The wedding

The guests were gathered outside the huts, the birds chirping happily and the air filled with merriment.

It was as if I was experiencing an out of body adventure. I could feel everything happening around me, the ululations, the jovial laughter the dancing and the merriment. I’d watched a lot of movies where the hero who had died would watch as people fussed and cried over their bloodied body. I could see how they where there, but also not there. I felt exactly the same way. Everyone seemed to be jovial while my world was falling apart.

The wedding, as per custom, took place at the groom’s home stead. I had been present, following behind as the bride, my sister Helen, left her traditional homestead early in the morning, with a blanket given by her mother. Her father had led the way to her future in laws’ home after Helen was told not to look back so as not to invite bad luck. Her father’s voice was loud and clear as it shouted out praises and called out clan names, telling his ancestors that his daughter was leaving the clan to join another. 

Once she had arrived at the groom’s house, Helen had walked around his home to introduce herself to the ancestors before she had slipped in through the kitchen door with no one noticing her. The groom’s family then had to pay a penalty for not noticing her when they should have fetched her. The official ceremony where my sister, the only family I knew would be marrying my husband who I loved to death, would be happening at midday.

When my mother ran off while I was seventeen, she left behind trust for me to complete my education and to take care of my sister who was seven at the time. We had always known that we had different fathers all together but Helen and I were still very close. We had to be, my mother had eloped and lost contact with her parents who would never let her marry a black man. She had been in love with my father since they were eighteen and it had taken bravery on her part, to leave her wealthy parents and move to South Africa where she lived an average life. Despite everything, they were happy. I was only four years old when my father died, but I had glimpses of him in my heart. He was handsome, loving, kind and everything I could have ever needed in a father. Everything that Gavin, Helen’s father and my mother’s second husband wasn’t. He left as soon as my mother was pregnant and my mother’s mental health deteriorated from there.

I had been the one to take care of Helen since she was seven. I worked three jobs, got into a local college instead of an overseas one, passed up on any partying phase, put her through school and made her he center of my world. I gave up on my dream of being a travel nurse and settled on Accounting, a safe and stable job, so I wouldn’t be away from her. I even supported her choice to go into modelling instead of finishing school. The only thing I had that I ever had for myself was Kevin. And she took him as well.

Kevin was the son of the owner of the Accounting firm I worked at. We had met a number of times at company functions before we finally talked. He was a defense lawyer by profession, and his parents’ pride and joy. He was also handsome, charming and everything I ever wanted. I fell in love with him in no time. His father, my boss, was rather fond of me and had always been happy when Kevin and I got together. His mother on the other and hated me, and especially when his dear son married me without her approval.

My best friend Clara, reckons I went wrong when I let my twenty year old sister stay with my husband and I. She had always warned me. She had told me that Helen had changed ever since she reunited with her father and her step-mother. I was so blinded by my trust and love for Kevin that I could not see what was in front of me. I was so caught up with trying to give my husband the child he and his mother demanded that I did not realize that Helen and my mother in law had become the best of friends.

At the back of my mind I could hear Clara begging me to leave the wedding with her, to stop torturing myself and divorce the man I loved more than anything and cut ties with the only family I had, but her words didn’t register. I was stuck staring at Kevin’s father, the one I thought had had my back, my biggest supporter, as he made a welcoming speech. A speech that welcomed his new daughter to the family. My eyes were still stuck on him when the exchange of gifts ensured. He in turn refused to meet my gaze.

My gaze went to Helen next. Helen who silently sat on a grass-mat, eyes downcast as a sign of respect for her guests. I couldn’t help but think about how disrespectful she had been when she told me she had fulfilled my duty. She said I couldn’t give my husband a child  and she had done my job for me. She also made sure to announce how she and I would be sisters again when she married my husband in seven days. All the while she was naked in my bed, my husband silent and looking remorseful besides her. I hadn’t shed a tear then, I was still yet to. In the background of my wandering thoughts, I could hear the singing and dancing of all those who had received gifts. The groom was the last person to arrive.

Kevin was still as handsome as the first time I saw him. I had never seen him in Zulu attire since I had gone for a white wedding, but he looked very regal and I found myself smiling besides myself. His six-foot-five frame, light features, stylish haircut and soft hands betrayed just how out of touch with his culture he was. He was still the most handsome man in the room to me though. it was at that moment, when Kevin arrived, that I re-entered my body. It became real and I grew aware of my surroundings.

The bride got up, made a mock bed and went to look for her husband. When she found him, she placed a grass-mat leading to the bed, on the floor, before him. He was to sit on the bed. She then took a basin with water and soap and washed his feet before pulling back the covers of the make-shift bed and inviting the groom to sleep. As the dramatic end of the ceremony commenced where the female members of the bride’s family got sticks and started beating the groom while he got up and ran, It was then that I had an epiphany.

I had been so invested in blaming Helen and Kevin’s mother for my pain that I had resolved to stay with Kevin. I had let him into my bed the previous night. Even though I felt empty and betrayed, I had let him off the hook because I was convinced he loved me and it was my fault he had to seek my sister’s bed for comfort. I had been willing to share my husband with my sister because I already loved her and had given up a lot for her already it wasn’t worth making a big deal of sharing one more thing with her. I was being too hard on myself because of fear of being alone and unloved. 

But no more. 

I had Clara. I had myself. I had friends who had begged me to leave Kevin because I was worth so much more. Family isn’t only by blood. I could choose my own family. And even though it would hurt, I would get over Kevin and Helen’s betrayal and start a new family of my own. I was barren and I could never have kids of my own. But that was okay, there were lots of orphans around the world. Orphans who needed someone to love them. Someone who would be loyal.

Family is loyalty.

I smiled to myself as I walked besides Clara, my very own family. My back was at Helen, and my heart would be next. She had betrayed me in the worst possible way and I was done.