I’m a late bloomer. That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t get to experience all the beautiful things in life now does it? It just means that I get to experience them late, which if I’m right, I’m the perfect example of he who laughs last laughs the loudest. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case when I met Devon and this I should I have known right from the moment he introduced himself.
“Hi, I’ve been watching you from afar and I swear your eyes and smile just pulled me to this spot. I’m Devon by the way.” Said the most beautiful raspy voice spitting syllables in the British language.
Oh, my heart if not my loins. A girl with his eyelashes and my eyes, a boy with his jaw and two more with everything us. Several thoughts just crossed my mind even before I could reply with the only response that came to mind. “What?”
“You heard me,” he said in a tone that communicated confidence but with a subtle treble of arrogance.
Boy, don’t I love them carefree and bad to the bone?
You may be asking where I got the experience from since he was supposed to be my first love but the truth is the mind of a writer experiences things in Dejavu. Devon right here was one of those. Someone I had seen in my past life, just that I did not have the face to put on the body. He literally came out of my wild thoughts.
“Hi Devon,” I said in a flat voice. A cheesy attempt that was made to conceal my instant attraction to him.
Now before I go any further, let’s just be honest here. Who in their right mind resists a Devon? Well, if not me due to the trauma he later brought upon my existence?
On top of that, He was downright dangerous, and beautiful, and had the weighty name to show how he owned it.
God knows I tried but if I succeeded there wouldn’t be any story to tell now would there?
True to his nature Devon had the world to show me. I went on my first date with him which happened in a gym. I arrived in a dress but Devon gave me his gym clothes to change into. Oh, his laugh when he saw me walk out, lost inside his oversized tracksuit, it was just perfect and I wished to create more of those scenarios.
After one hour of working out, which was actually more of him showing me how to perform weird stunts, we walked out and he directed me to an Uber ride which he had requested already. I’m less smart than I’m open to bewilderment and that button Devon knew how to press and when to. I was amazed by how streamlined his actions were and how good he could back up his words. So I chose to follow.
After 15 minutes we were at his home which was around Adams Arcade, Ngong road. He lived with his siblings in a three-bedroom house so I expected to find his siblings. In a turn of events, no one was home. As if on cue with my look of surprise, he asked if I could hop in the shower first.
Who would’ve known I was going on a first date to shower? After that was done and I had changed into the clothes I had worn earlier, he met me halfway with a glass of juice and a platter of fruits. I literally felt like a princess.
“What do you want to watch?” At this point, I was afraid that my tastes would be too revealing on my part so I just went with, “You choose.”
I should have known right from this point, that he was the type the Kansoul had in mind when they sang Moto Ya Kuotea Mbali. But who am I kidding? That alone couldn’t suppress my curiosity. So I did the unexpected when he returned after his shower.
I stood up and with a branch of berries, I met him on his tracks. I was really asking for it because he did as anticipated, which was to feed me using his lips. The end result of that tiny gesture was us making out on the couch for almost half an hour, and he broke off by saying that we should watch something before things got too far. Oh my world, he even had the willpower to resist the little French he had taught me, which just added him more points. He was winning.
After two hours of watching something, I can’t quite recall, he ordered food which we ate before he took me home. That was the last time I ever saw Devon before I went back to school in Eldoret.
Sure distance couldn’t keep us apart nonetheless the unexpected had to happen. He was supposed to go abroad for three months the exact time I would be in school. Considering I was in my final year of high school, we lost touch and I also had to focus on my studies.
Meanwhile, motivational speakers were in school day in and day out with talks of boyfriends and how they were the cause of poor grades, distractions and all other vices you heard of in high school.
Good thing Devon had travelled cause if not, during that midterm break I might’ve broken up with him. But I guess fate was on our side and our love story still had more days to live. Days came and passed and so did the final exams.
I was so excited knowing that I would love to go back after the stressful exams. Unlucky at cards, lucky in love, or is it the other way around?
But guess what, on a fine evening as I was busy gossiping with my friends and giving them relationship advice, considering I was the most successful having steered mine for a year I received a text.
“Mimi umenitoka kwa roho by the way, tuachane tu.” I thought his phone was stolen because that was no Swahili from an English man’s handset.
I called no one picked up. Facebook? He didn’t have an account. Where else could I reach him? Jen and Kathy saw my world shatter into pieces and as they tried to comfort me I couldn’t help but cry me a river. Everything was too surreal and for a moment I thought I had imagined it all.
But then one year later, on one of those days when 1 + 1 in the past adds up to 2 in the present, I received an epiphany.
To be honest, I was just looking at my sister being all hyper just because she received a teddy bear from her first too. What lesson couldn’t she learn from my story including English accents that do come with the meanest Swahili? Anyway, I closed her chapter with mtaachana tu and went back to my business, cause what do I know?
Adams Arcade did not change. Seven years have gone by but that place still brings me a nostalgia, that can never be equated to anything if not anxiety, ghosts, fallen dreams and a time I never want to relive.
Sometimes I do wonder though, what if his phone was really stolen and he just can’t recognize me now because I’ve changed?
Epilogue;
I guess I wasn’t the only one with eyes and a smile even though I led myself to believe so. Devon changed because I had taken the only two things that pulled him to me, to Eldoret. In addition, it was right when he needed them the most. With this moment of truth, I got closure and finally, I laid my first love to rest. Read My Brother’s Fiancée Broke Up With Him A Week To The Wedding!
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Feature image via teepublic
