by Seun Odukoya
Interestingly enough, he does not lay a hand on her. Never. He is in no way abusive. He really loves her but what pushes him is way stronger than what they feel for each other. If she stays, he’ll destroy her along with himself. But she loves him so she won’t leave him – or so she says.
It’s a tragic love story; really. A classic Shakespeare tale. Kinda like ‘Leaving Las Vegas’.
If you haven’t, see that movie.
Now stretch your imagination a bit more. Indulge me.
Now imagine he does all those terrible things – and then beats her. Abuses her. Rapes and uses her whenever he feels like it.
And to the guys; this is your sister.
WHAT. WOULD. YOU. DO?!
Domestic abuse is in no way cool. Not in the least.
Ladies, if you are in an abusive relationship – WALK. Please.
Else he’ll kill you.
That’s not love. That’s something else entirely.
WALK O! I dey beg una; for your sakes and the sakes of those who love and care about you.
If you know anyone in an abusive relationship, or you’re in one yourself and need help – do not hesitate to call any of the following helplines:
Project Alert on Violence Against Women
21 Akinsanya str, off Isheri road, Taiwo Bus stop, Ojodu Berger. 01-8209387, 08052004698, 08180091072. [email protected]
Real Women Foundation...
7b Jubilee road, magodo Shangisha. 08037178963, 017611656
BAOBAB For Women's Rights
Ernest Omoregie, Agboyi road, Lagoon Estate, Ogudu Ori-oke, Ojota, Lagos. 08023330981, 014747931
Sponsored by Real Music Inc.
chapter 15: eba
So I’m in love with this guy.
You would think such things happen every day, but not to me. Before you start to think too much, I am not a child. I am twenty-seven years old – a successful career woman. I pay my bills, take care of my mum and two of my siblings depend on me. With stats like that, you have to know I have seen my fair share of life. You have to know having a level head on my shoulders is not an option. It comes with the terrain.
I also happen to be one of those ladies who are not disillusioned about love. I know love exists. I have had my heart broken like twice – and therefore decided it was an unnecessary distraction at that time. Of course after a while I became swallowed up in life and living and did not give romance too much of a chance. But I am aware of love and I always tell myself that if it ever came knocking I would not avoid it.
So I’m in love with this guy. After not feeling this/that way for a while, a woman becomes frightened. She starts to doubt the authenticity of her feelings; she starts to have fears that the guy just wants the usual thing most women think most guys want. But there’s something about this guy…
I have to be honest with you, it’s really been hard balancing my head and my heart these past two months. I go all soft around him and yet I have to fight an impulse to tear his clothes off and serve him some Warri-style loving. Yeah. With the right guy I’m a freak.
He does not say much. He’s very quiet and patient with and around me. He also wants to spend on me. He shares his wealth with me – he makes me feel very special. Little by little, he makes a space for himself in my heart…in my life.
And then he calls me to tell me he wants to come to my house on Sunday. For the first time.
I ask him; “what would you like to eat?”
He laughs and says, “eba.”
Okay. It is embarrassing to admit this, but of everything I can cook, eba is not one.
Of course I don’t tell him that.
I get off the phone and then I start to panic. I have no idea where to start – and I am too embarrassed to ask my friends. And Sunday is just two days away.
I wake up early enough the next day and go to the local market. There I buy ingredients with which I intend to make the egusi and efo riro to compliment the eba. I also buy some ponmo, crayfish, and eja aro. Don’t laugh. I’m in love.
I clean all the fish and meat, stuff them in the refrigerator and then I set out to clean the whole apartment. I finish late in the day – so I take a shower, snack out and sleep.
Sunday wakes me up with dazzling sunshine. I’m smiling as I leave my bed…my heart is doing a crazy little flutter. He is coming!
So I cook the best egusi I have ever made in my entire life. I take my time; watching over the boiling pot like a mother hen watching over her chicks. I’m sweating up a storm but I’m smiling the whole time. It really is a great feeling; cooking for someone you love and care about. And then, it’s their favorite meal.
I have to ace this; I think.
He sends me text messages that further compliment the tone. Hmmm. Sweet boy.
Okay…so the soup is done. I dish it into a cooler and think of other details. I have two bottles of Stout in the fridge for after…and some other so-not-your-concern goodies.
Now to face the eba.
I pulled out my trusty iPhone 5 and Google ‘how to make eba’. You don’t want to imagine how many responses I got, but the best and most detailed one was on Wikihow. Bless them.
I don’t want to bore you with details but I poured away enough hot water and garri to start my own bukka. I scald myself so many times…at one point I sit down and start crying.
It is sobering that I never took the time to learn how to make a meal as simple as eba. I consider eating humble pie and calling my homegirl Bisi for help but I want to do this for him myself. He’s earned it.
So I get up from feeling sorry for myself; put another pot of water on after reading the instructions thoroughly again and then start. This time my patience is rewarded and I have a wonderful-looking lump of eba looking at me with a clear, innocent expression. It is a hundred percent lump free.
By this time, it’s a few minutes to three. He’ll be here at three-thirty.
