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“How much time do you have?”

“Not going anywhere anytime soon, and Jola is going to sleep till morning.”

“First, I want to apologize to you.”

“For what?”

“Just listen and don’t talk, let me get this out.”

I nod and sit back, noting this is the first time since we arrived that he hasn’t been excited.

“Andrew and I met in the military. We became close friends when he saved my life. I didn’t come from a rich family, but Andrew had all the money and he was friendly. I really liked him. His parents wanted him to marry a girl, Claire, and he didn’t want to marry her. That’s why he joined the military.

After our service was done, he’d hoped his parents would move on from the idea of him marrying Claire. Unfortunately, they didn’t, so he came to me and said let’s travel to Europe. I was excited, plus he was footing the bills, so off we went. We had visited Spain, Germany, and Italy. Our next stop was London, UK, and Andrew accidentally slipped in the hotel. Next thing we know, we are in the hospital.” He sighs. I remain quiet.

“That’s when Eniola came in. Everyone calls her Eni. A true beauty; intelligent with a sexy British accent and soft voice. She was feisty, don’t be fooled by the soft voice. I saw her first while Andrew was sleeping. She was the doctor that night. He’d broken his arm. But for some unforeseen thing, Andrew smiled at her and that was it for her.” He gives a sad laugh.

“We couldn’t continue our trip, not like either of us wanted to. Andrew did everything to keep Eni close to him, even though I told him I wanted her. I felt he was being selfish because he knew I’d fallen for her, and he knew his parents would never accept him marrying her. We both knew Claire was waiting for him back in the US, whether he wanted her or not. But Andrew was adamant that Eni was his and kept fighting me for her.” I know she picked Jola’s dad, but what made them bitter?

“We had a fight over her, and both ended up in hospital. He told me he would never speak to me again if I went after Eni again, because she was his girl. And I said she would never be his because we both knew he was getting married. He shouted at me and said Eni would always be his girl, and I was the one that was too blind to see that she had chosen him.” He exhales.

“After our fight, we went our separate ways. When I heard he had married Jonah’s mother, I figured he had moved on, so I flew back to see Eni.” He pauses for a moment and sighs. I remain quiet because it’s clear my dad is lost.

“To my surprise, she told me he had told her about the marriage and begged her to wait for him, that he would end it in five years, and she had agreed. I tried to convince her to pick me, and she cupped my face and said, ‘you don’t want a woman who already gave her heart away.’ She agreed to be my friend and promised to write to me from time to time.” He’s quiet. Silence is eerie. He never stopped loving her. It’s right there on his face.

“What happened next, Dad?” I ask, this whole conversation is shocking to say the least

“I returned home alone, sad, with lots of hatred for Andrew. I felt he was selfish and he had all the money, and this one thing that I wanted, he couldn’t let me have. It took a while for me to get over what I believed was betrayal. I met your mother in between my anger. It was supposed to be a fling, until she told me she was pregnant with you, and I decided to close the door on any thought of Eni and didn’t speak to Andrew again.

You and your brother were born, and life just went on, until the day I received a letter. I was glad to be the one that picked up the mail that day. You were about nine or ten, and the letter was from Eni. She wrote that she’d thought about me and decided to write, hoping I would reply if I got the letter. She talked about her work and ended the letter saying she and Andrew were married and she had had two miscarriages and decided to focus on her work only because she didn’t think it was possible for her to ever have a child. I suddenly felt sad for them. I decided to see her in person. The address on the letter was in London, which was surprising because, in her letter, she’d mentioned that she was married to Andrew, who I knew lived in California. I went to see her. She was happy to see me, and we talked at length. I showed her pictures of you boys. That’s when she told me she was pregnant again and she really thought this baby would survive. She hoped it might be a girl and told me the J name. She also told me Claire, Jonah’s mother, was constantly harassing her, which was the reason she lived in the UK and not California.

We laughed and I said goodbye to her. We took that picture at the airport and that was the last time I saw her or heard from her, until I heard about her death. Andrew, of course, called to curse me out when she told him I’d visited her, and he promised to have me on his shitty list, and started blocking all my business moves. Our hatred just grew from there. And I moved to the Midwest.

Then you and Jonah met in the military, and you just happened to save Jonah’s life.” It was either I saved him or forever lived with the knowledge that I watched him die when I could have done something. “Andrew called to thank me, and I told him we were even. He’d saved my life and you saved Jonah’s life. I told him we need not talk again after that day.”

“So, you didn’t speak to him after that?”

“He called when your mother died, and I called him when I heard Eni died. That was the last time we spoke. I asked him if he and Eni had a child, because I didn’t know if she had another miscarriage. He said yes, and at that moment, he didn’t know how to help his daughter because she was the only survivor in the accident that killed Eni and Eni’s entire family. Eni had shielded her. I told him to just keep her close to him.”

“She still has nightmares,” I say.

“I can imagine. It was a terrible plane crash. They were returning from a wedding. He told me it took a while for rescuers to get Jola out, and, miraculously, she was not physically hurt.” She has a scar on her left thigh that she tries to hide, and she still relives the accident in her sleep. That’s a scar that takes time to heal, if it ever heals.

“Now Eni’s daughter is in my house.” He smiles. “I can’t believe it, and my son has fallen in love with her.” I ignore the latter.

“Dad, so all this while, you and your best friend fought over a woman?” I ask.

“I wasn’t fighting with him after I met your mother and had you boys. He was the one that wouldn’t let it go and kept blocking all my businesses, to the point I had to leave the west coast.”

“You went after his woman, Dad. He loved her. From what Jola tells me, she was the love of his life.” I snap. I would have done worse to you if you’d tried that with me. I can’t believe my whole life of hating Jonah was based on Dad’s lies because he fell in love with a woman that picked his former best friend.

“I did apologize to him when he called to thank me about you saving Jonah.”

“What did he say after you apologized?”

“He apologized for blocking my business ideas and opportunities. He said Eni was upset with him when she heard what he’d done.” He chuckles. “He said, ‘you know her, she didn’t speak to me for a month.’ That sounded very much like Eni.”

“Did Mom know about Eni?”