Okay I see

I woke in the early hours of the morning with a pain in my chest, on the left but more left than where the heart is situated. Sitting up in bed, I pushed my hand into the side of my rib cage and the pain subsided. Since I was up, I might as well go to the toilet, but Paddy seeing me stumble into the on-suite bathroom, jumped up onto the basin cupboard and I had to turn the tap on for him to drink.

After my toilet, I sat on the edge of the bed looking at my cellphone waiting for Paddy to finish drinking. All of a sudden my phone started ringing. I saw the name of the caller, Simone, and I knew straight away that Carol, Matthew's mom has crossed over. In trepidation I answered "Hello Simone", and Simone then asked if I was Jerome, I answered "yes", and she asked again "Jerome West" and I said yes again. She then told me the sad news that Carol has past on and she asked if I can let Matthew know.

It was 03:31 and I just sat there on my bed. Emotions were raging through me. Matthew was my biggest concern. It was too early to get ready and drive to Pretoria to see Matthew, but I got up and made some coffee. It was dark in the lounge and I didn't want to put any lights on as my emotions remained hidden in the dark. I opened the blinds so that enough light came in from outside for me to make coffee and not stumble over any cat.

On my drive up to Pretoria, in between my tears, I had so much time to think of how I am going to break the news to Matthew that his mom has past away, one way was that I would knock on his res door, wake him up, and as he answers the door still half asleep, I would stand there, just shake my head, then give him a big hug. While in my thoughts, the phone rang again, it was Simone. She told me that news of Carol's passing was spreading fast and she feared that one of Matthew's friends might message him before I got to him to break the news, so I had to phone him. As suspected I woke him up with the call. Matthew said hello dad, and I could not say a word, I just choked up.

Nothing was said between us for what felt like ages...

Then I managed to say, "I am on my way to fetch you".

He answer, "okay, I see" and the call ended.

In those 3 words, okay I see I just knew that he knew, no other words were needed than okay I see.