₦airaland Forum

I am growing stronger in my resolve to take a decision on whether I would ask for a separation or pay the rent. The rent was the focal point because paying it would mean I was committing myself. I no longer looked embarrassed when I left the ‘cover’ of the apartment to step outside. At first, the neighbours had been evasive and uncharacteristically nice till Chijioke’s mother began her trouble making again; a welcome development because I couldn’t stand her pitiable efforts at being nice.

Coming back with the children, I opened the door expecting to see my husband on his usual spot on the sofa. It didn’t really strike me as strange perhaps he was in the bedroom. The children had run right in oblivious to anything and were making a lot of chatter. None noticed the change but I did, it wasn’t only the empty sofa, it was something else, a change in the air.
For the first time in forever, an aroma came from the kitchen, something I wasn’t responsible for.
I walked to the kitchen, heart pounding and saw him stirring a pot. The sight did more to me than I thought it would. It rendered me speechless. Sensing my presence, he turned.
“Welcome, how was work?”
“Good…afternoon…fine”
“No hug for your husband?”
My mouth opened but no words came out. And then my resolve crumbled there and then. Yes, it might be a trap but I don't want to think too much about that. I just want my husband and my children together in one house.
Maybe things would get better and maybe not. Maybe, I would think more on this later but for now, my husband needed a hug and I was going to give him one.

THE END

He watched her transformation at first with contempt and then a growing sense of alarm. Yes, he had anger issues and sometimes found it hard to control it. It really was something he tried to work on but his fists sometimes brought out the worst in him what with the help of his wife’s attitude. Yes, she was putting her all into helping the family but which Nigerian wife shouldn’t; men did it all the time why not women?

It was frustrating trying your hand out at different businesses and failing at them. It made him feel like less of a man. He wanted to be able to live life without struggling to rise above financial worries. It was that way before, long before the second child came so what had changed?

He had thought that her decision to sleep in the children’s room was going to be temporary but it was dragging on and he couldn’t let go of his pride to ask her to come back to their bed but this business of her not wanting to pay the rent was not only humiliating to himself but to them as a family. He had not wanted to think much about it but he couldn’t stop the growing panic.

Every time I passed their door, I could barely restrain myself. I wanted to knock and inquire on how she was doing but I knew my limits.
I couldn’t go to her; she had to come to me. We were communicating via text messages though. After my plea for her to leave fell through, I had to put a little emotional distance between us; didn’t want her giving me unnecessary heartache.

And yet this week, something about her had changed. She no longer cowered when walking. I had always seen her after the incident darting into her apartment, wanting to escape probing eyes but not this week. I wanted to ask what had change but couldn’t dare, if she wanted me to know she would reach out.

I felt thoroughly ashamed. I have always perceived myself as a woman with dignity now all that was gone. Everyone now saw through my pretense, how pathetic my life was. I thought about what Shola had said. She wanted me to leave him but it was easier said than done. Lily was still a toddler, Jeremiah and Benjamin didn’t deserve me tearing them away from their father and I couldn’t bear to leave them behind as well; I doubted their father would give them up without a fight. The idea was tempting but I wasn’t strong enough to carry it out.

There was a thick tension in the house and I had started sleeping in the children’s room, I only went to the room to take the clothes I’d wear for work. I couldn’t even dress in there, didn’t want someone strangling me from behind because that was how he looked at me these days like a filthy heathen fit to be killed.
The children too were quiet and everyone walked on tip-toes. We carried on that way till it happened.
Jeremiah answered the door that day.
“How are you? Where are your parents?” The voice asked.
“Fine, they are inside. Please sit down sir.”
I had avoided him since the day his son came to help and wondered what he wanted. I heard my husband greet him cautiously.
“Good afternoon sir just came to remind you that your rent would expire next month; and you know how it is done. You write to us so we would know what to do once the time is up.”
“No problem sir. We will communicate as usual.”
“It’s okay, abeg don’t fight again oh. This life is an easy one. I hope Ma Lily is fine?”
“Yes sir, thank you.”
“Greet the children for me.”
“They will hear sir.”
That evening after a quiet dinner, my husband finally spoke. Apart from the basic greetings and food announcement, we had said nothing to each other for two weeks plus.
“When will the house rent be ready?”
I had been expecting the question, “I don’t know.”
Silence and then “Is this like a punishment or what?”
“Look, I don’t want to get in a fight…”
“Really? Because it looks like you have just thrown the gauntlet. What was your reply supposed to prove?”
“Okay, I don’t feel like paying the house rent. I need the money for something else.”
“Like what?”
“Something else,” I replied with a shrug.
“So we get thrown out on the streets because you have a grudge?”
Silence
“Hilda?”
“John”
“Do you have anything to say?”
“Nothing”

