It was the most relaxing evening; the hammock rocked gently, soft breeze swayed the full green leaves on the big tree to which my hammock was tied, I had a book in hand… I remember that evening well, every little detail, every word that was said; it’s one that I won’t ever forget. The book that I was reading was so intriguing that I was talking to myself at some point: “Dude! She didn’t really mean that! Can you not see at all?” Yea, I’m weird like that.

Anyway, I was so engrossed in the book that I didn’t hear approaching footsteps and suddenly I felt a hand on my head. I almost jumped out of the hammock and my skin. Oti held me back and smiled that smile that I loved so much; it made his dimples appear deeper and he looked so darn cute. “Sorry babe, I didn’t mean to startle you”. He was grinning now, and I couldn’t even keep a straight face.

“I could’ve fallen out of this thing AND I asked you to stop calling me babe; you know why”.

“Well, we’re alone now aren’t we? I can call you babe when we’re alone.” I scowled at him and went back to my reading.

“Bee…?”

I loved it when he called me Bumble Bee or Bee for short. He said it was because I was contagiously bubbly and always buzzing with ideas. It always made me smile.

“Yeah”

“We need to talk. Can you listen for a second?”

“Listening” I said, even though my attention was on the book.

“Babe, you really need to look at me and listen for this one”

“Okay, shoot.”

“Bee, we can’t keep hiding this”

“Hiding what?”

“Hiding us. I think we should let everyone know about us; we don’t have anything to be ashamed of, we love each other. Besides, how much longer do you think we can keep up the hiding?”

I snapped the book shut and turned to him “Uhm, let me refresh your memory…”

“I know, I know, I’ve heard all the reasons why telling everyone would be a bad idea, but Bee, I love you so much; you don’t even know how much I love you, and babe,…” he reached in his pants pocket and brought out a little black velvet box, got down on one knee and my alarm system went off.

I kept saying: “No, no, no, please don’t do that”, but he went ahead and asked

“Please, marry me”. I stood and tried to get out of the hammock while still saying: “No, no, no, no, no, no” Well, that was not a good move, because the last thing I remember was saying: “no, no, nooooo!” and then everything was black.

______________________

Patricia and I were course mates. We didn’t really have much to say to each other at first; we just smiled politely at each other, and as time went on, we occasionally asked each other about our different classes or the latest movies. We really started talking when we both graduated from college. After graduation, we had pretty much nothing to do, so we hung out a lot. Pat was a great girl, so we became quite close after a little while. For two people who had mostly really different interests, we got along surprisingly well. One breezy evening, with our backs to the tree that served as shade in front of my house, we chatted away and somehow got to discussing grandparents.

“Wow, I haven’t seen Grandpa in a while” Pat said.

“Your paternal or maternal grandpa?”

“Maternal”

“I should go see him, you wanna come with?”

“Uhmm, I’m not so sure about my old people skills, but hey, why not?”

“Gramps is not old”

“Yeah right, he’s young-at-heart abi? (I laughed) when are we going to see him?

“Is tomorrow ok?”

“Yeah, sure”

“Great. We’ll leave in the afternoon. If we run late, he’ll have his driver bring us back”.

And so, on that fateful noon, Pat and I went visiting her grandfather. The house was pretty impressive; really nice decor in the living room – that was far as I saw – everything basically reeked of class and old money.

“Girl, I didn’t know your gramps was this rich!”

“Ode, shut up and sit down jor” she laughed and then went up the marble spiral stairway.

She returned minutes later with a middle-aged man on her arm; he couldn’t have been more than 50 – or so I thought. When Pat said: “Bassie, this is gramps, otherwise known as Grandpa O” I didn’t do a great job of concealing the shock. The man looked at me and smiled. He was good looking; I mean, I thought someone with a granddaughter as old as Pat should be way older, probably resting one side of his body on a cane. Ok, Pat wasn’t that old, she was quite young, as was I.

We chatted well into the evening, when it was time to leave, Grandpa O hugged his grandchild, and then kissed his back of my hand, looked directly into my eyes and said: “it was really nice meeting you B”.

“It was nice meeting you too, sir”.

He turned to Pat and told her that his driver would take us home, just as she had predicted.

I could have sworn there was something in Grandpa O’s golden brown eyes when he looked at me; there was something about him that unnerved me a little…

My name is Bassie, at the time, I was 21 years old and I had absolutely no idea what I had just walked face first into…

What about the concluding part

I'll likely put that up later Better yet, you can read it on my blog here: http://thelityard.com/mindless-behaviour-2/

niyot124:
What about the concluding part