The first day I took my fiancé, Denis home to meet my parents, was supposed to be a happy occasion for the family. My parents had known about my relationship with him for sometime and had always wanted me to bring him home. But I had delayed their meeting him until I was really sure he was the right man for me.
A few months ago, I finally took Dennis to meet them. As things turned out, it was one meeting that should never have taken place. Why? You might ask. Well, read my story and you will get the answer.
***
Meeting Dennis
I first met my fiancé at work. In fact, he was my supervisor and boss at the company I worked with when I newly joined. Initially, I was wary about him because of my experience with my former boss at the last place I worked. That man gave me a tough time all because I turned down his advances to date him. And this was a man that was married with seven children!
Anyway, I should not have worried about Dennis. He treated me fairly, more like a younger sister than a boss. He was always giving advice both on the job and even in personal matters too like relationships. Maybe because I was the new girl in the office, a lot of the guys there wanted to date me. They kept pestering me for dates and would not give up even when I had no interest in them.
“Don’t take them too seriously, Meg. That’s what they do whenever a new female staff comes. Especially a pretty one like you,” my boss advised me one day after observing one of my co-workers, a notorious womaniser giving me his ‘manifesto.’
With time, I got to know more about my ‘oga’. Though of mature age, he was about 35, he was not married and seemed to have no fiancé. It was a colleague of mine who told me his story one afternoon during our lunch break.
“He was engaged to be married about three years ago. But unfortunately, his fiancé died before the wedding,” Esther, my colleague revealed.
“What happened?” I asked with interest.
“Well, I heard she was sick. They said she had cancer, something to do with her blood or so,” she added.
“What a pity,” I said shaking my head. I felt sorry for my boss for losing his woman so young.
“Yes. He must have really loved her for since then, he has never been close to any woman again, whether in the office or outside,” she noted.
She could be right. In the one year or so that I had known my boss, I had never seen any female visitor coming to see him at work.
Sometime later, my boss was transferred to another department of the company. And that was when our relationship changed. From being just my boss, we became friends and grew closer than we were before.
He started inviting me out for drinks and even took me out to dinner. It was while we were eating that he made a confession to me. He told me how he had been attracted to me while we were working together but could not do much about it back then.
“Why?” I asked, feeling curiously thrilled at his words. The truth was that, I had had feelings for him for sometime too but had kept mum about the way I felt.
He took a sip of water before he said:
“I didn’t want anything to affect our working relationship. But you are no longer under me now. So…”
From that day, we grew closer. With time, he took me to his home and I met some of his relations. Dennis and I were very compatible, despite the eight year age gap between us. We seemed to like the same things and had the same goals and dreams about life. As our relationship blossomed, I fell more deeply in love with him. He was my ideal man and in him I saw the man I wanted to be with always.
He seemed to feel the same way too. About seven months after our relationship started, Dennis proposed to me. That day, we had gone to the cinema to watch a movie. It was on the way back that he stopped the car and asked me to marry him. I was so happy that I had flung my arms around him and said a loud, ‘Yes!’
Before then, Dennis had been asking to meet my parents, to get to know my family members. But I had always told him to be patient, that when the time was right, he would get to meet them.
A few days after we got engaged, I told my mum that I would be bringing him home.
“Really? That’s good. I can’t wait to see the young man that has made my daughter look so happy!” she enthused.
“Ah! Mum! I always look happy!” I stated.
“But not like this. There’s a glow about you that was not there before. You must really love him,” she said.
I nodded.
“A lot, Mum. I can’t imagine what my life will be without him,” I said.
“He must be really special. What does he look like? Is he handsome?” and she began bombarding me with questions about my fiancé.
“Ah! Mum! Take it easy! You will get to meet him soon so don’t be so anxious!” I stated laughing.
My Mum and I were very close. Maybe because I am the first child and only girl out of four children. Sometimes we were more like sisters than mother and daughter. Often, when we went out together, people often mistook us for siblings. We looked so much alike and my mum looked so young for her age. You see, she married quite early and had me when she was still very young, as a teenager in fact.
I loved her so much and because of our closeness, there was nothing I didn’t tell her including details about my love life.
The weekend that Dennis was to visit, was spent by my mum and I cooking and cleaning our home.
“I want him to know he’s getting a wife who can cook, that he’s not getting a Mr Biggs wife!” she remarked as she stirred a sizzling pot of soup with an enticing aroma that pervaded the whole house.
I laughed, full of joy and anticipation at the meeting of my beloved with my family…
To be continued
What happened when Dennis met Meg’s parents? Keep a date with us next Saturday!
Names have been changed to protect the identities of the narrator and other individuals in the story.
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