First love waits and triumphs

LIFESTYLE

“Uncle” attempts to spin a yarn around something of a love quadrangle from some time back, with a knowing smile

HELLO, she says, getting the buzzing phone from her bilum.
Something like surprise, unease and annoyance all rolled into one can be sensed in her tone, and read like a billboard as well.
How so? Let’s just say it is a VHP or very high proximity call. The caller is sitting inside a bus at the Eriku highway PMV stop and the receiver standing a few meters across the street near the Salvation Army lodge.
“Where are you?” the man asks his wife. She does not have the slightest suspicion that he is actually looking at her and watching her every move.
“Oh, we’re here on Krangket Island for a church service and will return home to Sisiak in the evening.”
‘We’ is mother and toddler. Krangket and Sisiak are on the fringes of Madang town, some 300km northwest from Eriku, Lae.
“So Krangket Island is at Eriku, is it?” the husband toys with her while trying to maintain a level voice.
She looks around in horror across to the highway bus stop and up and down Bumbu Road.
“Listen, and listen well,” he tries even harder to remain calm and continue in as civil a manner as he could muster.
“I’m going ahead to Madang and will pack all your belongings. As soon as you arrive there, whenever, simply collect your stuff and leave and never ever think of returning.
“And remember, please don’t create a fuss of any sort when you get there. You and I are done. ”
Ending the call, he slides the PMV window aside and glares at the startled wife across the street. Next to her was a man who was not a stranger; it was her ex. Their gazes meet only long enough for the shock and ugly truth of a marriage about to end to hit home either way. He slides the window back, settles into his seat and prepares to take the five-hour drive home. A mixture of murderous thoughts are whirling around in his mind and his heart is racing. Despite his growing rage he steels himself, knowing that if he does anything rash here, he will only make a fool of himself in the eyes of the couple and bystanders about.
An angry confrontation will only make him appear a sorry loser, he reasons. For there was no better evidence needed than what he is seeing that the woman regards as his wife is not his alone. Their marriage is too crowded and something has to give. Someone has to leave. And he knows who that will be.
It is the story of a son from years back, who came by on some business errand the other day. Sitting at a table in the open-walled lunching area he unravels the twists and turns in his life of marriage.
It is a tale of his own folly, one woman’s betrayal and another’s fidelity. It is also a tale of rekindled love and a happily renewed relationship.
His narrative goes on for a good half hour, interrupted only with a comment or question here and there.
The son would be referred to only as Otaar. Beyond concealing the identities of those involved, he is okay with the story being told, however embellished though it may be.
He had actually left his first wife and a daughter. The couple was brought up in conservative Christian homes and the wife’s dad was a pastor.
From childhood, both were actively involved in church from Sunday school. Later on as a teenager Otaar became an active member of his congregation’s music ministry.
Their youthful romance flourished and naturally led to a marriage that was accepted by both families.
But after a couple of years, the marriage was strained by work commitments and distance as they were living apart. Eventually, they separated and she took custody of their daughter.

Commitment
Instead of running off with another man, the ex-wife committed herself to her education and eventually acquired a post-graduate qualification and taught at colleges.
Otaar on the other hand, was made to try another marriage. His father and the “Eriku woman’s” father were long-time friends and when their children had failed first marriages, they arranged for them to get together to start a new life.
But even from the start of that marriage, Otaar was cautioned that it would require an extra amount of commitment from either party to make it work, with past ‘acquaintances’ still lurking around.
Nonetheless, the marriage was blessed by a pastor and she moved in with a child from the previous marriage. A couple of years later, she had a child with Otaar.
Again, as in the previous marriage, because of his work which involved travelling between Lae and Kimbe they decided that the wife and child remain in Madang while the father would visit them during breaks.
It was on a weekend some time a year later when Otaar, over at Kimbe attending to company work, had a sudden premonition that bothered him. Something tugged at his mind urging him to fly at once to Lae and hitch a bus ride to Madang. He had spoken to his mother in Madang who told him that his wife was attending a church fellowship on Krangket Island that weekend.
Something did not sound right, Otaar thought to himself and wanted desperately to find out what it was. So he purchased a plane ticket for the short hop over the Vitiaz Strait from Hoskins to Nadzab. On the airport transfer bus from Nadzab to Eriku, he was constantly bothered by the feeling that something was about to unfold that would alter the course of his life. Getting off the airport bus, he boards a waiting PMV to head back on the highway and onwards to Madang.
Lo and behold, who would he see but his own wife standing with another man there. And after that short confrontation from inside the bus, he left Lae.
When he arrived n Madang, he broke the news to both families that the marriage was over. The separation was not going to be a simple affair. Problems he had encountered after the end of his previous marriage and his conviction to forgive and reconcile would nag him for some time.
But when he sought counsel from an elder member of his church, he was warned that there was no guarantee that even if he forgave and took back his wife, she would remain faithful because she had already shown what she is capable of doing.
As the y say, once bitten, twice shy. He he took the elder’s caution to heart and finally parted ways with the woman.

Reunion
Meanwhile, the first wife, working in the highlands, hears of the situation and calls Otaar. After an emotional talk over the phone, they arrange to get together and start anew.
The couple moved to Port Moresby toward the end of last year. Their daughter is in Grade 12 at a secondary school in Lae. For Otaar it is a reunion that made him renew his commitment to his first love which he should have never walked away from. A second child is on the way. The age gap of about 18 years between the children is going to be a reminder of a separation that a wisened Otaar looks back on with regret and gratefulness.
Things could have turned out differently but for his wife’s commitment to her education and career and, in some odd sense, faith that her man would one day return.
Now and then Otaar does marvel at the loyalty of the woman next to him and his own foolishness of walking the oft-trodden path of the straying husband.
However, the reunion also vindicates first love yet again.