📝: BEAUTIFUL BETRAYAL
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CHAPTER FOUR
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I was in agonizing pain and needed help, my step sister left after she came to see me to the market because she was into garri business with her mother, who was my step mother. Her mother was the last wife our father married. Meaning that my father was a polygamous man with three wives and 16 children to crown or all.
I laid down on the bed without even being able to move an inch, and then I used my right hand and held the chair beside my bed and with the help of that I fell to the ground, still not minding the pains I began using my butts to crawl on the ground until I got to the bedroom. And luckily for me, the new house our step brother, who was now a rich man, built had a water system in it.
So I turned on the water from the switch near the wall and began bathing. For four complete days, no one saw my brake light outside ànd both my Mom and siblings refused to come and know how I was fairing at all. Emeka became concerned because it’s been a long time since he saw me outside, so that day in the evening when his wife had finally removed her hawk eyes from him.
“Zarachi, my love! Are you home?”He called out knocking on the door.
I managed to answer him and came inside only for him to see me with the left side of my body dried up, he rushed straight to where I was laid and began asking random questions at the same time. He went inside after I had answered to check if there was food so that he could rush and go and get drugs for me, but he found none and then since he knew all the nooks and crannies of our house and my room, hé took a pot and went to the kitchen and began preparing jollof rice for me to eat and then after he went to get medicine from the chemist guy not to far from our house.
He got me the drugs and then he fed me with the food he had prepared before giving me the drugs and all this while his wife, Queen, had already returned from where she went with his sister. They were surprised not to meet Emeka at home and then waited silently for him, but they still had their spy come check out whether he was at our house or not, unknown to Emeka, I had sighted her from the door he left open. From the way she peeped at us, I was rumbling with laughter inside me already but I just had to pretend to be okay so that none of them would get alarmed.
“You know I don’t like it when you’re sick.” He told me reassuringly.
“I don’t know how it is and I’ve been calling your line but it’s not connecting at all.” I explained myself and then I narrated how the incident happened and how I landed. While we’re still talking my own elder brother called me on the phone and then we entered his customary long period of call. Most times the way we talked on phone made me wonder most times, I felt as if this mañ was maybe working with MTN, if not how would some talk to you for almost an hour plus.
“Zara, how is your body?” My elder brother asked over the phone.
“Brother, I’m not fine too. I don’t think I can survive it.” I answered feeling worn-out with Emeka’s eyes straight at my face. Maybe the words I used weren’t going well with him but who cares, when all I wished for at that time was for death to come and take me far from all this pain, shame and ridicule.
“Sorry, I’m still in training, I can’t come to see you now. But don’t worry, I’ve your account number with me, I’ll send you something now!” He informed me and then we talked for a while before he ended the call.
And then Emeka faced me with a sad facial expression. He asked me why I would be making such a statement and using deàth as a bait or an answer for everything happening to me. So after I apologized to him and we gossed for some time before we slept off, don’t get me wrong we didn’t sleep together. I laid on the ground and he was seated on the cousine.
I woke up after hearing my phone buzz, since it was an itel button phone, the way the sound came out loud was something else and I wondered how Emeka didn’t wake up when the phone buzzed. Maybe he was deeply at sleep or probably tired from all the farm work and babysitting. I tried to be angry at him so that he would know how hurt I was and probably leave me alone so that his wife and sister won’t become thorns in my skin.
My elder brother sent me 30 thousand naira and asked me to get someone to take me to the hospital for a check up. I thanked him and then woke Emeka up and told him about the check-up my elder brother requested and he seemed a bit happy and told me that we would be going to the clinic the next day or rather if I wasn’t happy with that, I should wait a bit then on Saturday we would go to the big town together and get a proper checkup down.
But I didn’t hesitate in turning down the offer of going to the big town because of I was shine of people seeing me in that condition, in our village most people thought I had traveled and the way my sister acted made it even more obvious that I had, in the morning, she would just send her regards to during the kid leaving with them and that was all, she bàrely came to see me and no how I was fairing at all.
