Previously - Chapter 1
For Nikolai, that time had come. And the choice of a woman he wanted to bear his children was finally made.
It had taken him a while to decide, several months of mulling over the future, but mostly the past and its ghosts, it’s what-might-have-beens. And what a past! And the ghosts!
Chapter 2 - The bridges to burn
Even so, Nikolai’s mind was made up. Anna was as suitable a wife, as any man would wish for.
She was of course not the most beautiful woman he had ever courted. He had seen many, experienced several prettier. But she was beautiful enough, and struck him in many different kinds of ways. Beyond what the eye could see, he admired her Godliness.
Not that he was as Godly himself, heck, she had to force him to church every Sunday! But he appreciated the need for that in a wife, a lesson, probably the only one he had learnt from his late father.
A man - his father once said - may forgive himself for failing at anything, except at choosing a good wife. And that is because by several likelihoods, he plants the seed of a generational repercussion, the first of whose fruit, his children will bear.
That important is the choice of a wife. She is the foundation of family life. She is both its creator and its image. What becomes of the children is mostly her discipline and direction, hardly the father’s.
What becomes of the family’s fortunes is both her diligence and indulgence. The man may earn the family bread, but it is her who saves it, who sets the table. The man may set the family rules, but she enforces them.
Nikolai appreciated this, not least because his mother was the perfect exemplar. She was the reason their family stood ground, not only long after his father passed on, but even during the many years of their tumultuous marriage. Had it been another woman, she would have long walked out on his father, and out on their family.
When on his death bed, his father had told him: “the best gift a man can ever give his children is a good mother,” Nikolai knew where that counsel was coming from, what it was alluding to. Indeed, it was a confession, the least he could say of a woman who, against all reason, had stuck by him and helped build the family.
Until his later years, his father had been all, but a philanderer who perpetually cheated on his wife, a drunkard who was set, not only on drinking out his life, which he finally did anyway, but also on emptying and gambling away the family’s fortunes, which he came close to.
Had it not been for his mother, theirs was a broken family. But she stood her ground, and glued the family, clung to the eternal hope to save him, and could have, if it wasn’t the cancer was beyond her.
It is not too farfetched to suggest that in Anna, Nikolai saw his mother. Strong, faithful, courageous, everything, he had grown admiring about his mother.
It was now several years since those tumultuous days, and both his parents were demised, but the memory was still fresh. He remembered the nights, and they were many, when his father would return home drunk, well past midnight. Uncomplainingly, his mother would open the door. Uncomplainingly, she would warm the food, and set his table.
Whenever they quarreled, despite being on the right, she would end up being the one to apologize. It didn’t make sense then, but now Nikolai understood how that humility was the key to keeping the marriage, the family intact. Then came the years of his father’s sickness, and she had to tend him while at the same time earn the family bread, and oversee their education.
It was too her, Nikolai owed his education, in deed, his everything. It was unfortunate that she had not lived long enough to enjoy his fruit. After years of struggle, he had a week ago, finally gotten his first job a year after she passed on. Everything good was falling in place now. This is why he had finally decided to turn attention to building a family. It was something he could now afford.
And it was timely. Two years since she moved in, Anna needed some sort of assurance. She loved him, and still would, but it was only fair that he took the relationship to the next level.
Until now, he had prevaricated. Without a reliable source of income, he had been unwilling to commit. But that was no longer the case. The insurance company was, by all standards, paying him well. What other reason was there to wait?
Now looking at her, peacefully asleep in his arms, he swore he had made the right decision. She was the bridge he would cross.
Next - Chapter 3
Mirrors
