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Chapter 23: He would have waited forever
- African Perspectives
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- 135 Sahara and I swaggered and swayed in each other’s arms until it was time for me to relieve Rebekah from her watch over Gray.When I was leaving the studio, Sahara asked me to meet him there the next morning on my way to the hospital. “At 6am?Are you mental?” His grin set my whole being ablaze.Though I firmly held that anything that started before 10am was uncivilised, I was much too euphoric to protest any further. So when I staggered into the dimly lit studio in my scrubs, not yet sufficiently caffeinated for such a ghastly hour, Sahara was waiting for me at the barre looking like a delicious dream. His eyes locked on mine and drew me to him. I moved without knowing it, and when I found myself before him, he took my hand and got down on one knee. “Acacia GraemeWolf, you are a tornado of loveliness.” Fire in his tone and in his eyes. I was transfixed. “The moment I met you, in this very spot, I was caught up in your storm. Scary as it was, since it was obvious to me that you belonged to someone else, I knew you were home. I knew I was home. I know I wouldn’t be kneeling here if your heart hadn’t been marauded by tragedy and loss. I’m truly sorry for what happened to Taylor.This is not how I wanted to have you.You deserve every happiness. I love you, mama. And I love Gray as if he were my own. It will be my honour to be a part of your family.” “You already are,” I choked through my tears.“You already are.” And with that, he slipped Taylor’s rings off my finger.They were still - 136 unconsciously a permanent part of my wardrobe. For a fleeting moment, my ring finger naked, I couldn’t breathe. Not once sinceTaylor put them on had I taken them off. Not once, despite practically having to hold them onto my finger when I lost weight during my pregnancy. Not once, despite the constant battles I fought with latex gloves every shift at the hospital. Not once. Only when Sahara dressed me in his own exquisiteness did I breathe again.It was the ring his late father had crafted for his mother.An intricate Egyptian-Moroccan design that spoke of another love.A love beyond my own. It fit me perfectly. He fit me perfectly. Sahara. Strange as it was to everyone who came, Sahara and I had our wedding in the dance studio just six weeks later. I couldn’t imagine marrying him anywhere else.There I had met him, there had he pursued me, and there had I given my heart to him. Rebekah and Padma, my recurring bridesmaids, furnished the studio elegantly for the ceremony and reception, leaving enough room for Sahara’s students to perform Swagger and Sway for our guests. Mum gave me away (again!), Sahara’s mother was his “best man”, and Gray was our ring bearer – well, a squirming Gray carried byTaylor’s mother.We were quite the potpourri.A heterogeneous hodgepodge of terrifying happiness. And though I missedTaylor and thought ofTony, it was a simple and yet sensational day. Sahara arranged for Gray to be looked after by his grandmothers while he whisked me off to our honeymoon. Astounding iron ladies. Three brilliant multinational women to teach my son things I would never be able to.What a lucky boy. I left Gray in the best of hands as I began my wifehood as Mrs Sahara Camden. Sahara took me to the Fiji Islands for a week and then to Sydney for a few days. As much as he loved New York, deep down Sahara’s heart always missed the South Pacific.The piercing cry of seagulls and whitecrested waves suited him. He was positively ecstatic about showing me all the places he had loved when he was growing up.The boy he was then [54.167.52.238] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 23:15 GMT) - 137 had literally been oceans away from the girl I had been, and yet there we were.Together. One. Our last night in Australia, as I lay in my husband’s arms, I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude. “Thank you, Sahara,” I murmured, struggling to keep my voice steady. “For what, my Nubian love?” he laughed, looking at me like a child on Christmas...