I just couldn’t stand all their noise and palaver. I never wanted to be the kind of girl to get married, have kids, have trouble with my husband, divorce and leave broken kids behind. No! Been there, felt that. So I’d often toyed with the idea of not getting married at all. I knew I could get married and not have children, but I wanted my own kids and I didn’t want them to go through the hell I went through with my parents.
I couldn’t bear the noise any longer. It seemed my earphones couldn’t drown their noise and yells as well as the shatters. I didn’t want to get emotional, so I got up from my bed, went straight for my drawer and picked up my Beats by Dre headphones. The bass tone would’ve been enough to shut out the noise even from a drone. Tears slid down my face.
“No. No. Not now, no!” I cried.
No one was watching really, maybe just a few cockroaches that had sneaked into my room, but I didn’t want to start crying. I didn’t want to be dragged into all their mess. I didn’t ask to be conceived by them.
Thrice, I have made lists of every possible person I wish I’d been born to. Maybe T.D Jakes, maybe Dangote. Obama? Chimamanda Adichie? Or even Folorunsho. I felt I was born into the wrong family.
I quickly dressed up, packed my copy of Huckleberry Finn, notepad, pen, my phones, and flung them into my schoolbag. I hadn’t planned on attending any lectures that day. I’d wanted to sit back and laze around at home and get my own one day holiday. But now, they were forcing me to leave.
I patted some concealer under my eyes to hide the darkness originating from my soul, yet visible under my eyelids. I quickly drew my eyeliner around, put on some lipstick and went out of my room.
She sat on the floor next to our front door, clutching her hand. I could see the red liquid dripping from her left wrist. It stained the green wrapper she was wearing. She looked at me with so much tears in her eyes. My eyes bulged. I felt my heart would stop beating any moment.
“Look at what your father did to your mother. Né’anya.” She whispered to me, still sobbing.
I wasn’t sure what to do anymore because there were many things I wanted to do in that moment. I was eighteen now, and so there were many things I could do. I straightened up, opened the door and walked out, saying nothing to her. I was glad to finally smell what was supposed to be fresh air at last—but it stung my lungs! It felt like I was breathing in poison. Fresh poison. Lots of poisonous hatred for my father. It was a lot. So I kept walking. I kept walking towards the Riverside. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do yet, but I just kept walking.
Mirabelle Morah
