Every month is the month of love if you’re reading Bolu Babalola’s book.
So, because of this, I’ll be reviewing a second piece from her short story collection, Love In Colour.
All the stories in this book are beautifully crafted. It really answers for its name.
This piece I’ll be reviewing is titled Yaa, and of course it is about a character named Yaa, and her supposed lover, Kofi.
I’d advise you to read this book if you haven’t yet, so you’ll enjoy this even more.
When I read this piece, and reread it the second time for this review, it reminded me of something a friend told me about love.
She made me understand that,
‘two people may be soulmates but they may not be in love’.
We were discussing a TV series ‘grown-ish’, it was a trendy thing to watch at that time.
I couldn’t quite understand the on and off relationship between Aaron, Zoey and Luca. We agreed on the fact that Zoey and Luca were soulmates and they seemed to have been in love but Zoey and Aaron were very much in love and they were the best for each other.
Two people who are soulmates do not necessarily have to be in love, it just means that they were destined to be together, to be around each other, to guide themselves and help themselves make the best decisions.
It could be a mutual, platonic kind of relationship most of the time if they are not in love. When two partners are in love, they can also be soulmates which is beautiful and saves them the unnecessary hullaballoo of love triangles. This is not the case with Kofi, Yaa and Adric, her aforetime lover.
The book talks about her relationship with Kofi first. Bolu makes us understand that Kofi and Yaa were groomed into loving each other. It was more of nurture than nature.
‘…through nurture rather than nature, the two saw their relationship mature into romance’.
Yaa’s family were from the lower class market caste in the region. Theirs was a grass to grace kind of story. Kofi’s family were from the wealthy class of old money and old power of the Ashanti region in Ghana. And with the new wealth of Yaa’s family, the lines dividing these two families had blurred and they believed a match between their children could bolter their prestige and make their power rise even higher.
It had always been this way,
‘the knowledge that she and Kofi were meant to be together wasn’t so much imparted to Yaa, but built into her, and then enshrined as the only world she knew. It became intrinsic to her thought processes, vital to how she strategized her life and career.’’
I didn’t like Kofi’s energy when I read this piece, he didn’t even deserve Yaa. They weren’t even platonic friends at all. The whole love affair had forever been centered on Kofi, it was Yaa loving him and wanting to make the relationship work, putting in the efforts and making his plans work. It was always Kofi and Yaa but never Yaa and Kofi.
I’d felt like they could just advice themselves but when it came to being true friends they weren’t meant for that.
So for years they had been groomed together with their lives already laid out and planned.
Then…
Yaa met Adric in university. He had liked her fighting spirit, how she headed protests in the school against the elites who exploited the poor. He liked her from then on.
And it looked like the feeling was mutual.
‘he caught her eye, and she’d almost stumbled by the force of how he looked at her. It was more than a preliminary attraction; it was a want to know.’’
So they began to see each other, the book tells us that they had an immediate easy playfulness.
‘’she liked his mind, liked that he wanted to know hers. Love immediately pulled at her. It was a kind of love she’d never known; unburdened, pure and without expectation. Transparent love, unqualified love.’’
Eventually Adric found out about her and Kofi, and he was heartbroken. And angry. He’d tried to understand the complicated relationship between her and Kofi, but he just couldn’t see it. He told her to be herself and follow her heart. To try to follow him, and be with him instead.
Adric tried to convince her;
‘’so lead Yaayaa. Choose yourself. Rid yourself of these people and their expectations.’’
Yaa chose to listen to her head.
They broke up afterwards with words left unsaid and emotions left undissolved.
Years later after they had finished school and had all moved on, Kofi and Yaa were getting along and it seemed like they were going to get married. Kofi had asked her to a date maybe to propose to her or maybe to celebrate her birthday that day, but apparently he texted that he would be late for the date. Ironic was the fact that he was cheating on her with his office assistant and that was probably the reason why he was going late to the date after everything.
She met Adric for the first time in years, in the Taxi she had taken to the date. He had called her by her nickname which only he used, and instantly she knew it was him.
‘’there were two people in the world who knew her, the essence of her and honest her. One was Abina, her best friend and spirit sister, and the other was the man whose eyes were currently sliding from soft, warm surprise to something colder, a forced distance.’’
They began to talk about how life had been since they had been apart, how Adric’s mother misses Yaa and doesn’t completely trust Kofi whenever she sees them together on TV. They reminisce on things that could have been and wished upon time to reverse its hand.
Yaa apologizes to Adric for pushing him away and all the years of silence… ‘I’m sorry for how hard I was on you. I’m sorry for the last thing I said to you. I know who you were with me was real.’’
While in the taxi she sees Kofi walk into the foyer of the restaurant, she decided that she would choose herself and be freed.
He was the embodiment of everything that had kept her from herself, who had been as imprisoned by expectations and pressure as she was. They were both victims and it was time for them both to be freed!
Thoughts on this piece
This is a nice piece altogether. I loved the beautiful love story of Yaa and Adric and I loved the happily ever after energy.
I didn’t like Kofi’s at first when I read this piece, he truly didn’t even deserve Yaa, they weren’t even platonic friends at all. The whole love affair had forever been centered on Kofi, it was Yaa loving him and wanting to make the relationship work, putting in the efforts and making his plans work.
While Kofi was not entirely a bad or an evil person, he and Yaa weren’t just meant to be together.
I hoped you enjoyed this review very much. I’d love to hear from you about it. Have you read the book? If so, what are your thoughts? About Love In Colour, about the reviews so far?
Let me know in the comments ;)
PS: Be sure to check out the related posts below. It's a great way to catch up on all things love, literature and art that we get up to on the blog!