EVEN for my age, I knew Miss Jean
was wildly beautiful. I am sure my father had the same opinion about her, my
mother on the other hand was never a fan of hers. She always complained about
her fat cheeks and legs, her article of faith was that the men living in the
apartment block were blind and lacked a contextual definition of beauty. My
father always disagreed with her submission on Miss Jean’s beauty. He would give
up when my mother reminded him of the fact that she was single and also growing
old. She often said “If she is beautiful as you people claim, why doesn’t she
have a husband?”
A week before my birthday I knocked
on her door and reminded her of my upcoming birthday. She said and I remember
those words up till now “Why would I forget my sweetheart’s birthday?” She
locked her door, went to her car and drove off. That evening, she returned holding
assorted cooking items. When I saw it, I was very happy because I thought she
had bought those things for my birthday. That evening, she prepared vegetable
rice and black sauce. My mother was in the shared kitchen when she was
preparing the food. Little words were exchanged between the two; my mother
never liked her, she used to be the beautiful woman in the apartment block
before she came so it was more like Miss Jean had come to eclipse her shine.
After cooking, Miss Jean, went to
her room and never came out. But from outside, I saw candles lit on her dining
table, it was very obvious that she was expecting a special visitor of some sort.
My mother too saw this! I doubt if there was ever an issue in the house which
my mother was ignorant of. “I think Miss Jean is expecting a visitor” my mother
greeted my father immediately he came home from work.
“I have every reason to believe so.
I hope it’s a husband for her” he replied and quickly went to the table to have
his diner.
Nothing happened, no one came to
look for Miss Jean. On the next day, the food that had been previously been
prepared by Miss Jean found its way to the bin. You can imagine the smirk that
was on my mother’s face when she saw this.
For five days in a row, Miss Jean
prepared special food each evening and ended up throwing them away the next
morning. I was particularly annoyed about the whole happenings. For the love of
God, Miss Jean was a better cook than my mother, instead of her wasting the
food, she could have given it to the children in the block. Before long,
everyone noticed this and became worried even my mother.
On the sixth day, something
happened that changed my life forever. Miss Jean never came out of her room.
She missed work and this was quite unusual. We stopped hearing the sound of her
sweet voice as she sang to popular songs we all knew of. Her apartment was just
quiet.
“Don’t you think we should go find
out what is wrong with Miss Jean?” my mother said.
“I think not, we all know she has
been through a lot recently, we should let her sob. She will be alright at the
end.”
This conversation came to an abrupt
end after my father headed straight to the dining table to have his meal. My
mother was however not satisfied. Immediately, my father stepped out for choir
practice, she went to knock on Miss Jean’s door. No one answered. She knocked
again waiting for a response. After standing there for about ten minutes, she
gave up and walked to the kitchen.
She barely reached the shared
kitchen when she heard something heavy fall in Miss Jean’s house. She quickly
rushed there and pushed the door, luckily it was opened. And there Miss Jean
was; as dead as a door knob. My mother shouted and this attracted the attention
of everyone living in the house. Beside her was a note which read “Bruce, is
this too much to ask? Just a night with you to make me a mother?”
She was sent to the mortuary. A
week later, she was buried and her apartment was given up for rent. Her
replacement was the exact opposite of Miss Jean who matched my mother boot for
boot. A year later, we moved out the apartment block to another because my
father was tired of stopping these two women from fighting. Till then, I never
got my gift from Miss Jean and more importantly, Bruce never passed by the
house to look for Miss Jean.
