Tèmítọ́pẹ́ Ọ̀jẹ́délé-Adéjùmọ̀

Beejay must have read Leviticus 18 for the umpteenth time, because while he was kissing me with all the passion his 5’8, dark-skinned, broadchested and thick-haired self could gather in the hotel room we both agreed to spend a weekend we could not have at his grandma’s mansion, he was totally out of breath; as he alternated between kissing me and assuring me that we did not fall into the list of unlawful sexual relations, just so I could at least return his kiss.

“Toun, we are very distant, too distant for God to feel offended if you have my babies. Babe I love you, please don’t change your mind….”

Right inside my head, a huge commotion was let loose. I was in love with Beejay. Even now, the older and more experienced me is still convinced that what Beejay and I felt was love; it wasn’t some kind of tantrum. But I was naive and confused. I wanted to kiss him back, to run my fingers through his hair and start giving him babies right there and then. But how? I was sixteen, Beejay was 20 and Leviticus 18 or not, we were cousins!  Who would attend our wedding? Who would accept us in our almighty family? I thought of running away with him, and we living our lives like no one else existed to remind us of norms and traditions. But my mother? I would never abandon her like that; even if Beejay were Cupid.

By the time I finally decided that our actions were unreasonable and we had to face reality, Beejay was already unbuttoning my shirt, alternating his soft lips between my lips and my neck, with his right hand already finding its route to my breast, while he kept moaning “I love you, I’m crazy ’bout you”.

I was angry. I pushed him off in a way that greatly startled him, because he thought he had done his sermon well with a concise text. I adjusted my brassiere and was buttoning up my shirt when he came to me again, asking what was going on.

“I can’t do this!” I barked at him.

“Why?” He asked like he was going to cry, a look that I forced out of my emotional zone but rather chose to be appalled by it. I was not going to fall for Beejay.

“Are you nut? Does this feel right to you? We are cousins for Christ’s sake. This is not going to work; we are just out of our damn minds. It’s all faux!” I kept shouting, shaking with my own anger, with tears finding their ways out of my eyes. There was a huge juggle of emotions going on in my head.

I picked my bag and made to leave. Beejay grabbed my hands in a bid to preach more, or maybe apologise like I would reason later, but I didn’t allow whatever it could have been. I slapped him hard across his face and left the room while he looked at me like I was a ghost.

The rest of the month was miserable for me; as I struggled to ignore Beejay’s incessant calls and forced myself not to read his texts. I also had to block him on Facebook, because he started sending me messages there, profusely begging for me not to shut him out.

After a month of torture, I asked my mum one afternoon about how close we are to the Pierres, the Olaremis, the Kuyes, the Browns and the Adenirans. She looked at my tortured self intently, sighed as though she knew why I was asking and went on to press her phone like she would not answer my question.

I felt quite uneasy and went back to reading Danielle Steele’s “Wings” absentmindedly, then she answered.

“We are not related… “Silence.

“At least not by blood…”

Then her phone started ringing; it was Big Mummy.