I put the eba in a cooler and take a long, slow shower. When I’m done, I look myself in the mirror and smile. I feel a bit naughty. I take my time dressing up like the women in those body lotion and bathing soap adverts. I like the feel of new sexy underwear. I rub excess lotion in my hands to salve some of the burns. I’m grateful the skin is not peeling.
I settle down to wait.
My phone rings and my heart takes a puff of weed or some other intoxicating stuff. I’m high.
Calming myself I pick the call.
“Hey,” I say, trying to sound cool.
He sounds cooler. “I’m on my way up,” he says.
“Okay.” I jump up and open the door. Bone acting cool.
He shows up looking very debonair in a deep blue shirt and black slacks. He’s carrying a bottle of Bailey’s and a small shopping bag. I jump on him and kiss him thoroughly.
“That’s better,” he says. He carries me into the house. I lay my tresses against his clean-shaven face and sigh contentedly.
I kiss him some more. He responds, dumping his goods on the table and carrying me over to the couch. We get pretty steamy in the following minutes, and then we come up for air.
“I’m hungry,” he says , patting his slightly-bulging tummy. I laugh.
“I’ve been waiting to hear you say that,” I answer.
I serve him his lunch and sit beside him, trying to hide my nervousness as he eats. That’s the thing about him. He does not like to interrupt any activity; whether eating, working or –
He kisses me.
Whooo. That is surprising.
“Best eba I’ve had in a while,” he says, smiling at me.
chapter 16: it happened before 10am
I’m some kind of a rules person.
While I believe that ‘law and order’; either as a TV series or as a legal system is nothing but a crock of shit, I also believe that some order is necessary. I mean – how do you get anything done without discipline?
So it follows that I have rules that govern my life and living. Rules like no eatin
g after eight at night. No eating before twelve noon. No alcohol during the week except on vacation. Yeah. Pretty boring I know.
I had a couple concerning relationships. No serious relationships or commitments before I am a particular age. No romantic anything before twelve noon except on weekends. And no romance around the office. I believe the informal expression for that last one is; “don’t shit where you eat”.
I like rules. They keep things simple.
So I have a meeting this morning with a new client. The meeting is in the office and so we had all been briefed yesterday. I am ready – or I think I am.
The boss calls me over the intercom at exactly eight-forty five to say he’s leaving the office – another meeting suddenly showed up. I’m to handle the client by myself. I mumble incoherently but inside I’m elated. The boss has a talent for disruption and having him there would have been twice the wahala.
The client arrives at eight-fifty. I’m ready – or I think I am. Tade, the dark and pretty receptionist tells me the client is waiting in the conference room. Taking a last lick of my Baba Blue drop, I chew and swallow it rapidly, and then bounce to the conference room.
As I open the door I catch a whiff of some subtle perfume – very suggestive perfume. I start to feel alarmed in spite of myself, and I wonder why I’m feeling the way I’m feeling. Nonetheless, I step into the room and close the door before turning to the client with a blinding smile. “Hello,” I begin to say, “my name is…”
I stop in shock. The client is a woman – the prettiest thing called woman I have ever seen. I mumble a mental apology to my mum…but it is the truth. This client is pretty.
She stands up and I am treated to a visual buffet. I actually have to quell an urge to dive over the table onto her chest and completely uphold the cliché that all men are dogs. At least this one would willingly make an ass of himself over this piece of ass.
I smile at the wit in my words and reach for her outstretched hand. I look into her eyes, not listening to what she is saying. After seconds of chattering and not getting a response she looks directly at me for the first time.
I guess she sees something in my eyes because she lowers hers shyly and her hand becomes limp in mine. I’m sure if she were a few shades lighter, she would be just as pink as the blouse that protects her obviously deep cleavage from my roving sight. As I make my way to the table, gently pulling her after me, business is the last thing on my mind. I’m sure I can say the same for her.
Remember what I said about rules? I forgot to add another all-important one: rules are meant to be broken.
I break at least two of mine before ten that morning.
chapter 17: her wedding
He does not love me.
I know that the same way I know his name. The same way I know his touch, what he likes to eat, his kisses – and all the other details that are not for public consumption.
But somehow, he has won his way into my heart. I love him unfortunately.
How do I deal with that?
I go through the ceremony with my heart in my mouth. I don’t know what he will do. I’m so scared.
This does not make any sense to me. Why am I here? It’s not like I’m pregnant. But I will be honest and confess that I maneuvered him into a place where he had no choice but to ask. Why did I do that?
Because I love him. I love him.
That probably does not make any sense to you, but it means everything to me. Add the love thing to the fact that I’m twenty-eight…and you begin to see some sort of reason. Seun always said that it’s better to marry late and marry happy than to marry early and live in regret. But then Seun is a man. What does he know about a woman’s heart? Her fears?
Speaking of Seun – he said he’d be here. I haven’t seen him. But if he said he would be here he would – Ah; there he is.
He and that infernal pad of his. Always scribbling something – the same way he scribbled through the three entire weeks we were together. He still is, here at my wedding. Scribbling.
I wonder what he’s writing.
