She Is Blind

Chapter Twenty-Five: Fixing Things

I did not set my eyes on Winifred again till I went home, and each time her mother called her name again I felt a wave of relief sweep through me, mainly because I had been so scared that she would get suicidal and have her mother screaming on sight of her dead child suspended from a rope.

But it did not mean I was comfortable with myself. Ever since Winifred walked out that door she seemed to have taken my peace with it, and I felt so much guilt after what happened, and pain too each time my mind thought of the possibility of her being my step-sister. I was beginning to hate myself for the pain I had caused Winifred, and the hate grew as time went on.

Mu return journey home was a tiring one, and it had me silently cursing and promising not to come back home till I graduated. Although this bus was faster than the one that took me to school and I got home quicker, I found myself missing Lagos and it now seemed more home than home.

When I got home it only took me the sight of my father to have my temper ignite some more. I could not believe that he had kept such a secret away from all of us for so long, and had even let an innocent woman live alone with her daughter and pretend to be a widow. That he had lied to my mother hurt deeply, and that he was smiling as he saw me, embracing me even tightly hurt deeper, and remembering that Winifred’s mother was still crazily in love with this man twisted the knife in my heart around, and the fact that I had slept with Winifred hurt deepest. I faked a smile, and tried to concentrate on being the center of attention as everyone cheered me and asked of how eventful my journey was.

Not a lot had changed, though, except for my attitude towards my father. I never really stopped hating myself after what happened with Winifred, and my father seemed an appropriate channel for me to let the hate flow, and at times I found myself blaming him, and how things would have been different if he had controlled his need for a woman. Each time he smiled at me, or my mother, or my younger siblings, I felt a new surge of hatred for him, that he should be so comfortable while harbouring such a secret. If he noticed, I did not know, but I knew our relationship was balanced precariously on a thin line, one soon to break under pressure.

AB for certain had noticed the changes in my mood, but how was I to tell him about such a long story? That Gift and I were no longer together? That I had slept with a girl that seemed to be our stepsister? Each time he asked me about Gift I found ways to deflect the question and I was uninterested in whatever Blessing told him the frequent times she called him to speak to him and whenever he counted the days left for Blessing’s own holiday, a day to my own resumption, I felt uninterested.

And then one day, a week and a day after I came for the holidays, I decided to tackle the bull by the horns. I could not keep on hating my own father, and perhaps some one-on-one talk would do some good. For one it was only a suspicion, not a founded fact, and basing all my emotions on it bordered on being quite childish and immature. And so when I approached him, asking we go out for some time, he happily obliged, and his facial reaction made me feel some regret for ever hating him.

He loved us so much, that he chose us over staying with Winifred and her mother, and all I did for him was hate him and indirectly blame him when I slept with Winifred.
As he drove the car down the tarmac that day, I looked sideways at him as he spoke of how proud he was of me and my small accomplishments, and how he had dreams of me being a big media personality someday, to start up my own family, and to live life as comfortably as I wished. And I felt sad as he said all these things, that he loved me so much, all of us so much, that he wanted the best for all of us, in exchange for nothing, and my heart softened towards my father. I did not even want to ask him the question again.

Curiousity however, and the need to know how to face Winifred forced me to ask the question, and I asked him.

“Dad do you have another child somewhere?”