My precious gift
The unsettling sound of nauseous vomiting woke me up with a start. Who on earth was retching so loud, rousing me from sleep?
I wondered as my hands groped under the covers to get hold of my wife, Panda. The answer was imminent when I padded an empty space on my left side; is that Panda?
I bolted out of the bed like a mad somnambulist, and sprinted all the way into the bathroom in a frenzied panic.
True to my fears, Panda was all hunched up on the toilet seat, her face partially lost inside the bowl.
Something was terribly wrong. Since we got married, I had known my wife to be of sound health. The only time we ever came to any close sort infection or ailment was when sympathizing with an ailing friend or relative in the hospital wards, or occasionally watching its fictitious form in malignant horror movie! The previous night had seen her all perfectly jovial, laughing at my shrewd jokes with enthusiasm only akin to the angel’s. So this deviation fro the norm hit me with a destructive impact! All my masculine cool being replaced by an instinctive sense of emergency and fear of some unknown phenomenon.
True to my fears, Panda was all hunched up on the toilet seat, her face partially lost inside the bowl. ‘What is it Baby? ‘I apprehensively, trying to pick her up. As if to answer my question, she suddenly stiffened, recoiled,and lurched for the toilet basin just in time as the involuntary muscle contractions threw her into a violent wave of vomiting spasm. Quite an answer indeed. My mind was in a wild detour, imagining all sorts of eerie things that could be happening to my wife. As I supported her over the toilet bowl, I feverishly prayed, Oh God, let nothing happen to her. Not my dear beloved, newly wedded wife.
We had been married for just a year and a half, but to me, it seemed like I had been married all my life. I could no longer remember life before her. I deliberately let that bit of my bachelor life slide into the dark sea of forgetfulness, and gladly so. I could not mar my blissful matrimony time with the memories of my miserable solitude life! I no longer considered as fun the roasted meat eating, beer drinking, and football talking, till the wee hours of the morning that had once characterized my life. And going home to a lonely alcohol induced sleep, after which 1 had to endure an all blaring headache as I nursed a hangover and cursed the beer barons! Did I used to call that fun? It was an expensive indulgence and most of the time I was in debt.
When Panda came along however, things took a topsy-turvy turn, and for my very own good. It was a life started anew. She rescued me from the brink of a forever downhill spiral just before I turned myself into a pile of ruin. Gently, yet firmly, she had reformed my social calendar, which saw a huge chunk of my drunken friends make an uncompromising exit. Then she lovingly and laboriously encouraged me to kick my drinking habit, and cut on my lavish spending. This saw me learn to budget and repay my bachelor’s humongous partying debts. With spending or the bare minimum, soon money started accumulating in the barn!
However, I had not envisioned, in any way, the prospects of death, trying to part us this soon. And I received with much loathing and resistance, this untimely move. Death and ailments should have better audacity than to strike newly weds at the peak of their love and intimacy! I fumed from the inside. I carried her to bed and sat her down gently to let her catch her breath. I desperately wanted to know what was wrong with her. But she was far out of breath to talk. I was holding both my phones in my hands. Just in case I needed to call an ambulance. Seeing the phones, and sensing my intentions. My wife began shaking her head in negation, a faint smile on her lips. ‘Do not call an ambulance, Honey,’ she intercepted in a barely audible voice.
‘Say what?’ I asked, slightly confused. ‘Am not sick, I am pregnant Joe. You are going to be a father.’ Pregnant? A father? This one caught me flatfooted. For a brief moment, I lost myself as a flood of relief swept through my tensed up nerves. My wife was not dying? Oh thank you God! For real? ‘Yes Honey, we are, and this seems to be the morning sickness, my pregnant companion.’ Good gracious! Now I know a more dramatic phrase than the famous; from rags to riches. And that should go something like; from potential widower to potential dad! I was beyond myself. What a serendipitous turn of events.
‘Were you planning to tell me all this, Pumpkins? You had me dying of a heart attack!’ I swept her into a bear hug and swung her in large arcs of celebration. ‘Actually, I was to surprise you later today. This news was to be your 30th birthday present. Happy Birthday Baby Boy!’ She said it more like a silent whisper. Some things from her were only meant for my ears, even in the privacy of our own bedroom.
Panda has these beautiful love-sick eyes, and when she gets emotional, they sparkle like polished gem stones as the light rays get reflect on their teary film. Looking into those sentimental eyes, now oozing with so much love, gentleness and profound joy, made me transfixed with the awe of how much I truly adored this girl. I knew 1 was the luckiest man in the planet to have such a fine woman as my wife and soon to be the mother of our child. I was lost for words. All I could do was grumble an inaudible heartfelt gratitude, all the while wishing that hug could last forever. What a gift!
END: PG18/48-49