This Is How She'll Tell It
By Anna-Maria Poku
If you ask Dede, this is how she’ll tell it.
She’ll start by telling you that she’s deeply sad, and that it’s the kind of deep sadness that wraps itself around you and never really lets go. She will describe how it’s the kind of sadness that starts like hunger - small and slow, at first - like how oil heats up in a pan before it starts to spit at you, in an unrelenting sort of way.
She will go on to describe how she almost hates her husband. Almost, because in a twisted sort of way she’s also grateful she found him. She will tell you she resents him and the life they have, even though she chose it. Dede is self-aware like that, you see. She will talk about how devoid of intensity and excitement he is, and how everything is always the same. Here, she will pause for a little bit, look into your eyes and add that he is free of passion, fire and that there is nothing that makes him tick. Nothing that makes his eyes come alive. She will add here that while she loves the life she’s lived and all that it gave her, she is full of regret. You will ask her why. Then, she will smile the kind of nostalgic smile that only old-timers smile, and tell you it is because of Dodzi.
She will say that she’d met him when she was at university, at church of all places, and shaking her head just a little, she’ll ask if you can believe it. Eyes twinkling and beaming with joy, she won’t give you time to respond. She will carry on and say she believes God delivered Dodzi to her. She will tell you that it was on a Thursday and she’d been having a particularly rough week so she’d gone to seek some comfort. And then she’ll mutter, somewhat to herself, that looking back, the whole thing was even more special because she wasn’t even religious. Going to church in the middle of the week was a total one-off but to this day, when she remembers that Thursday, she says a silent thank you to God for allowing her to meet and experience Dodzi Gadekuku. She will tell you how she’d been on her way into the church when he’d bumped into her on his way out. She’ll explain how she’d looked up, expecting to scold whoever it was and tell them to watch where they were going. She will pause the story here and tell you she did that because she is impatient. You will smile at her and say you know, because you always see her shouting at the coconut seller who comes by on Wednesdays, you always hear her telling him to walk faster and with purpose. She will chuckle a little and say that it’s because he walks like a man with no mission. Then she will get back to the story. She will tell you that when she looked up into Dodzi’s face, expecting to say her piece, words failed her. She will explain that she’s not a softy who believes in love at first sight or anything like that, but she’d known immediately that there was something about him. She’ll say that he apologised and, in an uncharacteristic Dede manner, she’d graciously told him no problem. She will tell you that, there and then, she filed him away somewhere in her mind and hoped that they would meet again.
You know that thing where you notice someone for the first time and then it seems like you see them everywhere afterwards? She will tell you that that’s what happened. All of a sudden, she realised they had mutual friends, saw him sitting at the back of classes they shared, saw his name on boards all over school. He was everywhere. She will tell you that they crossed paths again in the restaurant on campus about a week later. She was there to get some lunch and he was there with some friends. It looked like they were just hanging out. But while she stood in line waiting to get her food, she could not, for the life of her, stop looking at him and how animated he was as he spoke. She will tell you that she was enraptured. Then, she will tell you that she did something completely out of character and waited. She’d waited and waited and waited, long after she’d finished eating, so that she could catch him. And she did. On his way out, she’d caught him and she’d struck up a conversation with him and the conversation never stopped. She will tell you how that evening had been nothing short of epic. Everything long forgotten, they’d gone out to see a film, she couldn’t remember which one - just that it was one of those new ones with the cool posters - and then they’d gone back to his room and made the kind of love that you only read about in books; the one where you laugh and feel every single thing. She will tell you that she fell in love on the spot.
She will tell you about how he was cool, calm and collected, always. Guarded. Mysterious-ish. He never gave too much away except for when he was with her. She’ll tell you how she’s not even remotely funny, but when they were together, he’d throw his head all the way back and laugh a laugh from the bottom of his stomach. He’d laugh at some of her corniest jokes and the best part was that you could tell he actually meant it. She will sigh and say it was the most adorable thing.
She will tell you how she’d said ‘I love you’ first. She was the more uninhibited one that way, you see. It had been after a few months. They’d been lying on her bed listening to music and she’d turned over to look at him laying on his back bopping his head slowly and she’d said “Dodzi?” And because he made it a point to always be present, he turned immediately to his side so he could look at her and said “Hmm?” She’ll tell you she responded quietly, whispering the words, almost like she was testing what they felt like in her mouth and said “I love you.” She’ll tell you that he’d gone dead quiet and that she’d panicked, worried that she’d messed it all up. But then she’ll smile as she tells you how he smiled his little secret smile, and said simply, intently, while looking straight at her “I love you too, Dede.”
She’ll tell you about how Dodzi had fire. How you could see it in his eyes when he’d come to her room after class most days, raging about one thing or the other, how unfair it was and how and why he wanted to change it. She’ll tell you how he always stood up for what he believed in and how she was in awe of him and that she still was.
She will tell you that the three years she spent with Dodzi were the best years of her life - that the kind of love they shared was the kind that mattered. The kind that was easy. You didn’t have to choose it everyday. It just happened, because subconsciously, you really really wanted it to. So, it did.
Then she will tell you about how she left him.
She will tell you that even though they had this enduring kind of love, she left him anyway. She’ll say that it was the 80’s and life in Ghana was unbelievably difficult and that after the famine and the drought and the long queues for barely edible kenkey and no fish, she was so tired and barely holding on. She will tell you about how she had a sick mother and little siblings and responsibilities and that when she’d met a man, a rich man, who took a liking to her in the bread aisle of a Kingsway store, she’d paid him attention and that when the attention had turned into a proposal, she’d said yes. She will tell you that she had to choose but that thirty-seven years, a husband, two kids and a whole lifetime later, still, not many days went by when she didn’t think about Dodzi. Then, she will begin to tell you more about him - about them - and what they shared.
Here, you will interrupt and say that quite frankly, you’re surprised she’s telling you all this. After all, you’re doing a report on love and you thought the couple next door who’d been together almost forty years would be the perfect case study. So you’d come and you’d asked her about love and what it took to keep it alive for so long. You’ll say that, honestly, this is not at all what you’d expected her to say. At that point, Dede will chuckle and turn to you in an almost self-righteous way before asking “Am I answering your question or not?”
You’ll be quiet for a moment - only a brief one - and then, smiling, you’ll turn to her and you’ll say “Yes. Yes, you are.”
And then you’ll ask her to continue.
Anna-Maria Poku is a Ghanaian and what she likes to call, a baby writer. She writes bite-size book reviews on her book Instagram @annasreads, but when she’s not doing that, she’s writing about life and love and the in-betweens. She has words in Brittle Paper. You can tweet her @annamariapoku.
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