III

I held her just as the buckle hit her on the back. I had gone to check my car when I heard Ma Lily’s door open and a heart wrenching scream. I didn’t trust my crazy neighbour or her brats. The early evening spat might have caused them to do something crazy like deflating my tires, that’s how bothersome and crazy they were.

I ran to where Ma Lily was half of her in, half
out.
With one hand, I dragged at her while with the other I struggled for the belt. We were all screaming at each other whilst the children watched us, watched the adults indulge in their ‘favourite’ past time.
Ma Lily’s husband nearly succeeded in getting the belt from me till someone else grabbed the cursed belt from us both. It was the landlord’s son.
“What is wrong with you? Do you want to kill her?” He screamed at Ma Lily’s husband.
I left the men to have a go at each other, by then Lily had started crying. I couldn’t risk going in to take Lily not when the men were having an almost violent argument.
“Jeremiah, please carry your sister inside!” I yelled hoping that the deafening noise wouldn’t drown out my request.
But he seemed to have heard because he carried his sister who was wailing whilst resisting and dragged his other brother inside their room.

Turning my attention to Ma Lily, I half lifted her up the stairs towards my apartment. I didn’t think of the implications I just wanted her out of there.

"I want to open a shop. I want us to have extra income,” I said, whilst arranging the wardrobe.
“Who will stay in the shop?”
“We will get someone while you supervise.”
“What will you be doing all the while, supervise me?”
“Why will you say a thing like that? I just want something to occupy your time; I know it must be hard for…”
“Did I not say so?” His sudden interruption had me bewildered.
“W…what do you mean?” I stuttered, hating how he had backed me again into a corner.
“When women earn money they begin to think they can dictate the lives of others. This morning you were busy complaining of the soup in the kitchen, you later had to go upstairs begging to warm meals and perhaps talk on how difficult life is for you; so people would pity you and have contempt for me. Now, I am fit for a shop.”
There was no need to give a response, I had again lost control of a simple conversation; but he continued.
“All of a sudden, you have got wings. I put you through school, opened a shop for your mother and now I am fit for a shop. If I still had my job, would you have recommended I supervise a shop? Wouldn’t you have done it yourself, regardless of how tight your schedule was? When I lose my anger, one would think I am not justified. They might look at me and call me a wife beater but what about the wife who throws veiled insults and makes it look innocent? What do they call those kind of women?”
I couldn’t hold it in anymore; it didn’t matter if my body still ached. “What woman gives her monthly salary to a man that doesn’t work, so that the man gives her a stipend from her own sweat? Where is it written in the Bible that you should not lift your hands to help? The virtuous woman you keep comparing me to, did she not have help at home and in her estate and vineyard?”
“At least she was a virgin,” he bit back.
“So, my not being a virgin when we married is the cause of all our problems? It is why you have no interest in the children, why you would not help me? Did you not know I wasn’t a virgin before you asked for my hand in marriage?”
“The Pastor said that women who had defiled themselves bring spiritual problems that affect a home.”
“So, why in hell did you marry me, why do you sleep with me, why do we have s.ex? Why didn’t you listen to your Pastor? I would have been better off. I wouldn’t have had a man that beats me because he is weak. A man that reminds me of how wretched I was when he met me and yet won’t get off his lazy butt to look for a job but listens to sermons day in, day out. A filthy man who thinks self-righteousness takes him a step close to heaven.”
“Why are you shouting at me?”
“Why won’t I shout? Is it for me that I toil and sweat? Is it for love that my body aches every now and then? Eight years and all you think of is virginity…May God damn you to the hottest part of hell!”
“Hilda! How dare you…” He was unbuckling his belt.
“If you touch me, I will shout for everyone to know the beast you are.”
“Shout all you want, it won’t change anything.” He replied advancing towards me. He had forgotten that the door was open.

