He went about his dreams the wrong way but he was the guy I chose so I loved him nonetheless. All he wanted to do in life was to travel abroad. He told me often, “I don’t belong here that’s why I struggle. Look at my head. Look at my nose. You just look at my size. Do I look like a Ghanaian to you?” I would look at him from his head to his toe and tell him, “If you don’t look like a Ghanian then you don’t look like anything at all. Everything you’ve mentioned about you screams Ghanian. You even look more Ghanaian than the average Ghanian. He would call me a hater. I would call him a dreamer. He would joke, “When I finally travel out of this hell-hole, I will find another woman who believes I’m not a Ghanian and marry her. I will leave you and your Ghanaianess here to suffer because you called me a Ghanian when all you see is an American or a Dutch or a Caucasian.”
His friends called him Jay but that was not the name his parents gave him. His parents are staunch Catholic so they named him after their favorite saint, Saint Anthony. Saint Anthony of Padua. He once told me, “They named me after a man from Portugal but they didn’t have the courtesy to send me to where that man came from. How can I live in Ghana and be a saint? Of all the saints you’ve heard of, have you ever heard of Saint Kojo or Saint Abrokwa? That should tell you that a Ghanaian can’t be a saint.
So he dropped his Anthony and chose Jay. Jay from Jay-Z. His hip-hop icon. He didn’t choose just his name. He even chose his accent. His way of dressing. He didn’t have the mouth of Jay-z but it was alright. If he did, I wouldn’t have said yes to his proposal anyway. With that kind of mouth, you should have money to be able to attract a woman. A woman like me.
He played Jay-z songs every day. He would come to my room with Jay-Z CDs and leave them there. With time, I had every CD that had Jay-Z songs on it. My room was like a museum—a museum where people visit and learn about the Hip-hop icon.
He was working with a construction company when I found him. They were working on a site closer to my house. Every morning when I’m going to work, I will see them working. When I’m returning from work, I would see them there. A lot of the guys on the site approached me, wanting to be friends with me. Wanting to get my number so they could call me sometimes. I’m a woman. I knew what that meant so I was careful. The last time I gave my number to a man who wanted to be a friend, he ended up being a boyfriend. He later broke me into pieces, called me a slut, and left me where he finished me. It was hard getting up but I did. It was hard putting my pieces together but I did. When I finally healed, I learned sense. I learned not to pay attention to men who come looking for friendship.
But Jay was different. I saw him every day but he said nothing to me. He was around when his supervisor called me asking for my number. One time his boss sent him to get my number for him. He walked up to me and said, “That man there. He’s the boss. He says he wants your number. I don’t know what he wants it for because he’s married. I laughed. I said, “Then go and tell him that I said I know his wife and his wife would be very angry with me if I give my number to him.” He left but he made an impression on me. It was a dirty job they were doing but Jay always had clean clothes and clean boots. “How does he do it?” I asked myself.
One evening, I got to the site and he was the only one outside. He said, “Do you mind if I walk you home?” I looked at his boot and looked at his working gear. Work was closed but he still looked clean like the morning dew. I figured I could ask him how he does it while walking me home so I said, “Yes, I don’t mind at all.” We walked in silence for several seconds. “So tell me how you do it,” I said. “How do you keep them clean when everyone around here has theirs dirty? Or you pay some people to do your work for you so you don’t get stained?” He said, “That’s the American way of working. The Ghanaian thinks working gear should be dirty but we don’t think that way.” I looked at his face. The tribal mark on his left cheek. I said, “American with a tribal mark? How is that possible?”
He burst out laughing. “I didn’t know you can be this funny,” He said. “You started the joke,” I remarked.
He waited for me every evening so he could walk me home. He did it for days. He did it for weeks. Before weeks turned to a month, we were lovers. The first day he came to my room, he left his helmet there. The next morning when I was going to work, I sent it to him. It was intentional. A political statement. It was like me walking to the building site and screaming, “Hey y’all listen to me. I roll with Jay now so when you see me walking, don’t look at me. Don’t whistle at me and don’t run after me asking for my number. I’m taken!” The move worked. They left me alone and shifted their attention to Jay.
