ABUSED. Chapter 25

The only thing that let me know he was alive was the loud moans coming from the room. He must have dragged himself into the sitting room because at a point, the moan and groan got louder and I half expected him to blow down the door to my safe haven anytime. I checked the time of the phone and hissed in frustration- 5:14am; it was like the damned thing was moving like a snail. I started pacing up and down the small bathroom, shaking like a leaf but when my head started spinning, I sat on the water closet and started thinking of who to call and confess my crime to.

The clock kept adding minutes and at that moment, I started thinking of going out there and tend to him but then again, I would never break away from him. He told me once that if I ever left, he would kill me and I had a feeling that if I really leave, I would be on the run for the rest of my life. I hadn’t finished that thought when he banged hard on the bathroom door. I went cold with fear and scooted into the far end of the bathroom, wrapping my arms around myself and praying to God in my mind that someone would just come to my rescue and end all the suffering I was going through.

“Jumoke please come out,” he said in a voice weaker than I had ever heard from him. “I’m losing lots of blood and I’ve started feeling lightheaded.”

I scooted further into the wall but didn’t even consider the sincerity in his declaration. He was used to having his way by giving crappy excuses and this wasn’t going to be one of those times because my life was at stake. For all I knew, he could be right in front of the door waiting for me with a knife or God forbid, waiting to strangle me to death with his bear hands. 

“Please. You’ve made your point. I promise not to harm you when you come out. Please you have to help me or my death will be on your conscience.”

He was luring me in and I knew it but the mention of death made my fear come back in folds. I hadn’t even considered the fact that he could die and I would be responsible for it. The door shook again but not as heavily as it did the first time. I knew he leant on the door because of the groan the door and its frame made as he laid his back on it. I imagined him on the other side of the door, with his legs stretched in front of him, the knife still in his thigh with blood oozing out of the deep wound and his scalded chest. I shuddered at the image it made: I did that to him. Then I remembered  the day I crawled from the same bathroom I was in presently, with blood flowing between my thighs, with intense pain and him snoring away in the bedroom: he did that to me. He killed our unborn child.

I rubbed my fingers to ease the tension from them, and then rubbed the back of my neck. I hadn’t finished that when loud knocks came from the front door. I almost peed in my pants; I moved to the back of the door but when I hit my back on the wall, I quickly slapped my hand over my mouth to muffle the scream of pain that would have come out of it. Fresh pain hit me and I realised I had been so worried about my wellbeing that I had forgotten the pain he inflicted on me too.

The knocks got louder and more consistent. I quickly checked the phone and saw that the time was 6:30am.

“Jummy, open the door,” it was Damola.

The relief that hit me almost knocked me off my feet and I didn’t even wait to think about how he knew where I lived or thought of coming to check on me. With shaky hands, I inserted the key into the keyhole and twisted it, unlocking the door. Kayode fell heavily; he had leant all his weight on the door and didn’t know when I jerked it open. He groaned in pain as his back made contact with the bathroom tiles but I didn’t even wait to check him before leaping over his body and ran towards the entrance, my pain forgotten again.

I threw the door open, threw my arms around him in relief. He didn’t hug me back for a while; probably surprised at the physical contact then he slowly brought his arms around me carefully. I flinched when his arms made contact with my back. He jerked me back but still held my arm.

“Shit, are you okay?” he asked with concern evident in his voice.

“Now I am,” I tried to sound convincing but I knew he wasn’t buying any of my bullshit. It wasn’t until he let me go that I had time to notice my uncle behind Damola, looking me up and down and for the first time in both our lives, my uncle hugged me tight; I tried not to wince and I could feel his silent reassurance that everything was going to be okay.

I released myself and dashed back into the house, headed straight to the bathroom and leapt over Kayode’s passed out body despite the pain in my inner thighs, back and in short, my whole body. I was energised because u knew my salvation had come and I would be an utter fool not to take the chance. I took the phones where I dropped them and as I was about to leave the bathroom, I was met with Damola’s intense questioning gaze.

“Jumoke what did you do?” my uncle voiced out Damola’s silent question with a panicked voice of his own. “Did you kill him?”

“He’s not dead but we have to leave right now,” I said. “I will call his parents and tell them to come straight to the house without fully explaining what happened. I didn’t kill him, I swear.”

My uncle shot me a disbelieving look which got stopped mid-way when Kayode groaned from the bathroom door. He looked around to make sense of his surrounding and that was when I noticed that he had removed the knife and the wound didn’t appear quite as deep as I had imagined but it was still bad and the risk of it getting infected was high since he was still on the bathroom floor.

My uncle kicked his good leg hard and he jolted fully awake. He sat up, looked around again and narrowed his eyes when he saw Damola.

“What is this oloshi doing here?” he didn’t exactly sound threatening but the hate behind his statement was unmistakable.

“Better calm down. Here’s your phone. You’ve saved us the stress of calling your parents to come and pick you up. Call them and tell them to come fast. She’s leaving right now.” My uncle snatched the phone from me and dropped it on his laps.

We left the house but not after I looked at Kayode and saw the silent promise of retribution he threw my way with the most hateful look I had even seen on him. I took my eyes off him and made my way to the front of the house with Damola and my uncle in tow. I didn’t even cry. I was an emotional desert. We got into Damola’s car and the silence that descended on us as we drove home was very comforting. Each one of us was lost in our thoughts. Something came to my mind and I broke the silence.

“Wait, Damola. How did you know that I was in trouble or know our house. You’ve never been here before and I’ve never told you about where I live.”