Our two boys were there looking at us frightened. I couldn’t cower this time, I didn’t want the boys to see me cowering like a thief, so, I leapt on the bed and when he tried to drag me down; I gave a violent kick where it would hurt the most and ran out.
I opened the sitting room door leading outside and screamed for help with all my might till the buckle landed on my back.

I was dead tired and so glad to be home. Did I say how much I hated work? My boss used the ‘you are a lifesaver’ line on me anytime I wanted to give it all up. My phone rang as I was lazily climbing the stairs. It was my fiancé.
“Hello boo,” I cooed into the mouth piece. And then, “Hey, leave that place!” I yelled at one of my neighbour’s children.
The Arrow was throwing stones at my car.
“Chijiiiiii…..oke!” The Arrow’s mother yelled from their verandah. “Leave that place before dey use eye kill you oh! I no wan hear any ng.bati ngb.ati this evening.”
“Why won’t you hear okoro okoro this evening when your child cannot greet his elders.”
“Shey as you yaself greet me abi? Na me tie your womb abi na me nefa give you husband…anuofia!”
“You are one thousand times mad. Is it by spouses and children? This your children that look science experiments gone wrong. No go look for work oh, stay for house turn to amoeba, nonsense!”
Fumbling with my door, I opened the door and stumbled inside breathing hard. It was then I realized that I hadn’t disconnected my call.

“Is there anything too hard for God to do?” I came in to hear our Pastor’s words. That particular sermon was one of my husband’s favourite. Jeremiah and Benjamin ran in dragging my handbag and greeted their father as I carried Lily in.
“Good evening,” I greeted him a bit formally, moving towards the room.
“Hmm…welcome.” He had his Bible and jotter open and pretended to be engrossed in the sermon but I knew.
He was always uncomfortable after any altercation perhaps he felt ashamed and embarrassed as I felt too. Why didn’t dialogue work for us as it did for others?
Dropping Lily, I unbuttoned my shirt. Today’s work had been a little tasking. I felt like lying on the bed and never getting up for at least two days but I couldn’t for the moment because I needed cooking gas.
My body felt stiff as I undressed into my house clothes. Removing Lily’s shoes I quickly undressed her and left her to her devices.
Giving the kitchen a quick glance, I saw that everything was as I left it in the morning. That meant that there was no miracle, no surprise filled gas tank. The rice in the sitting room would have been on the floor too if I hadn’t mandated one of my sons to sweep it in the morning.
Walking into the sitting room, I paused and took a breath. “Please, can you help me get gas? There’s no gas for cooking this evening.”
“You should have said so before leaving the house in the morning.”
“Sorry, I forgot.”
“So, I should leave this sermon because of cooking gas?” He asked, stretching as he got up.
I watched as he took his sweet time. I wanted to scream, let it all out or take a walk far from everything, just somewhere I could catch my breath.

I heard a knock as I was stepping out of the bathroom. That should be Ma Lily; she was coming in a bit late. I had less than ten minutes to leave the house.
Opening the door, I wanted to ask why she was late but I saw someone else. This was not the woman who had knocked my door with urgency few minutes back. She evaded my eyes and the hands that held the pot and flask were a bit unsteady.
Wordlessly, I pointed towards the kitchen and watched her walk stiffly in. Perhaps I should ask her what was wrong; the change was alarming.
“Ma Lily, is something wrong?”
A slight shake of the head was what I got in return. She had her back to me and wouldn’t even acknowledge my concerned attempt. I couldn’t stand forever wishing she would talk.
Turning, I walked away.