Not only her both her brothers inclusive and her mother too wasn’t an exemption in this matter. I told Emeka my reasons why I wouldn’t want to go and let everyone know my condition. The village I lived in was talented at gossip and honestly I don’t want to be their center of discussion. I hatéd that with passion and I don’t want to be one. So I just told him I would love to go to the clinic in the evening time because by then people wouldn’t be using the road in the morning.
We concluded and then he left for his house, I at least felt loved by someone. Instead of staying inside for God knows when without anyone or instead of staying inside and then dié with nobody knowing until I began decaying. I couldn’t contain my joy thàt day as I crawled on my butts to where the pot was and dished food for myself to eat.
Emeka arrived home only to meet his sister and his wife sitting on the bench outside their compound, from the look of things they were obviously waiting for him to come back so that they could begin their routine of questions and answering. Emekà from the loók of things was probably tired and needed rest but as he entered and was trying to go inside his sister, Grace went and blocked the door preventing him from entering. If he moved to the left , she would move to and gradually Emeka was getting annoyed but he had to keep calm.
“So Emeka you don’t have shame at all? Minus that sef, have you forgotten you have a wife and a child at home?” She poured out her disappointment to him.
“Honestly the last thing I would need now is disturbance, I want to go and rest.” Emeka said in distress.
“Emeka, since I gave birth have you ever cooked for me in this house?” His sister, Queen asked, still sitting down and not looking at me, I obviously knew she was heartbroken or something. From the sound of her voice, one could simply decipher that she was in tears.
Emeka was thinking for the best answer at that time but he owed no one any explanation and then when he made an attempt to carry Grace to the other side, she hit him on his back as if she was p******g yam and akpu mixed together. Emeka was very lucky his bones didn’t even break because immediately he managed to lay down on the bed, he felt as if someone placed 2 cement blocks on his back. Emeka took the pain relief we had but he felt none of it was working at all because the pain wasn’t going down, instead it was coming back in full force.
After some time he managed to sleep off and it wasn’t until when he woke that the pains subsided and came out, he headed straight to the kitchen to get something to eat only to meet the stainless steel shining bright at his face. And at that time, he was hungry and there was no food in the house. He was angry but he couldn’t show it outside. But surprisingly, when he reached the living room, he met Grace and his wife, Queen, eating well garnished noodles while he was left to salivate.
He went to open the door only to find out that it had been locked, and when he asked for the key. All of them there pretended not to hear him at all and kept devouring the noodles that they had prepared. He knew asking father would be a complete waste of time and then he went back to the kitchen to prepare something to eat and found out that all the shelves in there had been locked, they even went as far as getting the gas disconnected.
Seeing the tight corner these two women had endeared him into, Emeka had no choice than to sleep hungry and when he tried eating the other food from his wife at night, she bluntly down him down with a heavy knock on the head. The knock immediately taught Emeka the full meaning of “Coordinate yourself” without using words. He drifted off to sleep.
The next day, me and Emeka went to the clinic and had the normal village test which wasn’t more than thyroid and malaria and this time around on sighting me, the man in charge didn’t even think of using a language that would be a little bit reliving at all. He just concluded that I had a partial stroke and that there was nothing he could do about it that would refer me to a big hospital in the city.
My eyes became teary as Emeka carried back on the wheelbarrow and I used the wrapper I had on me to cover myself and thank God it was late already, so everywhere was dark and only lanterns with kerosene inside them shone, our power supply wasn’t working again. Because our youths had one day beaten one of their members to death and so they had to punish us for it. I arrived and then Emeka went and called in a traditional herbalist to come and check my condition.
This man told me and Emeka that he was going to treat for a week and if his remedy didn’t work that means what I would continue suffering from what I was going through, I had high hopes and believed that it would work out for me, so we agreed to give him a chance to do what he thought was the remedy.
It was Tuesday morning and I was at home, outside at the backyard laying down on my mat receiving fresh air. It’s been long, so that morning I had my step sister’s workers carry me out. And while I sat, I looked behind and saw Grace and Queen coming to the backyard, furiously like someone that was forced to engage in a marathon fasting, they came through the passage with … …
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Tbc
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#kiononiawrites
