She broke my heart and had no idea about it

I met her again after seven years. Seven years of unbearable torture. She was walking down the street, a man and child by her side. I followed them into a fast food restaurant and sat a few tables away from them. She ordered for chips and liver.

Oh, she still ate chips-liver. I remembered the 22 or so sacks of Irish potatoes she had eaten during ‘our times’. I remembered the beer she drank every Saturday evening before joining other choir members in church the next day.

Then she smiled. That mischievous smile that followed a really loud laugh! She was still beautiful, too, even after seven years. I watched her chew, turning the food from the left side of her jaw to right and to left again. Memories of me teasing her about how she chewed like a camel several times flooded back.
I followed them after the meal. To the tiny blue Vitz that the man struggled to fit in.

When they finally set off, with the man behind the steering wheel, I hopped on a motorcycle and followed them to their Kisaasi house. I had whole day. I could wait whole day just to talk to her. Ask her why she dumped me the way she did seven years ago.

See, seven years ago, Joselyn and I were the perfect match. We met on a church trip to Kiwamirembe and just clicked, as if by miracle. For about three years, we dated and made plans. She even picked names for the three boys and two girls we were to have.

Then suddenly, she stopped taking my calls or answering messages. She even moved back to her parents’ house and any attempt to contact her was met with hostility. I was broken. Devastated. All I thought about were the three wasted years. Plus the chips she had eaten in the process.

My chance came when he drove out the tiny Vitz. I waited for him to disappear beyond the fourth fence in the estate and knocked at the imposing black gate.
A young man opened. I asked him whether I could talk to Jocelyn. He led me in. When she saw me, she froze, and started crying. She accused me of breaking up with her through a very insensitive text.

“I never broke up with you,” I said. “Instead, you left me. And cut off communication and even returned to your parents.”
Luckily, she still had the phone and text that read: “I have had enough of you, witch. Move on, *itch.”
I do not remember sending such a text. I never owned the Uganda Telecom number on which it was sent. But she never ever asked me about it. She just went silent.
And with the silence, a love I never thought would break.

cabangirah@ug.nationmedia.com