Another Sassy Girl: The Saga

A good story begins with people walking towards something. In starting a story with motion, the writer shows he/she hopes the story will also walk smoothly to its end. This story begins with someone, a young lady with a peculiar stern expression and a pair of glasses sitting on her face.

(1997, University of Ibadan)

She is carrying a stack of books on one arm and pointedly ignoring the young man trailing after her.

“Evelyn! Wait up!” The young man calls breathlessly.

The young lady throws a disdainful look over her shoulder and keeps walking until he slows and gives up.

***

When Evelyn gets to the lecture hall, she is 15 minutes late and has to sit at the back, right beside the class “fine boy”, Rich. Throughout the lecture, she feels him staring at her so she isn’t surprised when he corners her after lectures.

“Hello pretty” Rich swaggers up to her.

“Hi” Evelyn replies stonily.

“Umm. I’ve been meaning to talk to you.” He says, oblivious.

“About what?”

“Just wanted you to know how pretty you are hehe, looking at you makes my day mehn”

Evelyn looks him over in disgust.

“Yeah, I want you to go out with me babe, just one date and I prom..“

“After those lame pick up lines?” She interrupts him. “Where did you get them from? Your grandfather’s old courting handbook?”

“Err err” Rich stammers

“See, I can’t listen to this, I have better things to do, good day!“

***

One would wonder what would make a young lady so averse to the company of handsome young men. You see, before you judge someone’s behavior, you first have to put yourself in their shoes or in this case, walk in their footsteps. Evelyn had proven to be a character worthy enough to be followed so we followed her home, walking inside her house and genuflecting with her as she greets her mother in Esan.

“Di-je Ene!”

“Onegbe?” Her mother asks her.

“Ofure..” She replies and moves into the house. We follow. We do not hear a man’s voice to tell us that her father was somewhere inside the house. We wonder if he might have gone on a trip for business or relaxation. Then Evelyn walks into her mother’s room and we realize there is no man in this house.

I know you’re asking yourself what use that information is to us and to you dear reader. I know you might think it nothing special, that our dear Evelyn comes from a single parent home. Then you must have been forgetting what made us follow her home in the first place. We want to know how she grew up to be the “sassy” girl she is. We want to know what moves her.

***

Some say family meetings are sacred because of the extent of truthfulness and in a loving family, the depth of feelings shared at such times. This evening we stumbled into a very tiny family meeting, small yes, but no less sacred. Evelyn and her mother sit together on the sofa, facing each other slightly. We move closer until we hear they are talking about Evelyn’s father again. We leave them to it, we are not intent on making their moment any less sacred.

By staying back at this house, we have been able to glean information from a lot of things. The walls, the boxes of used and abandoned stuff in the tiny room at the back, Evelyn’s broodings and her mother’s silence. We have crafted together a story about how these two beautiful women happen to be left “manless” in this house.

***

Unlike Evelyn who is privileged enough to be going to a higher institution, Evelyn’s mother was not so opportune and stopped her education at Secondary School level.

Nevertheless, she was a very bright young lady with big dreams. One of them was to create a business empire that would become so large that she would be able to have graduates working for her.

Needless to say, she achieved that dream but a little bit late. By the time she had started her business and was ready to settle down, she was already over 35 and considered to be a very old maid.

Her bold no-nonsense attitude only contributed to making men feel as if she was lording her money and position over them.

She was 39 years old when she met Mr. Raymond Akhigbe and they got married. Their honeymoon didn’t last for too long though. She soon discovered that he married her because of her money. It was too late though, the man had sunk his claws into her already by getting her pregnant with a child. A year later, Evelyn was born. Bundle of joy that she was, hers was too small a bundle to douse the anger and bitterness roaring through their home.

It was this persistent anger that drove Mr. Akhigbe to the beer parlor. He could not cope with the knowledge that his gold digging had been a useless venture. He would return late at night, drag his wife out of the bed and beat her senseless.

Two years later, they divorced and went their separate ways. At this point, Evelyn’s mother’s business had dwindled from bonfire into a candle flame. Very little money was coming from the business and they were barely surviving, living from hand to mouth.

***

(2007, Benin City)

On a Sunday, a young good looking couple can be seen walking down the road with their two children, a boy and a girl. The man and woman are in an argument about something. The man throws his hands around as he argues with the woman who just stares after the children. If we were there with them we might have blamed the anger on the sweltering sun but we were not and the person who gave an account of it later (the woman herself) didn’t think so.

Later we would know that the couple were Mr. and Mrs. Aduebue and their little children were named Michelle and John. We would also know of the tumult in their family and how close to breaking it was on that Sunday when they argued under the sun.

You see, Mr. Rich Akuebue like any proud African man was very traditional. Actively seeking adoration, care, and respect from his wife. Mrs. Evelyn Akuebue on the other hand was a new generation lady who believed that a woman’s place was outside the kitchen and in the heart of the world. She had studied accounting at the University of Ibadan where she had lived with her mother until her marriage to her heartthrob Rich.

Seven years after a blissful wedding ceremony, the handsome couple were already having problems in their home. From heated arguments to full-blown fights, their love was continuously brought close to breaking point.

Speaking of hearts throbbing, one might wonder what mountain the young man Rich had used to push Evelyn’s heart into throbbing. One might wonder why Evelyn allowed herself to be pushed. Our elders say a man’s enemy is in his own household. Forgive us, we innocently say this, we are very aware of Mama Evelyn’s good intentions when she urged her daughter to quickly find a husband (while she’s still young) that sacred day of the family meeting.

We have made discoveries in all our searching but none as painful as this. The generational curses our people are frequently afflicted with is nothing but a combination of bad genes and bad advice.

