CHAPTER 7

Ariana lived her life as a single mum raising her only son. She got a work where she struggled to make ends meet. She was the breadwinner of she and her son.

Due to her well mannered attitude, patience and humility, she was favoured by people especially her new boss. He was a single man who was the only son of his family and was also wealthy.

He admired Ariana so much, her intelligence, bravery, humility, patience, kindness and the rest. She was also a friendly person but wasn't interested in making much friends.

Seth fell ill on a Thursday night. His condition worsened that night and Ariana had no one to call that night.

She stayed awake through out the night with him, hoping that by daybreak she'll take him to the hospital if he didn't get better.

Morning came but instead of him to become better, his condition worsened. She took him to a clinic in town where he was attended to. All her attention was on her son that she forgot to phone her work place.

She didn't go to work and when she received a phone call from a colleague who was also a friend to her, it then occurred to her that she was late already.

She explained to her why she couldn't make it to work that day after she heard that her boss asked of her.

That evening, her boss and her colleague came visiting. Their names were Ashana and Ryan. Ashana escorted him because he didn't know where she lived. She left after some minutes, leaving Ryan.

Ryan later found out about her child's illness and what had and hadn't been done. He decided to take up the responsibility of taking care of her child. He bought foodstuffs, clothes, etc for them.

Ryan started to become close to them and Ariana noticed this. She tried to caution him but he told her not to worry. Seth too began to like him and was fond of him.

Ryan sometimes took him to school and brought him home whenever he was free. He took him out, hanged out with him and made him feel loved.

He replaced that empty space in the heart of Seth that Chris was supposed to fill. He performed the responsibility of a dad to Seth.

People who didn't know them began to think that Ryan was the dad of Seth. They sometimes referred to Ryan as the husband of Ariana even in their presence. This made Seth to ask his mum to marry him.

Everyone was taken aback by the little boy's request. But before he asked his mum, he made her to promise that she will do whatever she asked him to do and she accepted.

This made her unhappy. She told Seth to go into his room but he refused as he sounded more serious. Ryan just stood there, checking for her reactions.

Seth started crying when his mum shouted at him and slapped him of asking such. She asked him what he ever lacked, what didn't she for him to request such? Wasn't her love enough?

He told her that since the day his dad left them, he felt lonely and was often teased at school. When other children's parents both came for them for their school party and end of term ceremony, he only had his mum.

But when Ryan came into their lives, things changed for him. Nobody teased him again because he too had someone who looked after him and he looked up to him as his dad.