SANTORINI

Enjoy the first post for this year under the ‘Precisely mine’  column anchored by Ayokunle Adedipe

It’s been a while I wrote. It’s been a while I actually poured out my feelings in paper and honestly, I’m tired of my melancholic writing. The situations around me have turned me to a sad writer. Always writing about tragedies and lost dreams and sold desires. 

I had to take a break from humanity. From all the noise, drama and unnecessary conversations. From all the thinking and pressure that you have to do well and always strive to be a better person. The world was moving and it was changing as fast as I could change out of jeans. 

Santorini had given me the best gift since the gift of salvation. Silence. Peace. Solitude. 

That was what I craved more than anything and I am glad Santorini was the perfect place for it. I looked up from the paper I was writing and soaked in the cool sun. If there was anything like a cool sun, Santorini had it. For the past 2 weeks, I was becoming a new person. I cried every night to sleep for the first week then the second week experimenting every new food in the hotel before I retired for the night. You would wonder why I cried for 7 nights. It was the Greek movies. Never knew Greek romance could be so heartbreaking. 

Today was the beginning of my last week and I wasn’t even ready for the holiday to end. I had taken a month off work but I still had to see my parents. They would want me to stay and enjoy my last week of holidays but I owed it to them to visit. I hadn’t turned on my phone since I got here. I only checked my work emails and my parents sent me regular mails to my work email. 

I couldn’t bring myself to check my social media accounts either. I hadn’t deactivated it but I have been off social media for more than  6 months. I sipped the famous Santorini white wine ‘Assyrtiko De Louros’ and laid down to watch the sunset. That was my routine since I got here. Today’s sunset was different. It reminded me of the sunset in Hawaii. It had this same setting but I wasn’t alone then. I was with a man. My husband. It was our 2 year anniversary and he decided to surprise me by taking me to Hawaii. We were both hardworkers so we barely had time for a vacation. It was the best surprise until I found out I was pregnant during the trip. I was over the moon. We were going to be parents. After the trip, we went back to New York and started getting the house ready for our baby. 

One night, I got home early and he was working late. He didn’t come home that night but he sent me a voice mail that he would be home soon. 

The next day, the police called and asked me to come identify a body. It was his. He was found dead with a gunshot wound on his forehead by the corner of his work place. They ruled it a suicide and closed all investigations. I went into premature labour immediately I saw his cold, lifeless body and had to deliver our baby by myself. My parents flew to New York as fast as they could but they didn’t get there on time. My beautiful baby boy stayed in the NICU for 3 months till he was normal enough to be discharged. In those 3 months, I buried my husband. In those 3 months, I lost a part of my soul. It’s been a year since his death and 6 months since I saw my son. He looked too much like his father. I couldn’t look at him without remembering how pale my husband looked on that table. 

My mum would look after him till I was strong enough.

Santorini had cured me a bit of that pain and I knew I had to go back home even if it wasn’t for myself. For my boy. For our boy. 

It was dark already and the beauty of Fira was at its peak. If only he was here with me to witness it. I knew it wasn’t a suicide. I was sure of it. We were a happy family and we told each other everything as it should be and I knew I shouldn’t be investigating anything. I wasn’t a cop or anything related but I had to do it for his sake and for our son’s sake.

After Santorini, it was time.