This is how Evelyn’s home breaks up like her mother’s, over a simple battle of wills. And as always, when two elephants fight, the grass suffers.

***

(2017, Benin City)

That is why when we find ourselves in Michelle’s story, we meet only her. The other characters and events are like phantoms. We wonder if this is to teach us that we all are the only characters in our individual stories, alone among phantoms. When we enter into the story, we meet Michelle, as a 20-year-old girl. A 300 level English and Literature student of the University of Benin.

We meet her seated, staring at her fingers. Some people say if you stare at a person’s fingers long enough, you’ll be able to tell his/her life’s story. So we peer closer, we want to know the secrets behind cracked and peeling pink nail polish.

***

These days, Michelle finds herself thinking a lot about her father’s absence in her life. Not because she misses him but because of lack. Needing money was making her think that perhaps if her mom was with her dad, things would have been easier. She wouldn’t have to borrow all the textbooks she reads from her classmates and she would have enough money to do the things she enjoys.

We know that because we see her sitting and staring into space very often, we hear her pray for more money before she goes to bed and immediately she wakes up. We feel sorry for her because we know she’s a hard-working girl and willing to work. We also know how impossible it will be for her to work and school. We cannot help her, but we feel sorry enough to mumble quiet Amens to her prayers.

At this point, we must admit to walking into this story a little bit later than we should have. We do not know the circumstances that shaped Michelle’s life and brought her to where she is now, staring at her cracked nail polish mournfully.

***

“Michelle!” We hear her mother’s voice from a distance.

“Ma!” Michelle answers blearily, cleaning the drool on her face with one hand. She had fallen asleep on the chair.

“Get up from there my friend! Go and do the dishes!” Her mother says. Michelle rushes to the kitchen obediently, we follow behind her.

She stares out of the window while she washes the plate, she hums under her breath. At this time Michelle is full of life, we can now see the warmth in her; a kind of warmth that threatens to turn into a flame.

While she washes, we walk around the house, we see her little brother playing in his room, we watch her mother reading with large glasses perched on her nose. Both figures are indistinct, none of them shine with Michelle’s clarity, this is her story after all.

***

Later that day, we find Michelle sitting on her bed and sucking on a biro. She is thinking, she is thinking of herself and her small family of mother and brother. She is remembering why her parents separated. She is remembering her mother’s grief at that time. She is thinking about a society where a woman is expected to be seen and not heard. Where a woman is always second place. She picks up a piece of paper and starts to write a poem.

We do not remember falling asleep when she did. Perhaps, if we were awake we would have seen her mother’s figure become brighter. We would have seen her walking around the house doing a man’s job, closing the doors and the windows. We might have even seen the future, Michelle standing in her mother’s shadow and closing her own doors and windows, but we were asleep.

The next day, Michelle wakes up before the alarm. She’d had a nightmare but she couldn’t remember the details, just the fear. She checks her phone and sees a strange Debit alert message from her bank. We watch her stagger out of bed into the bathroom.

We wait for her to finish taking her bath while listening to her singing in the shower.

After breakfast and some chores, Michelle gets ready and sets off for the bank.

***

“Good morning madam” The bank cashier greets Michelle.

“Good morning” Michelle mumbles back.

“How can I help you?” The cashier asks.

“I need my money back” Michelle says abruptly.

“Sorry?” The cashier asks.

“I tried to withdraw unsuccessfully yesterday,” Michelle replies. “I left the ATM machine without cash, only to get a debit alert this morning.“

“Alright madam, just go over there and wait, someone will come and attend to you.”

“No,” Michelle retorts.

“What?” the cashier asks incredulously.

“I said no, you think you people will keep me waiting here?” Michelle shouts.

“Madam…” the cashier starts.

We do not wait for them to finish their argument, we sense the beginning of a new story. We walk unapologetically into Michelle’s love life.

***

Another thing we’ve found out in our discoveries of our own small world is that there’s this great difference between a man cheating and a woman cheating. That is why when Michelle’s boyfriend Chris cheats on her and begs for her forgiveness, we feel he has done something noble.

We call Michelle hard headed for refusing to forgive him, ignoring his calls and deleting all his messages unread.

The only person who stands with Michelle on her decision is her mother. She tells Michelle that she is bold and beautiful and doesn’t deserve to be second place to any man.

Once again we witness this family of women coming together to stand against the world. Just now we cannot decide what to think of their decision to chase the young man from Michelle’s life. We cannot decide what is responsible, bad genes, or bad advice.

***

The morning Christopher (Michelle’s boyfriend) arrived at her house had dawned bright and fair like any normal day. His feet hadn’t dirtied the rug when he stepped in. There was no inkling, no warning as to what his coming would do to her innocence, nothing.

We watched them sit down in perfect silence until he broke it.

“Michelle” he called out.

To give him some credit, at this point, her name was like a prayer on his tongue, a plea. But she ignores him, he might not have even spoken with the way she sat so still in her chair.

We watched her stare in that posture, she looked at the glass. Maybe, if he had eyes of centuries like we did, he would have had mercy on her and left; just walked out of the door and at least leave a memory with her, a little feeling that once she had a heart and once she might regain it again. But he didn’t, and he kept calling her name and she kept growing stiller and stiller until he asks.

“You know you’re auditioning right?“

She stares at him.

“You’re auditioning for your life already,” He said, spreading his hands to encompass the whole of the house. His eyes burned wickedly and he was smirking.

“I will leave” he continues” just remember this Michelle, a sassy girl who is full of ideas can only end up as a lonely old crone!“

We watch him get up and walk away. Then we look back at Michelle. We find her holding the arm of her chair in a white-knuckled grip. She is staring into space as if waiting for something. We sit back, the least we can do is wait with her.