CHAPTER TWO
Dear Father,
Greetings from England and dry land! And what a journey it was, father, with that mighty sea constantly slapping against the ship and spraying the deck with salty water. There were many days when we saw no land at all and no other ships, just dolphins and flying fish, and once a group of sharks attacked our dolphin friends turning the water red. Occasionally we passed another ship and our captain would blare his horn loudly, saluting the vessel while we waved, but usually it was just us and that endless frightening sea.
On board I made friends with two students. The ship made several stops along the way at Takoradi, Monrovia, Freetown, and the lovely Las Palmas. Once in Liverpool they tugged us into the harbour and I travelled to London, and then up to oxford where I am now in my college rooms.
Oxford is not as I expected, life is different here but a great adventure. Say hi to mother for me.
Yours truly,
Sonia.
Today, Sonia and the barkers were having a drinks party for foreign students at their house at St. Giles. Isabella welcomes Sonia with a warm hug before whisking at her through the kitchen and into the garden where everyone was gathered. Sonia felt disappointed that they had to mingle outside rather than inside where it was warmer, but it seemed to Sonia that this was the British way. People spent all day talking about the weather, complaining about how cold, damp and miserable it was, until the sun poked it's head around the clouds, and then everyone cheered up and started talking about lovely weather. But 'lovely' to Sonia could only be warm weather, not this cold, pale orange sun sitting high up there in the sky. She was thinking of an excuse to return Indoors when she spotted her friend Whitney standing next to a striking-looking man. She had only heard of one Nigerian man in Oxford so she guessed it must be him - the famously handsome third year, Richard.
They were talking literature when Sonia joined Whitney's small circle of friends who stood by the back of the door, which was at least warmer than standing under the apple trees where everyone else had congregated. Whitney was in the process of arguing that Shakespeare was the greatest author of all time while others argued for Tolstoy and Homer. As Sonia listened, it became obvious that the group knew much more about literature than she did. Even Whitney was able to roll out an impressive number of literary theorists in support of her position.
"What does Richard think?" Sonia asked, curious to hear his thoughts for she knew that he read Modern Languages.
"poets are the greatest writers," he answered.
"And why?" She asked, knowing that the safest way to avoid being questioned herself was to do the askings.
She noticed, as Richard talked, that he appeared quite serious: never smiling, despite the fact that the conversation had taken a jocular tone. Sonia had heard women say that Richard was arrogant on account of his beauty. Others thought it was a result of his having lived in England for such a long time. It was rumoured that both his parents had gone to school in England and he had been sent to boarding school as a child. Whatever the reason for Richard's apparent seriousness, Sonia was determined to make a good impression on this handsome man. He spoke eloquently, like an actor, poised and confident so that Sonia quickly lost track of what everyone else was saying until she heard someone say her name.
"What do you think, Sonia?"
"me?" She replied, stalling for time. "I think, if I had to choose, it would always be Shakespeare - the sonnets", she said, with the sinking feeling that someone would now ask her to say more, to explain or God forbid, name a favourite sonnet. To avoid further questions, she mentioned in passing that one of her old teachers had been a poet.
"Christopher Kendis was your Teacher!" Richard exclaimed.
Later that evening Whitney marvelled at Sonia's good luck.
"Did you see how he lit up when you spoke of Kendis? He even smiled!" Sonia laughed, pretending not to have noticed, but of course she had; everybody had noticed.
Sonia did not see Richard again until they bumped into each other the following Monday as he was dashing out of the covered market. He invited her to have coffee with him at the cadena the next day, and to his surprise, she accepted. It was all she could do to stop herself from grinning while saying goodbye.
The following day he was struck by how made up Sonia looked. She was the sort of woman who would always look attractive, but it seemed to Richard that she had put extra effort into styling her hair and adding rouge to her cheeks. He didn't care for the rogue, finding it artificial, but the fact that she had gone out of her way to look good for him was all that mattered. Perhaps she really did like him, he thought, while he talked again about Kendis and some other Nigerian authors. She asked him why he was so interested in these writers. Wouldn't it be more interesting to talk about writers that he must know from around the world? No, he replied, insisting that his knowledge of Nigeria and Nigerian writers was not good enough. It seemed to matter a great deal to him what other Nigerians thought of him. If only he knew how in awe of him they all were! Richard was beginning to think that she was sharing things with him that she might not have shared with others, when she changed the subject and asked him how many girlfriends he had.
"So far I've counted seven," she replied, referring to the number of women who had passed by their table to say hello to him.
Richard tried to laugh it off, but Sonia wasn't laughing. It took some days to convince her that he wasn't the playboy she took him to be. Each time they ran into each other she would find a way of commenting on his female friends, but because she was still talking to him, Richard free bold again and asked if she would like to come to his room for coffee. On Friday night she came, and this time, when she made yet another dig about his so-called girlfriends, Richard decided to play along. Rather than be defensive, he told her all about his teenage fantasies of Indian women and how he used to go to the Lebanese theatre to watch Indian films. Unable to understand Hindi, what else was he supposed to do but look at the ladies? Sonia laughed a lot this time, which gave him courage to turn serious and tell her how beautiful she was. He still half-expected to be pushed away or for her to say something about how silly and young he was, but she didn't, so he grew bolder and took her hands. And then, because she didn't resist, he drew her close, looking at her seductively, he kissed her neck, running his tongue deliciously to the sensitive area behind her ear, she moaned his name when his right hand touched her breast. His tongue and fingers did wicked things to her and she enjoyed every bit of it, from the way he kissed her to the way he touched her, she didn't want him to stop. What she did with Charles was nothing compared to this, Charles was good but Richard is better. They both had the best of themselves giving each other an explosive ending.
For the rest of the term, they spent as much time as they could together. Often, they took walks by the river and now it wasn't only her telling him about her background. He shared his with her, telling her more about his family. There were moments when Sonia felt guilty about Charles, but she reasoned with herself that she and Charles had been too young to make promises to each other. Three years was a long time to be apart at their age and now, when she re-read Charles's letters, they struck her as childish. Charles was just a boy. With Richard she had gained confidence, so much that she no longer felt the need to talk about long term commitments as she had done with Charles. She was after all only nineteen, and now that she had won the chase with Richard, she still hoped to meet other men and expand her horizons.