Memories

Pregnancy was such a delicate time for me. Well it is a delicate time for every woman. I started the Journey quite energetic, it was fun too but as I progressed further into mid trimester, I started to not be myself. It felt like I was literally living for the baby as every strength I own felt abstract. It was my body but with the pregnancy hormones, it felt like the body was given to me on loan or some sort of package that I can't get full access to. I became lazy and was always fatigued. I got nauseous and was sore all over.

I was almost rounding up with my second degree and I would say that I got lucky because most of the school work was done during my early trimester. Towards the end of mid trimester when I started experiencing all the burdens and baggage that comes with pregnancy, I had just exams and my project work to contend with.

Being that I no longer had coursework, I had a solid reason to live in the comfort of my room. Already, I felt like the weight of the world was bearing heavily on me. Thus, trying to be unnecessarily mobile will just be an extra burden that I could not deal with at the time.

Unless I need to go to the market or sit for an exam, I'm always lying down on my bed, of which most of the time, I am sound asleep. At one point, my course mate had to shift our study from my room to the classroom as I was fond of dozing off during study time.

Why he is at my study area, I am lying by my side with my textbook on the bed. One minute it felt like I was reading and the next minute it's my friend hitting hard on the study table with both his hands to get me to wake up and keep me alert. Sometimes, I'd get really angry at him for disturbing my sound sleep and even lie that his actions have made me forget all that I have read.

He'd just give me a stern look and say to me, "keep deceiving yourself.” After several failed attempts to progress with the study time held in my room, he made it clear that we are switching to the class area as it's obvious we are not doing much with study and it seemed like I'm slowing him down.

The first attempt that we made to study in the classroom till day break was a disaster. My friend had called that evening to inform me that he's praying at the mosque. When he's done, he would come over to my hostel to pick me up so we could go to the class together to read till day break. But the issue was that I felt so sleepy and despite having a paper to write that week, I was willing to damn all consequences just to sleep. I quickly placed my phone on silent, made sure my door was locked and slept like a baby. When my friend came, he kept knocking and I heard but was too far between sleep to do anything.

I saw my phone blink signifying I had a call, I managed to raise my head a bit and peeped at my screen to see who's calling and I saw that it's my friend. Quietly, I turned to the wall, adjusted my head properly on my pillow and dozed off. Before dozing off, I could hear him walk away and honestly I felt bad but then it was a battle between the pregnancy hormones and my study and the hormones won.

By the next day, I felt some type of way and could not being myself to call my friend, because I thought he'd be so upset and I wasn't ready for any confrontations or scolding. I know that I did wrong and I thought it best to just let the whole issue from last night cool off before reaching out to my friend. I finished up with my normal morning routine and as usual dived into my bed. I was about to drift to lala land when I heard a knock on my door. Although I wasn't expecting anyone, I was curious to know who's there so I got up, opened the door and right there was my friend standing there with his school bag starring at me.

I froze and didn't know how to react. My heart for some reason kept beating so hard like it would pop out from my chest through my mouth. While I struggled with words, he spoke to me like I am a very unserious person. "Nowhere to run today, I know that if you were expecting me, you won't have opened. Now that I have caught you awake, get dressed, let's go for lectures.

"Lectures? What do you mean lectures? Are we not done with course work?" I asked in a high pitched tone with the sleep in my eyes almost clearing.

"You see your life? When all you do is sleep, how will you know what's happening? I know you don't even bother to check the group chat and that's exactly why I'm here because if I leave you, you will fail woefully and your school fees will go to waste...."

"Will you go straight to the point and tell me the class that we are having or should I close my door?" By now, I was already irritated and agitated as I felt all that talk was unnecessary. I needed to know the importance of the lecture if it's something that I can forfeit and let the pregnancy hormones win again. But it turns out to be a class the lecturer rarely taught and he wants to do a last minute revision with us before the exam to avoid mass failure. Certainly that's not an exam pregnancy hormones can win again.

Still a bit sleepy, tired and exhausted, I got dressed in a free top and mom's jean while my friend waited outside at my door for me to finish. I got done, came out and we set for class. Since we were already running late, we decided to pass a shortcut, a bush path behind the hostel. My friend walked so fast trying to beat time, while I walked behind struggling to catch up. The faster I walked, the more it felt like he was farther ahead, I felt my speed slow down and my breath shortened. “Does this man not know that I'm pregnant?” I had thought in my head. Surely, due to my condition he should reduce his pace already.

Like he read my mind, he turned and saw me lagging behind in struggles, taking several stops to catch my breath. He stood at a distance, shook his head and came back for me. He held my hand so we could meet in the middle and manage our speed for it to sync.

It felt better walking behind him holding hands, I wasn't overwhelmed like I was and I seemed to be moving at a more moderate speed. Nothing too fast and nothing too slow. But then, I got tired and pretty exhausted, my speed dropped as it felt like my friend was dragging me along like a small goat being dragged to the altar of sacrifice. Just as we were about to come out at the end of the campus area, I got a nudge to look at the floor of which I did. Lo and behold, I saw something move effortlessly in the grasses in a twisting and oscillating motion. I squinted my eyes, looked closely and saw it was a snake.

The way I jolted? And forcefully freed my hand from my friend's? I didn't even know where the strength came from but I saw myself running like crazy back to where we were coming from and screaming snake snake….

I managed to look back and saw my friend chase the snake while making several attempts to hit it with a stone.

At that point I concluded that lecture has ended but boy was I wrong as after my friend chased the snake away, he came to where I was trying to catch my breath before running back to my room and dragged me by the hand to continue our journey to the class. This time around, he didn't need to drag me as I walked briskly ahead of him trying to get out fast from the bush path.