IT WAS almost four p.m. when Raphael's driver, Nick, pulled up to Tami's house.
Nick had been rather quiet all the way here. The last time he saw his boss and Tami was the night Raphael left for the airport, then Nick heard all over the news that the woman was 'missing'. Poor Nick didn’t know what to do or how to approach the situation, but he surely minded his own business.
Nobody spoke all the way here. Not Raphael, not Nick and obviously not Tami.
They sat outside the familiar house for over ten minutes, simply because Tami wouldn't let go of Raphael. She knew she was home, but she refused to open her eyes and face reality.
The minute she steps through that door, she knew it would all become real and she wasn’t ready. If she could, she would have Raphael take her back to his mansion for a few more days so she can cope.
“Tami? Baby, we’re here,” Raphael mumbled as he tried to ease her away. But she growled like a puppy latched to its bone and stayed right there in his arms.
Sighing, Raphael knew there was no way he was getting her to let go, and so he pushed the door and stepped outside.
He drew in a deep breath.
This was indeed dangerous, considering that many people still believed that Tami was kidnapped. Raphael gazed around, meeting the gaze of inquisitive neighbours peeping through their blinds as they ushered the rest of their family to come look.
But he also knew that he couldn’t take her back to his hotel room. Even though she didn’t want to face it, she needed to be home.
After counting to ten, Raphael raised his fists and gently knocked the door. Tami’s form began trembling in his arms and soon after, a short, brown woman who looked a lot like Tami answered the door.
Her eyebrows pulled together in confusion for a moment, until her gaze fell to the woman curled in his arms.
At first she was speechless as her body shook violently. Then her eyes watered and her hands flew over her mouth in astonishment.
“It can't be,” she mumbled, and the very sound of her voice had Tami raising her head from Raphael’s chest. When they met each other’s teary gazes, all their composure crumbled.
“Mama?”
“My baby!” Tami’s mother, Sarah, cried as Tami shuffled from Raphael’s arms. The moment felt long deserved as they grabbed each other in a hug, Tami immediately breaking down in a sobbing mess.
Raphael pulled his lips between his teeth as he watched them. It was surely an emotional moment.
“I’m sorry,” Tami said through cries. “I’m so sorry, mama.”
“It’s okay,” Sarah assured with her eyes still glued shut. “It wasn’t your fault.”
‘Oh but it was’, Tami thought, but kept it to herself. All she wanted to do was appreciate this moment—the calm before the storm. Because she knew a storm was indeed coming.
Slowly, Sarah opened her eyes which then landed on Raphael as he stood casually in the doorway. He didn’t want to intrude, but he didn’t want to leave Tami just yet either.
“Are-are you with the police?” she asked in hopes to get this all over with and done. With a missing daughter and a dead husband, Sarah hasn’t been getting a lot of rest lately.
“No, ma’am. I brought her home,” he simply said with guilt eating away at his very nerve. He was aware only now of the pain he put these people through, and he hated it.
“Brought her home?” she mimicked with narrowed eyes. “But how? The police had been looking everywhere-“
The pause and sudden look of realization on Sarah’s face confirmed both Tami and Raphael’s fears.
“It was you. Wasn’t it? You took my Tami away!” she accused with her voice now raising. Raphael stood firm in his place, despite the shrieking heighten in her voice.
“Mom no.” Tami tried to calm her mother, but it was to no avail.
“How do you feel huh? You feel satisfied for torturing us for two whole months! Our daughter-“
“Mom!” Tami grabbed onto her mother’s hand and swung her around with tears still steaming down her face. “I told you that day when I called. He didn’t kidnap me. This is Raphael.”
Shock dawned on Tami’s mother as she spun to face him again. “Raphael?” She questioned in astonishment. “Raphael who you spoke about for five years straight after you left that camp?”
Tami nodded frantically, wishing that Sarah’s motherly instincts would kick in when she remembered how much Tami loved that little boy. Maybe then she will feel convinced that she ran away with him.
Raphael’s heart welled at that. The thought that Tami spoke so much about him made him feel good. Too bad he didn’t have anyone to talk to about her. He surely had a lot to tell.