He looked at me from the rear view mirror and smiled softly. “I kept sending texts and you didn’t reply. You’ve never ever taken that long to reply me on the emergency phone before but I didn’t want to overthink things, so I waited till yesterday morning. I called and the line was turned off, so was your main line. I sent texts and they didn’t get delivered till yesterday evening. I got very worried then and I knew you were in trouble. I should have contacted your uncle earlier but I didn’t even know where you liked too until I decided to check your hospital file. I saw your address but I knew it was too late to do anything, so I called your uncle and told him that I thought you were in trouble. We met up this morning and here we are.”

“Thank you, sincerely.” I said and smiled appreciatively. ”But do you think we can go to the hospital first? I need to get myself checked out.”

He looked at me pitifully but didn’t say anything. We went to the hospital, where they treated my back wounds and I was given some prescriptions. We went to my uncle’s place after. No one questioned me and I guess my uncle already told his wife about my wounds because she didn’t even hug me, just held my hands and nodded in understanding.

I resumed work the following week. Resuming work felt like I was starting the same cycle of absence that got me fired from my last job. With Damola’s help, the hospital had called my boss and explained that there was an accident and I had to have a bed rest for a week. I was scared that Kayode would show up that Monday but he never did. I spent the whole day looking over my shoulder before I reminded myself that his wounds were worse than mine and he was probably in the hospital. I didn’t turn my phone on for the fear that he would call me and ask to speak with me or threaten me again.

On Wednesday, I started going to the group therapy again and when I told others that I finally left him, I got congratulations and prayers that Kayode’s chapter in my life would be closed forever. I strongly believed it was over and that my life would finally be good without him. One thing was sure; I wasn’t in love with him anymore. The rest of the week went well. On Saturday, I turned my phone on and the first thing I did was called Oyin and Ufuoma; and told them all that happened. As expected, they were together again and I asked that the phone be put on loud speaker.

“You got what you deserved,” the ever stoic Uffy told me. “We all tried to warn you but you were in love and didn’t know what he was doing to you. I’m happy for you sha…” she didn’t finish before Oyin cut in.

“Haha! Ufuoma don’t be a bitch. She has gone through a lot and doesn’t need you to rub the pain in,” I heard some protests in the background, probably Ufuoma calling Oyin a mumu for being sympathetic and not being blunt. ”I’m very happy that you have finally found the gut the leave him. I’m sure you’ve learnt your lesson and won’t go back to him again. And babe, don’t think this is the end and stop going for therapy o.  You still need to heal.”

I thanked them and was happy that I was finally having my life back. The rest of the weekend went well and by the beginning of March, I knew the chapter of Kayode and his brutality was over in my life.

It was the second week of March and I was leaving the office when I saw Kayode leaning heavily on the pillar by the gate. It was obvious that he couldn’t move around much at all and I was secretly happy that I could inflict some pain on him too. I wasn’t scared, just numb and very sure that whatever trick he had up his sleeve wouldn’t work this time. I walked towards him confidently and stopped when I was like 5 feet away from him.

“What is it this time?” I asked impatiently.

“I have a deal you can either take or leave.” He said confidently. Cunny bastard.

“I don’t have anything to say to you.” I turned to leave but what he said next stopped me in my tracks.

“Not even if it’s about Damola?” I walked back to him and crossed my arms over my chest. His gaze dropped to it and I scowled at him. “My parents want to involve the police in this matter and I can assure you that it is going to get to court because my father has strings and he’s already pulling them.”

My blood ran cold but my facial expression didn’t change one bit. He knew he got my attention and he smirked in victory. “I told my parents that you were not the one that stabbed me.”

He probably waited to see any change in my facial expression but when he didn’t see any, he continued. ”I didn’t tell my parents that it was you that stabbed me. I told them about this guy that has been stalking you, who didn’t know you slept at your uncle’s place and came home to check you again and then he attacked me,” my jaw dropped at the amount of evil in him. How didn’t I notice this? “And the best part is that he happened to work at the hospital where you were treated and since then, he’s been on your case.” He smirked evilly with a glint in his eyes.

“So how do you explain the iron wound on your chest?”

“Leave that to me,” he heaved himself off the post and moved closer to me. I took four steps back. “Here’s the deal. Either you let me make the idiot the scapegoat in this, make him lose his license and go back to square one; you’ll go scot free, or you come back to me and we leave this whole issue. We both know we love each other. We just need to accept that mistakes happen and move on with our life together.”

I waited for a few seconds, and then took a deep breath. “What do you need me to do?”

He smiled sadistically, “Good girl. We’re going to have the police arrest him on the basis that he has been harassing you since a few months ago when he was the one that treated you at the hospital. He has been coming to our home and your office, got into a fight with me some few times and just wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer. Tell them you’re terrified of him and on the night he attacked me with a knife, you were away in your uncle’s place and when you got home the next morning, you met me passed out on the floor with a knife in my thigh. I’ll fulfil my part”

I felt a wave of sickness and gulped heavily to push down the nausea. My eyes welled up with tears and I blinked them away. I would never allow him to see my weakness again. “I need to be very sure that I will go free after this.”

He nodded and assured me he would let me go but only if I agreed to use Damola as my soft landing.

“Okay.” I agreed and we gave me a full blown smile. The same smile that used to blow me away but at that moment, I never believed I ever found it alluring.

“I’ll call you with details. And don’t worry about evidence because it’s two weeks already. I have it covered.” He traced my cheeks with his finger as he left and I staggered back.

When he disappeared completely, I brought out my phone from my handbag and stopped the recorder.