The endurance period…
The slap threw her across the room, she knew what was coming and braced herself. Each time he got angry even before the beating she would imagine the feel of his fist or foot to her rib, the taste of blood in her mouth the chock of tears in her throat and the quiet place she went to in her head…
Wanda had become obsessed with Jude,it was as though she enjoyed these episodes.
…the black eye from last week’s beating had only just faded and aunty Billy wasn’t buying the story she was selling…she did a poor job at covering it, if only her make up skills were better. “Wanda, if that useless boy is hitting you just tell me, kin ji ko(do you hear me?).
The last thing on her mind was getting anty Billiy and her goons involved, Jude would kill her(maybe literarily kill her). “No ma, we’re fine, I slipped in the tub” “Tub? Wanda, bath tub ko? hmmmm suit yourself, don’t say I didn’t try to warn you, that boy is bad news”. She had heard this often it started sounding like a broken record.
"Each week its something else, sweetheart you aren’t that clumsy and if you keep tripping then something is wrong."
A few days later she was back to him.
Like she always did when he was in a “mood”, Wanda mentally led herself to happy times and the kicks and blows felt distant.
His loud sobbing jolted her, apparently she had fainted…waking up with her faced cupped in his hands felt strangely nice, at least he felt bad.
“my Love, can you hear me…I,I,I’m so so sorry, I didn’t mean to do this… damn me” his stammering voice was clearing and he wanted to sound more assertive… “I promise this is the last time I ever lay my hands on you…Please don’t leave me, I’d die if you do”… Wanda was too weak to respond but from the look in her eyes he knew she would stay.
She got in before aunty Billy and avoided any confrontation. She had taken pain killers and dozed off…11:25PM…the loud chatter from the living room reawakened the thumping in her head, that headache just wouldn’t go away, “or do I have a concussion?” “ah, God forbid, I am fine”.. Aunty Billy was in one of her moods, the cheerful kind caused from taking a little over her threshold of alcohol… and a voice that sounded like Uncle Tam’s could also be heard… “Was he here? did aunty let him into her life again, after what he did to me?” All that however seemed like a distant worry, her throbbing headache was her main concern.
When Wanda was posted to serve in Abuja her excitement was to the roof so during one of her arguments with aunty she let it slip…it came out amid tears but she said it, ”why do you bother advising me about Jude aunty when you allow Uncle Tam walk in and out on you….”young girl that’s none of your…”my business? yes it is aunty,….he raped me, he forced himself, he damaged me, he raped me…..” there was silence and aunty Billy was probably trying to process but hot tears streamed down her cheeks.” She flashed back to all the times they had fought and the accusations from two of her catering staff whom claimed he molested them…so this was all true. “If I didn’t ignore it when he did it to the cooks he wouldn’t have gotten to you".. The two wept and talked for hours, in the end the Police was to be left out of it because they knew it would go no where.
Her service year seemed like a life time, she was excited to be in Abuja and since Jude had settled here after his National Youth Service Corps in Bayelsa it was the right city to start a family.
Was she really considering going ahead with wedding plans? all the odds seemed staked against her, but “maybe Jude would change once we are married, I mean he wouldn’t hit his own “WIFE”…I’d be a wife then so everything would be different”.
1:08AM, her wondering thoughts had kept her awake, plus she had to explain the swollen jaw to anty Billy in the morning…
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