dial episode 50

DIAL
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Sequence 50
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©Aaron Ansah-Agyeman
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Her arms were tight around my waist, and the side of her face was pressed against my back. All in all, having done it all and experienced it all, that particular position at that particular point in time filled me with one of the greatest blissful moments I had ever known.
I could have stayed like that for eternity. Abena Adobea’s arms around me and her cheek to my back was divine. A slight tremor passed through her deliciously when I put my hands on her linked ones across my lower belly.
Her arms tightened when I tried to turn around, and she pressed against me tighter.
“No, no, Yao, please, please don’t turn,” she said behind me, and I smiled to myself when I heard the strained anguish in her voice.
“Why not, Abena?” I asked quietly.
“Because I don’t like the way I’m feeling,” she said, her voice equally soft. “I don’t like it at all.”
“And how are you feeling, Abena?”
“You know, Yao.”
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“No, I don’t,” I said as my own heart began to beat in an irregular way. “So tell me.”
“I don’t know what it is, Yao!” she whispered. “Stop teasing me! I know that if you turn something…something I’m not prepared for might happen. Please, would you want me to fix you dinner?”
“No, Abena,” I replied. “I’ll make myself some warm cocoa. Would you like a cup?”
“No, no, Yao!” she said urgently. “I can’t stay here, you know I can’t stay any longer. I’m going to release you, and go and sleep…please, please, don’t turn round until I’m gone.”
“Alright, Maa Abena,” I said softly.
She was quiet for a while, but she still held me, and when she spoke again her voice was extremely emotional now.
“My father used to call me that,” she whispered quaveringly. “Oh, Yao!”
She let me go quickly, and then she turned and hurried toward the front door. I couldn’t help it…I couldn’t help it one bit, try as hard as I could.
So I went after her, and caught her arm just before she could touch the door handle, and when I turned her round her eyes closed as she fell back limply against the wall.
My hands encircled her, and I drew her close. Her hands came up against my chest, as if to push me away, and then they spread almost with a will of their own and encircled my neck. I could feel her trembling against me. She looked so young then, like a girl in her teens, and her lovely lips trembled as I looked at them.
I couldn’t stop myself.
I kissed her.
Her lips were so soft, so pure, and so innocent. They opened for me, and her tongue met mine shyly, so poignant and sweet that I felt my nerve endings jangling rather violently through my body. My arms came higher up her back, and I drew her closer, as if I wanted her to disappear right into my body.
Her heart thundered like a million galloping hooves, and mine roared like a burning deranged and derailed train! It was a magical piece of time, a sweet slice of paradise that belonged to only us, where no one and nothing else mattered.
She was a bundle of bliss in my arms, a quantum of eternal joy that I just didn’t want to go, and as I kissed her she became more and more pliant in my arms, and I lived for that moment, existed for that brief space of air that embodied the joys and cravings of my heart.
I desired her, yes, but in a total way. I craved and lusted for her, but not for my personal gratification, but for a deeper meaning, a wholesome craving of my soul…to please, and be pleased, to cherish and be cherished, to love and to be loved.
Indeed, I was lost in the arms of this girl, pleased beyond compare in the sweetness of her lips. Her arms came down slowly, and she put her hands flat on my chest, and then she pushed me back gently, as loathed as I was to let go.
But she was insistent, and slowly I lifted my lips, reluctantly, and looked at the face of a real angel.
Her eyes were open, and her head was slightly turned to one side as she looked intently into my eyes with her heart open on her face.
“Yao,” she whispered.
“Yes, Maa Abena?” I said in a very dry throat as I swallowed my desire like a physical timber log in my throat.
“You’re a handsome man, Yao, and you’re rich and powerful,” she said softly, reaching up to put a small sweet hand on my cheek. “You’ve known sophisticated girls, and you’ve been with a lot of them. You’re charming, assertive and positive. In a nutshell, Yao, you can have me easily, because you know all the buttons to push, and you can sweep me completely off my feet.”
My face was pained as I looked at her, and I could feel the horrible cringing of my body, the first of its kind I had ever felt, as I felt her about to drop me like a bomb.
“Maa Abena, wait…”
She placed a hand across my lips, and shook her head as tears bubbled in her eyes.
“Please hear me out, Yao, I beg you,” she said tremulously. “I’m a village girl. Your ways are not my ways, and I don’t have much education. You can sway me, and in fact you have swayed me. You can lift me up right now and take me to your bedroom and take my virginity and I can’t resist it. But that is not the way I want it to be, Yao.
I’ve handled all the boys in this village and beyond, and none of them dared touch even my toe, but you have broken down all my barriers. We’re different here in the village, Yao. We believe in a girl’s honour, and the joy of going to our marriage bed whole. I beg of you, Yao, please don’t let me do this. Help me, please. Don’t take me. If it is love, let me fall into it naturally, to know you’re the only one for me, and that I am the only one for you. That is all I ask of you!”
Tears came to my eyes. I believed her, because she spoke to my heart. On the surface they were just words, but in a deeper level our hearts and our minds fused, and I understood her so very perfectly.
“I hear you, Maa Abena,” I said softly. “But, you know I don’t have time. I have but a few years, at the most, to live. Every day I age a bit more, under this curse. Before long, I might be too old to even see you.”
She smiled sadly as the tears trickled down her tears.
“I don’t believe love knows time and space, Yao,” she whispered softly. “I’ve known you less than three months, and yet, it seems I have known you for an eternity already. Let’s forget about the curse on you, or the impending death. To me, you’re a most charming man, even with your grey hair. To me, this moment is infinity, and yet it is too short. You affect me in ways no man has ever affected me before, Yao. But when I give myself to you, it will be because my heart is yours, for eternity, and your heart is mine till the last breath. You do understand, don’t you?”
I nodded as I took a step back, and even though I smiled, a few drops of tears fell down my cheeks.
“I understand, Maa Abena,” I said gently. “Go on, go catch some sleep.”
She was still leaning against the wall, and she came forward with a sigh and opened the door. She stepped out onto the porch, and walked slowly away.
My heart screamed for her. It was all I could do to stop myself from rushing at her and begging her to stay. I stood in the doorway and craved for her, wanted her, needed her.
She descended the stairs, and then she stopped.
An angel, a graceful beautiful angel.
Abena Adobea…Maa Abena.
An ethereal beauty, absolutely not of this world.
And as I admired her curves, her rises and valleys, her planes and rounds, I did not do so with the eye of lust, or craving, but I adored her with the beat of my heart, and the craving of the soul.
I did not want to sleep with her, no.
I did not want to have sex with her, or to bang her up, or hammer her.
No…no.
I wanted to make love to her, and I wanted her to make love to me.
To love, and be loved.
She turned slowly, and then she climbed back up the stairs and approached me, her steps sure and firm. When she got to me she raised her right arm, curled it around my neck, and drew my head down.
And then she kissed me…and I swear that for a moment, for a breath of a moment, my heart stopped beating when her lips touched mine.
She stepped back, and smiled sweetly.
“Did you like that?” she whispered.
“It took my breath away, Maa Abena!” I said softly.
Then it happened.
Maybe it was a smile, but it wasn’t a smile.
It came from inside of her, a sort of diamond-glitter light that spread across her face and the whole of her being, making her glow with a beauty that virtually shattered my heart.
“Goodnight, Yao,” she said and turned away again.
“Goodnight, you witch!” I whispered.
She giggled, and wiggled her behind teasingly at me without turning.
Oh dear!
It was the most beautiful gesture I had ever seen in my life.
She was beautiful, that village girl.
Everything about her was beautiful.