Binta

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"Help.....please stop...please don't....do this to me....i beg you...please.....somebody please help me....my God where are you!" I begged and struggled.

"You better shut up because nobody can hear you or save you now" he threatened and laughed along with his friends.

"Please what wrong have I done to you to deserve this" I cried.

"You are always covering your beautiful body with a big veil so I'm so interested in what is hidden beneath" he confessed roguishly.

"Just lay down still and cooperate with me and I would be gentle" he mocked

"Please God is watching us...this is wrong I beg you in the name of God" but he only laughed while his friends helped him pin me down and sealed my mouth so I couldn't scream or move and he raped me.

"My turn" his other friend said

"No leave her alone can't you see she is bleeding...she must be a virgin"

"But I love virgin" his friend insisted and he snapped at him

"I said no...let's go before we get caught" and so they ran away leaving me battling for my dear life...

I wish I could stop the painful memory it unleashed, I wish I could end the nightmare but I'm handicap with the series of events surrounding my lonely life.

"...When I opened my eyes I found myself in the hospital and I panicked but I later realized why I was here but how I got to the hospital I didn't know.

"Thank God you are awake" a young lady who must have been in her mid-thirties smiled at me whom I came to understand was the doctor who attended to me when I was brought in unconscious. She asked me of my name and told me how i was brought here and my condition. I thanked the man who brought me to the hospital and narrated my ordeal to them.

"Please I want to die I can't leave with this pain...please..."I cried my heart out. My parents tried all they could to comfort me and stood by me but it didn't change anything.

"Can you identify the culprit?"My father asked and I shook my head.

"Not even by their voice" my dad was becoming impatient

"Baba they were three of them and all wearing masks" I burst into tears again.

"Did the three of them...."

"No! only the one with a dark scar on his wrist" I could remember seeing the scar when I was struggling with him.

"Meye kike yi (what were you doing) in an uncompleted building in the evening Zara" my mother asked in tears.

"Mama na je yi karatu exams (I went to study for my exams)...I didn't want any distraction" I normally go there to study in the evening most especially when I have exams, I do enjoy my quite hours there.

It was my final year in secondary school, and about to take the West African Exams. I was 16 years old and very intelligent among my peers and the best in my set. When my peers were busy having fun and getting caught in juvenile delinquency I was so reserved and disciplined which made my teachers very fond of me. When they were informed about my incident they felt very bad and pity for me and tried to encourage me to move on with my life but all fell on deaf ears I just want to be left alone in my shell.

I withdrew from everybody, I quit school I just stayed indoors and alone, I even attempted suicide once.

My worst day was when I was confirmed pregnant; my world just stopped .how could I be pregnant for a rapist. My parents refused an abortion that it's a sin and I might lose my life but I really didn't care anymore about living and about sinning God had failed me already I thought.

My parent had to send me to my grandmother who lived in Ghana, far away from prying eyes and stigmatization .the news of my incident had gone viral like the rustle of a burning flame within a short time .In short I was termed a wayward child and a pretender of good morals only few believed my story but I didn't really care I worried more about my parents they brought me up in an Islamic oriented manner and never for one day had I deviated from it, now they have to bury their head in shame and hide them self indoors because of the curse I have brought into the family but thank God they believed me, thank God they stood by me and thank God for God.

I gave birth to a baby girl in Ghana, and everybody said she was so beautiful and has my eyes, but I couldn't look at her, I couldn't love her,her sight brought me painful memories. I didn't want anything to do with her.my father gave her the name binta, it's the name of his favorite sister.

"Zara this baby is innocent, do not take vengeance on her please" my grandmother would preach.

I hate to breast feed Binta, I have to be forced by my grandmother to do it in tears. I weaned her after 3month regardless of all sayings.

What amazed me about Binta was she never got angry at my nonchalant attitude towards her she loved me, she is always happy to be with me and preferred me to any other person and that really moved me a lot. I gradually became fond of her.

then one day Binta took critically ill and the doctor said she might not make it, I almost died I prayed to God every night and day to please not punish me for not loving my daughter by taking her away from me, I promise God that if he allowed her live I would be the best mother in the world, I cried prayed and fasted for the life of my daughter and God being the merciful Lord performed his miracle and my Binta lived and since then I kept to my promise.

Watching Binta grow helped in healing me, she filled me with love and makes me proud but sometimes when I look at her I get sad not because I regret having her but because she is in pain and I can't shield her from it so I grieve in silence.

I came back to Nigeria when Binta was two years old, I still refused to go back to school or mingle with youth of my age I just kept to myself and took care of my daughter.my parents wanted me to get a husband and marry but with my story all over the town no man wanted to marry a raped or wayward girl but only one man didn't mind. His name is Aliyu, he was the one who found me in the building, the one who took me to the hospital and paid my bills, the one who wept and comforted me, the one who stood by me through thick and thin, the one who covered my shame, the one who fathered my Binta, the father of Kamal and Zainab, my best friend, my savior, the one who taught me how to smile and laugh again, the one I have to be forced to live without because death snatched him away from me prematurely.