It was a baby boy.

Edem kissed his hairy hair softly and placed him on his chest.

Ini stared at Edem for long moments. There were tears in her eyes. She didn’t know what to do or say. The moment was here. The moment she had always wanted for her husband. The moment he would carry his own child. The child that would bear his name. His own blood.

She was aware of his secret cravings for his own child. He said it in his prayer points.

“Congratulations,” Ini whispered softly to him. He nodded tearfully at her. It was almost the happiest day of his life.

Ini turned to leave, but Edem’s arm snaked out and caught her hand. He was holding the baby in the other hand.

David walked away when he saw that Edem and Ini needed to talk.

“Whatever happened to us,” Ini said softly as he faltered. He swallowed and then released a long sigh of frustration. “It’s hard to say this.”

“You have a son now. What you have always wanted,” Ini said.

“I wanted more than a child.” He stared admiringly at the baby who was still sleeping peacefully.

“Go find her. It’s what you wanna say, you can get a good nanny,” Ini took her hands off him and walked away.

The anxious indecision on Edem’s face brought an ache to his heart. He didn’t know what to do. He’d stopped loving his wife long ago, just when he’d first kissed Emily.

He got to his feet gently and took the baby in his arms to his bedroom.

————————————-

He’d gone around town, looking for Emily with David the driver. Her phones were switched off and he was going insane. He’d gone to her house at Osongoma.

When the baby’s cry came in loudly, he ordered David to park the car by the roadside, then he called his mother.

“You have a grandchild now mama. It’s a long story mama, I don’t know what to do. He seems hungry,” he said over the phone.

When his mother heard the cry of the baby over the phone, she screamed excitedly.

“I will be at your house now,” she said and hung up the call.

“Let’s go home,” Edem ordered David.

He cuddled the baby in his arms till they got home.

[b]Link: [/b]https://africanfictions.com/behind-a-thousand-smiles-vol-2-chapter-2/