“How-how did you find him?”
“We met that night when I went to the pub. We planned the trip and left the next day,” she lied with her head hung. “I know it was selfish of us, and I am so sorry for the pain I put you all through. I do not know what was going through our heads.”
Tami peeked over her shoulder to eye Raphael, silently telling him to play along.
This didn’t seem like Tami at all. It's not like she was being bound to Nassau or being forbidden to see Raphael, so she really had no reason to ‘run away’.
However, suddenly it didn’t matter anymore. She was home and alive with not a scratch or hair out of place. In fact, she seemed healthier despite the tears in her eyes and clearly distressed state. She seemed brighter. More alive.
“Do you love my daughter?” Sarah finally asked after facing him, and Raphael made no hesitation to agree.
“Yes. I do.”
Sarah nodded. “Even if Tami did go willingly with you, and I say ‘even if’ because that still doesn’t sound like my daughter, it will take some time for us to adapt. So I hope you understand that this isn’t the right time to be around us right now. A lot has happened since you guys...left.” It pained her to say it. The very thought of her daughter abandoning her family to be with a man was heartbreaking.
Still, they all had to accept reality and move on someday.
“Of course, I understand.” Raphael made no move to protest. This was far more than he even deserved.
“Wait, not from me,” Tami quickly interjected, rushing to him. “I need you.”
“Tami?” a voice she knew too well called from behind her. Tami froze.
It was Amy. She knew it was.
Slowly turning around, they watched as Amy stepped through the front door and into the living room where they all stood.
Her eyes immediately started to well up in tears, and Tami didn’t even hesitate to go after her, wanting nothing more than to hug her. But Amy held out her hand, stopping her movements.
“So now that dad is dead you feel like you want to come home huh?” Amy asked with pure venom dripping from her voice. It broke Tami to pieces.
“Amy…” Sarah trailed in a desperate voice, as if asking her younger daughter to have a little leniency.
“No mom!” she protested. “She LEFT us. She’s the reason why dad is dead.” She then turned to face Tami again. “Go back to wherever the hell you were.” And with that, she pushed past her and stormed to her room.
More tears that she didn’t even know were possible fell from her eyes, and Raphael’s strong arms pulled her into a tight hug.
“She hates me,” Tami cried against Raphael's chest.
She lost her dad. She didn’t want to lose her sister too.
Tami only hoped that this was all worth it. Deciding to stay with Raphael would either make her happy, or plunge her into grief forever.
“She’ll come around,” Sarah mumbled, but even she wasn’t sure.
Sighing, Tami quickly wiped her eyes as if the tears were an abomination.
“I’m tired. I think I’m gonna lay down,” she whispered before lifting her eyes to Raphael. “Where will you stay?”
“I’ll be in a hotel in town. Get some rest, okay?”
Tami didn’t say anything else after he kissed her forehead and turned to leave.
She then faced her mother with the question that had been eating away at her mind ever since she saw her sister’s Instagram Story.
“Is Amy right? Did dad find out about me and…” she couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud.
“No, Tami. Of course not. He suffered a heart attack in Canada that he didn’t recover from. It had nothing to do with you.”
For the umpteenth time today, she broke down.
“Yes, yes it was. If only I had been here-“
“Listen to me.” Sarah held onto Tami’s shoulders firmly and stared her right in the eyes. “This had nothing to do with you, okay? He didn’t know. We don’t blame you.”
“Amy does.”
Sarah sighed. “We will never heal if we let this bring us down.”
‘Maybe I don’t deserve to be healed’, she thought, but didn’t say it.
“Did you see him? Before he died?” Tami asked in a hushed voice, at which Sarah nodded.
“He came home once he was stable, but he died here.”
“Did he go peacefully?” Tami’s eyes were squeezed shut. She wanted more than anything to be there with him when he took his last breath. But she could only imagine it.
“Yes sweetheart. And he told me to tell you that he loves you very much, okay? We all love you.” And with that, she pulled her daughter in the hug she really needed.
Tami held onto her mother’s words. At least it was good to know that he was thinking of her. It offered her a little peace.
But she only hoped that it would be enough to carry her for the rest of her days.