DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
EPISODE 13
Femi stopped in Ceddi plaza and bought beverages and fresh fruits for his wife. He also thought of buying some household groceries but he thought against it because he didn’t want to give his mother in law any reason to suspect that he had been maltreating his wife. He was determined to put up the show of the best husband during the course of her stay and that he must achieve.
Immediately he got into the compound, he wore on a fake smile and walked briskly to his room.
Femi: “Hello, wifey” he shouted at the top of his voice when he got upstairs. “Your baby is home!” he shouted again because he wanted his mother in law to hear him.
Shana was in the sitting room watching the live nominations show of Big Brother Naija when she heard someone calling out to his wife, she had disregarded the voice thinking it was her neighbour calling out to his wife because she couldn’t remember the last time Femi had used such sweet words for her.
Mrs Banjo: “Is that not your husband’s voice?” She asked her daughter after she heard Femi voice from outside.
Shana: “Femi calling me like that?” she had forgotten her resolve to put up positive appearances about their marriage.
Mrs Banjo: “Yes? What is strange in that?”
Shana: “Nothing, mum. Don’t mind me, I was carried away by these Big Brother housemates. I will get the door”, she managed to say and ran out.
“Welcome, Ifemi. How was work today?”
Shana was shocked when Femi drew her close and hugged her. Then he kissed her lightly on her lips and carried her in his arms to the sitting room. “I miss you, baby. All day at work I was thinking of you. Did you miss me?” he shouted at the top of his voice for his mother in law to hear.
Shana: “Erm, yes. I miss you”, she fumbled. She knew that Femi was merely pretending just to impress her mother and she felt like breaking his head. Here was somebody who hardly answered her greetings when he returned from work kissing and hugging her simply because her mother was around. Someone that had been spending the nights out telling her he missed her. “Missed indeed! This my husband must really think that I am foolish”, she thought.
Mrs Banjo turned around to see her daughter in her husband’s arms and all the fears that she had been entertaining about her daughter’s marriage flew away.
Mrs Banjo: “Look who we have here, the best son in law in town”.
Femi carefully dropped his wife and gave her a peck on the forehead, then he walked to where his mother in law was sitting and lay down flat before her as a sign of respect.
Femi: “Good evening, mummy. Wow, it’s a pleasant surprise to see you. I didn’t know you were coming”.
Mrs Banjo: “I decided to pay you people a surprise visit since you wouldn’t come to see us”.
Femi: “Ah mummy, it is not so o”.
Mrs Banjo: “How is it then? Ko ye mi o”.
Femi: “It is this bank job o, it doesn’t give me time to do the things I want. Only last week, my wife and I were planning on going to spend the weekend with you and dad. Isn’t that so, baby?” he turned to stare at his wife.
Shana: “What?”
Femi cast her a warning glance and she knew that she had to cooperate with him for her own good.
Shana: “Yes, mum. We wanted to come, don’t mind me, I am always carried away by this Big Brother Naija show”, she lied to cover up.
Mrs Banjo: “Femi, if banking job will not allow you visit us, then your wife who doesn’t work shouldn’t have a problem visiting us often. She is our only daughter, we miss her. Even her brothers who live abroad find time to see us every year”.
Femi: “I understand mummy but I am too attached to my wife. I can’t stay a day in this house without seeing her that is why it is difficult to allow her travel out of my sight”. He lied.
Mrs Banjo: “Oda, mo ti gbo. Enjoy yourselves”.
Femi: “But wifey, why didn’t you tell me mummy is around? I got some fruits for you, I would have bought more if I knew she was in town”.
Shana knew that Femi didn’t buy the fruits for her and so she muttered inaudibly and excused herself to set the dining area”.
Mrs Banjo: “You are such a caring husband, Femi. My daughter couldn’t have made a better choice. I bless God the day he gave you to my daughter. By the way, why isn’t your wife working yet? I think now is the perfect time for her to get a job so that she can take her mind off the miscarriage she just had and before you know it, God will bless you two with another baby”.
Femi: “I have been telling her to give me her CV so I can get a job for her but she said she doesn’t want to work until she becomes a mother. I know what to do, I will just do the CV myself and get her a job”, he lied again.
“Ah, Femi!” Shana who was listening to their conversation didn’t know when she shouted his name and the glass cup she had in her hands fell down.
Femi: “Are you okay, love?” he ran to her.
Shana: “Yeah, I was shocked when the cup fell down”, Femi knew she was lying.
“How can he lie so perfectly? Maybe that was how he lied that he loved him in the first place”, she thought. She knew that Femi, the snake that he was had crawled his way into her mother’s heart and so even if she complained about his ill treatment towards her, nobody will believe her because he had always presented their marriage as the best to outsiders.
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Licia drove after Femi when he left the house with the intention of trailing him to his house in her car. She knew that he was going home and she wanted to go and burst his bubble before his mother in law who was the reason why he left her hanging. She was successfully trailing him until she discovered that she had a flat tire. She disregarded the warning on the dashboard of her car and continued to drive, it was risky but what was at stake was equally important to her. Other cars that were passing by notified her of the need to stop and take care of the affected tyre but she wouldn’t listen. Suddenly the car stopped moving and it took great efforts to move it out of the road.
Licia: “Shit! Oh f**k, this tyre messed me up big time mehn. Femi has escaped. Oh holy”, she cursed under her breathe. “Today is your lucky day, Femi. Tomorrow will be mine”, she shouted and kicked the tyre so hard that she had to retrieve her leg for the pain she felt.
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Shana was expecting Femi to continue to put up with his kindness when they retired to their bedroom that night. Femi rolled over to the other side of the bed and as usual covered himself with his duvet, shutting her out of his world. Shana drew near and wrapped her hand round his waist.
Femi recoiled from her touch as if he had been touched by a python.
Femi: “What is it?”
Shana: “I want to feel your warmth. It is cold”.
Femi: “If it is cold then get up and turn off the AC. Am I your warmer?”
Shana: “I just had a miscarriage, Femi. I need to be comforted my husband”.
Femi: “There you go again. Miscarriage, miscarriage, miscarriage, that is all we hear in this house. Did I cause the miscarriage? Oh because you managed to get pregnant once, somebody will not hear word again. There are some women who are younger than you who have 7 to 8 children and above. Have they killed their husbands?”
Shana: “Are you the one saying this? Are we not in this together? Is it my fault that I can’t conceive whenever I want?”
Femi: “Of course it is your fault. I put a baby in there and you couldn’t even keep it till 9months. Ordinary 9 months. And yet you want me to keep wasting my sperm on you, no way. I don’t have semen to waste, I am not getting any younger”.
Shana: “Femi!” she was crying profusely.
Femi: “It is not your fault. Because I slept in the house today that is why you have mouth to talk, let your mother go back and we shall see how comfortable this house will be for the two of yours”, he left the bed and sprayed his duvet on the ground and lay on it, warning his wife not to come close to him.
Shana got up, determined to tell her mother all that had been happening to her, she was crying and she couldn’t bear the pain alone anymore. “Even if it means going back to my parents’ house with my mother after I narrate everything, I will rather do so before this man wrecks me psychologically”, she said.
WATCHOUT FOR EPISODE 14
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