EPISODE ONE
MY STRANGE NEIGHBOR ππππππππππππππππ by Nicholas Stephen
We had a neighbor that had stayed in our compound for two years. She seemed so quiet. The woman would leave her house early in the morning without greeting anyone including my parents and none of us had seen her going to church.
The compound was fenced and the houses were spacious with each having their own flats(one bedroom flat). The flats were up to eight in total.
People call her different names of which they said she gave herself.
Regardless of the number of times people preached for her, they all fell on deaf ears. The day I tried sharing the word of God to her she drove me off adding that I should better distance myself from her hence, deΓ‘th would be my calling.
That word alone got me thinking.
With the way the woman was behaving, everyone became so curious about her, seeing a grown up woman like that staying all alone wasn’t normal at all except if something was hidden underground. She barely had visitors.
Some person’s thoughts were
“Is she childless? Could she be barren? What about her friends and family members?”
Others were murmuring and gossiping about her. Seeing her weird behaviours, my parents warned me to stay away from her. Of course I told them I would heed their advice.
I was the type of person that always loves to dig into something that I found suspicious.
“There’s something fishy about this woman. I’ll get to the bottom of it. I’ll look for a way to enter that her house that no one has entered.” I told myself.
The day officially came. That day I closed from church on time because of her. The compound was scanty except for the woman that I sighted from our window sitting down on her verandah with hands placed on her cheeks. She was soliloquizing and smiling at the same time.
They restored power and I abruptly went to turn on the pump so that the two tanks could get filled up with water.
Not long, I saw her dressed on a red gown and leaving the house with her bag. I noticed she didn’t lock the door. She just shut it and left, I decided to grip hold of that opportunity to dig out what she was hiding.
I trailed her till she left the gate before turning back. I observed the whole place and everyone was absent and majority of them were still in church.
I rushed to our verandah, pulled my palms and crept to her room door. I observed and no one was watching so I opened it, entered inside and shut the door behind me.
Inside the room was filled with sands giving the impression that it hadn’t been swept for years.
I trailed it to her room. Everywhere was filled with cobwebs and on top of her bed was a human skull tied with a dark material. I got frightened till my legs began to shake like a leaf. About five red candles were lit they were already half burned. The mattress was so filthy.
The smell oozing out from her room wasn’t friendly at all.
I abruptly heard someone’s sound and my heΓ rt flown out. Immediately I turned, I saw her standing there looking at me and speaking in a weird tongue. She had a visage that threatened more than a charging bull.
I retreated and accidentally slipped off, collapsing on the ground.
“What are you doing in my room!” She thundered furiously while drawing close.
…………..
