be and the other two travelled so that’s where you guys come in. As for the food well what can I say? We all know who couldn’t make it,” They laughed, but I didn’t get the joke.
I came to later learn that it was a reference to one of his luhya friend who played professional rugby and had a very good appetite. “Anyway, thank you all for coming, baby sis thank you for agreeing to host this party and to you babe, thank you for taking your time to plan all this, you are an awesome girlfriend,”
“Thanks babe, I love you,” she said.
“Love you too,” he said kissing her.
I didn’t wait for cake, I went back to my place, poured myself some vodka in a glass mixed it with some orange juice and resumed to watching the movie.
It then came to me that I was overreacting. It was not as if the guy had said anything to me and except stealing glances of each other and helping me with my groceries up the stairs we hadn’t made enough contact for me to react in any way.
After the movie, I took a bath and jumped into bed. I was woken up the following morning by shouts from Cathy asking Jack not to take too long from wherever he was going.
“She could have just texted him,” I thought to myself.
Jack and Cathy were okay neighbours, but they were full of issues. I couldn’t count the number of times I went to console Cathy after Jack walked out on her in the middle of the night after she accused him of cheating or he accused her of cheating.
They seemed to always be arguing about something. When they were not arguing they were the best, I longed to be in a relationship just by looking at them but then I’d be thrust back to reality when the arguments started.
Surprisingly, after walking out, he’d come back later the same night and she’d start shouting at him then there would be silence for about fifteen minutes. She would break the silence with her giggles and laughter then silence and that would be it until the next argument.