I look at my husband. He’s having a conversation with Oxygen; his best-man and right hand man. I watch them talk and I feel a small sting of jealousy. How can he be so comfortable with a man? I wish he would talk to me like that; give his entire being to me for the duration of a conversation, listen to my words as though they mean the very life of him. His very essence.
I watch my husband and I remember a tense moment during the signing of the marriage register. He had paused and looked at me in that unsmiling way of his. I think I had a slight heart attack. I kept thinking; What is he doing? What is he about to do? Oh my God – he’s going to do this here?! Now??!
And then he smiled at me and signed. I nearly peed myself. I felt a warm hand squeeze mine gently in a silent gesture of reassurance. It was Bola, one of my course mates back in the university. I remember smiling at her gratefully while thinking to myself that she wasn’t one of my friends – in fact as far as friendship goes we’re just acquaintances. But she was there for me at that moment.
That nearly brought tears to my eyes.
I’m woolgathering. If I had not been I would have noticed that my husband and his best man have stopped talking and are staring at me. I start guiltily and avert my eyes shyly but not before I see my husband smile. I look back at him and he leans over and kisses me.
To say I am shocked would be the understatement of the year. Before I can wrap my head around the strangeness of the moment, I feel tiny bangers erupt all over my body. I feel like I would fall at any moment – so I hold onto him for dear life.
After a long moment which I’m sure is only a few seconds in reality he stops kissing me and I become aware of the crowd’s loud cheers. I open my eyes reluctantly and look in my husband’s. His eyes are vague; opaque glasses that reflect mine but there’s a faint smile on his lips. I’m grateful for that, at least.
I sit properly again and lower my eyes shyly as the guests continue to cheer. Putting my left hand against my heaving bosom, I try – albeit futilely to still my pounding heart. I love him.
I make a silent promise to myself. I will make this marriage work with everything that is me.
chapter 18: skit iv: his & hers
“But sha – you women are really silly sometimes.”
“You don start o. Like say you men are perfect… anyways what did we do to you now?”
“Whoever came up with that saying…that ‘if you can’t make her a wife, don’t make her a mother…?”
“Uh – oh.”
“ ‘Uh oh’ is right. Only a dumb-ass woman could have dreamed up something that daft.”
“Be careful o. I’m about to leave this conversation.”
“Okay…cool down. But seriously – do you think it makes any sense? Does it to you?”
“Of course it won’t make any sense to you – aproko male pig! If you cannot handle the responsibility of a child, why impregnate me?”
“Oh so you finally admit you’re attracted to me! We are getting somewhere!”
“That is so not the point!”
“Okay. What is the point then?”
“Why impregnate a woman you cannot take care of?”
“So…how do you get pregnant these days – by osmosis, or is it diffusion?”
“No. It is by Bluetooth. See am.”
“Well, even if it is by Bluetooth or infrared or some other something-or-the-other, you still have to accept the pairing. So if you get pregnant, we both agreed to it – in fact, more you than I.”
“What gibberish are you spouting now?”
“You are a woman. You know these things – you know what to do not get pregnant and all that. So, why don’t you take care of it? The issue is that a lot of you think you have to tie a guy down, and what better weapon than a pregnancy?”
“Well…’em…”
“We both enjoyed the sex. We should both bear the responsibility. We should both agree to keep it or not…I
’m just saying.”
“Whatever.”
“Now you’ve been convinced, how about a…?”
“Over my dead body!”
chapter 19: outcasts
He did not get it at first.
As he collected the result from the doctor he felt rather than saw the man flinch away. Am I radioactive? He wondered.
But that was mild compared to what the piece of paper confirmed. He smiled bitterly and walked out of the hospital, ignoring the nurses who were shaking their heads behind him. For the first time in his life, he appreciated the saying ‘ignorance is bliss’.
He stood on the sidewalk in front of the hospital, contemplating a future that was suddenly bleak. He thought about the books he planned to write. He remembered the scripts he was to supervise. He saw all the plans he had made with Tara about their life together become dust…as irrelevant as the smoke from the exhaust of passing buses. Here one moment; gone the next.
Feeling a deep cough coming from his chest, he turned and began to walk slowly towards the house he lived with his parents, wondering how he was going to tell them that after being sick for almost six months, he was going to die. Suddenly he began to cough, rasping coughs that felt as though his chest was being filled with hot coals. And then he spat out a huge glob of blood. Feeling relieved, he bent over and gasped for air, smiling bitterly at how people walking past gave him a wide berth. He wiped flecks of blood from his lips and placed his palm against his chest, feeling his heart beating strongly, and pumping blood back and forth to keep him alive. He felt as though his heartbeats were the winding down of his life’s clock.
He was dying.
They were waiting, varying emotions on their faces. From the bored detached look on his father’s face to the nervous-fearful one on his mother’s, to the looks of curiosity of the twins, to the ‘trying-to-look-concerned-but-failing’ expression on his girlfriend face. He was not surprised. The only thing that hurt was the knowledge that he had failed to change his father’s opinion about him. Mutely he handed the slip to the man and took his seat on the easy sofa - facing all of them as he took his shoes off.