While they asked him how he did it, we were busy planning our lives together. That was when he revealed his dream of traveling out of Ghana to me. I remember telling him that I wouldn’t like to marry a man who lives where I don’t live. His answer was soothing and dreamy. He said, “I wouldn’t marry a queen and leave her here to slave with the common people. We’ll go together.”
One day he came home looking worried. He was angry, I should say. He wouldn’t tell me what the problem was. He said he was fine but I knew he was lying. That day, he played Jay-Z’s Hard Knock Life until I got tired and turned it off. I told him, “You’re a catholic. When you face problems in life, it’s Mary you go to with your rosary in hand. One our father, one Hail Mary and you’re good. But here you are listening to Hard knock life. How can you heal, Anthony?”
He told me what the problem was. A connection man had run away with his money. Huge sums of money. I said, “You have a good dream but you’re pursuing it the wrong way.” He didn’t listen. He tried again but got bounced at the embassy. He lost a lot of money. That didn’t stop him. He tried again and again, each time losing huge sums of money. It was time for us to talk. “Anthony, you’re not doing badly in life. Look at the amount you’ve lost trying to travel. How many people have that kind of money in their account? If you do then it means you’re doing well. Focus. Just focus and everything will be fine.”
We went a year. He didn’t talk about travel. I patted myself at the back, “He listened to me. This is my achievement.”
We’d dated for two years. He talked about settling down. His demeanor had changed from Jay to Antony. He spoke very little and thought a lot. He talked about the future with passion. He talked about kids and talked about their school. He talked about uniforms; “They’ll go to a school that wears a yellow uniform. Yellow is sunshine. When you’re friends with the sunshine, you never meet shadows in life.”
In the rainy periods of 2011, we had our knocking ceremony. Two weeks later he told me he was traveling to the village and would come back the following week. I called him a day later and his phone was off. I called in the morning and called in the evening, his line didn’t go through. “Or there’s no service in the village he went?” Three days later I called his mother and asked if she knew about the travel and how I could get in touch with him. She told me, “He didn’t tell me about it. I’m not aware where he is.” A week later, I started getting scared. We went to the police station and lodged a complaint about a missing person. I was at the police station every day, asking if they’ve had any information about him. The answer was always the same; “Madam, we’ve heard nothing. As soon as we get any information about him, we’ll let you know.”
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Whenever the sun set, it sets on my broken heart. I started having weird dreams about him. Some nights I saw us on a beach talking and laughing. Other nights he talked to me in whispers. Weird tone of voice I could not hear what he was saying. Every sunset was a new day. Several new days passed. Weeks. Months. A year. I still didn’t hear from him. If he was dead, we should have found his body. No dead body. I started looking for him in crowded places. When I walked by the construction site and I saw the workers going about their business, I looked through to see if I could find that guy who wore the neatest clothes and boots. Two years later, all I had left of him were memories and Jay-Z songs. The hard knock life.
Two years later I gave my heart away to another man because a girl can’t wait forever. But I didn’t stop thinking about him. On my wedding day when the pastor asked, “Is there anyone here who can show just cause why these two persons may not be joined in matrimony..?” I raised my head and looked through the congregation and got scared. “What if he sits among the congregation? What if he intentionally chose this period to appear? A man who loves Jay-Z can do anything to get attention.” The room was quiet. Even whispers got me scared. It was as though he was closer but far. Thankfully, no one spoke so we got wedded.
I have a five-year-old daughter and a three-year-old son now. They attend a school that wears a yellow uniform. It wasn’t intentional. Sheer coincidence but when I thought of it I smiled. “Yellow is sunshine. When you’re friends with the sunshine, you never meet shadows in life.” I have a different kind of sunshine now—my husband. My kids. My life. That’s all there’s to my sunshine. As for Jay, I still remember him but not in the ways I used to. I think of him fleetingly ask wonder what actually happened to him. He tried to stow away and got drowned? Only he can answer that question.
Someone just knocked on my door…Is he the one?
I get this feeling all the time when out of the blues someone knocks on my door. That’s all there is to Jay now. Just a wondering feeling that never leaves.
–Sunshine
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