When May gets pregnant for Edric at a young age, her wealthy father feels deeply hurt and humiliated. In a moment of anger, he disowns her. Upon the disown, May is left with no choice than to go with Papa Edric, her lover's father to join the middle...
“To learn to read is like fire; every syllable that is spelled out is a spark.” —Victor Hugo.
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She didn't know it would come to this. If she knew, she wouldn't have moved closer to him.
He shifted towards her on the bed and she moved backward. Her reaction shocked him.
"Who did that to you?" He asked yet again.
"Uhm. Uhm." She searched for what to say as she covered her sweater properly, hugging it to her body as if to prevent him from opening it again. "Nobody."
He creased his brows quizzically. "What do you mean by nobody?"
She said nothing trying to think of what she could say to change the topic or distract him but her brain wasn't working.
"You don't have to hide it. Just tell me." He assured.
She shakes her head, "It's truly nothing."
He didn't take that. "Why don't you want to tell me? I thought we were friends. I just shared something quite sensitive with you but you can't share yours... why?"
What he said made her feel bad, but she still couldn't tell him. She said the first thing that popped into her head. "I fell."
"Fell?" He repeated. It didn't make sense. "Fell how?"
"I-I- I fell backward." She stuttered. "On the stairs. Yes. I was walking down the stairs in my house when I slipped and fell backward."
"So you are trying to tell me that an ordinary fall caused all those welts on your arm? I haven’t even talked about how red and swollen it is."
"Ye– yes." She stammered, looking down and fiddling with her wristband.
Iby gave her an unimpressed stare for a while before he said, "Okay. If you say so. But next time be more careful."
She nodded in affirmative, biting her bottom lip.
He stood up and walked to his kitchen. May wondered what he was going in there to do. She thanked God quietly for making Iby believe her little lie. He had almost caught her. She didn't want to share her life story with him just yet. She wondered what he would've done if she had told him the truth.
She checked her phone time. She had three more hours to spend with him before she had to go pick up Maryam from school and go to the market where she would buy the oranges for sale.
As Iby walked back in with a cold water bottle, PHCN powered the lights and his bulbs shone.
May could hear little children from afar shouting, "Up Nepa! Up Nepa!"
She smiled. Although the name had been changed to PHCN a long time ago, Nigerians still call it NEPA.
There are some things that never change. May thought.
