Pebbles from Mount Carmel

MUNA: THE RUN DOWN

PLEASE NOTE: This story was my entry for a competition at my university while I was an undergraduate.
    Joy comes, in the morning, and light comes light comes after the darkness
She never know she never know say ahhh, joyyyyyy comes in the morning, and light comes light comes after the darkness.
    The melody of this song which is now my favorite rang through my head. The Gratitude did an amazing job with such deep and interpretative lyrics, and on days when I couldn't stand the pain, these words helped me by. The song was more of a ministration that mere melody and for everyone passing through a dark night, Joy comes was the jam to make you understand that light comes after darkness.
     I looked at my phone and saw four missed calls from Dr Okenwa. My phone was on vibration so my music could still play; maybe that's why I wasn't distracted and I didn't notice what was going on. The day the pastor looked me dead in the eye and asked me for how long, I knew that this spiritualist must have seen something that made him so confident I was going through something unspeakable. After our counseling session, he encouraged me to be strong in the faith because God spat out lukewarm Christians and worse still, anyone who puts their hands on the plough and looks back, God will abhor so I was determined to tell Satan NOT TODAY! NOT EVER!
  The breeze blowing from my window was so cool and refreshing and the moonlight accompanied it to make me feel the presence of nature.
     “You are everything, and everything is you, precious Jesus what a wonderful wonder you are, ohhhhhhhhhhohh oh ohohhh oh ohohoh” started to play in my head. God was the most creative person to ever exist. How could he make the trees dance with such rhythm to no music? How did he tell the leaves the fall in due season? How did he make the sun go to bed early everyday so the moon could stay up for a TDB (till day break) mission? Why did he cry so that the rains could fall? How come the oceans never dried up no matter how much water they lost to the shore? God is truly the greatest.
   As I stood by my window enjoying the evening, my phone rang very loudly this time. My ring tone did not consider the thought of deafening it owner; rather it rang like a wailing child who just lost its mother.
   It was Dr Okenwa again and I just knew that running away at this point meant bumping into problems greater, so I took his call.
    Dr Okenwa had been my lecturer since the day I stepped into this school to study Zoology. He told me when we started talking that he always admired me and hoped that something could bring us together. In my naivety I never considered the thought of this father like figure harboring ill intentions towards me. He encouraged me to study hard, attend classes, join a bible believing fellowship, attend programs, crusades, revivals and the likes carefully because the world was at its peak with false prophets and men of God, and he was always protective of me when it had to do with the male gender.
    The day Kelechi told me that he stopped talking to me after Dr Okenwa threatened him, and had a few boys beat him up on his way home from night class, I was furious. This was the third time something like this was happening, and I expected Dr Okenwa to understand that Kcee was first class material, so if I had to get it right, I was supposed to hang out with people like him.
   I marched to his office with all the force of the raging fire, and barged into his office the moment I got there. He was discussing about the departmental conference with his secretary Miss Ezinne, and one look at my face and he could tell that it was either he provided me with answers, or one of us was going to pay a visit to the newly launched emergency wing of the school clinic.
   “Muna, have a seat” he said calmly as he sat down and on his round chair, spinning around.
“Sir this is not the time to seat" I replied with my pitch high and my hands on my waist.
“My friend will you sit!!!!!” He roared and looked at me like a lion trying to find some compassion for a sheep. Of course that never happens so I didn't sit.
That was the only trigger required to shoot myself down because at that moment, he threw me a slap across his table, flew with the speed of flash to lock the doors and turned to me with this stare of "what are you going to do now?"
There wasn't much I could do. The time was probably minutes to eight in the evening, his secretary had gone home, and even on my way in, the department was empty. There wasn't anything shouting could do.
I was so sure he was going to rape me, this was the second attempt; but I didn't expect that amount of energy to still flow in veins of a man closer to 60 with a year or two, and like I saw it coming, he pushed me over the table and I got raped.
I couldn’t call this consensual neither could I say I wasn’t violated, but as the blood trickled down my dress as I trekked home, I lost whatever was left of my innocence. I was a firm believer of all the virtues that could make a person great, but apparently those virtues were non-existent to me now.
   That incident was the birth of everything bad that has happened to me so far. I couldn't live with the shame so I stopped going to school in a bid to avoid seeing him, and I wasn't interested in studying anymore. For someone who was the head of the departmental disciplinary committee, it was of no use reporting because I might be termed a liar, or I could get into more trouble than I already was, so I hid my scars and tried to cope with my pain. Seeing the sign board on my way to school from the main gate "Sweet from Sweat endures" "Play straight or you go home" "Success is for those who have decided to do the work" and other inspirational quotes pissed me off every single time. Those words seemed like a reflection of a flawed system and I didn’t see why the people who put up those words would make us lose faith in them; it was pointless.
My academics were failing drastically and by the time the result for that semester was released, I barely managed to attain a 2.5 Grade Point.
   I got home late from a party that day and met Kcee at my door asking me why I was doing this to myself, and why I changed so suddenly. I was so sure he had heard the news by now as slow as he could be with gists. I was now the girl my fellowship sisters used to admonish others. I was the perfect pulpit example of a child of God who started out doing God’s work, but veered of the path of righteousness in pursuit of the cares of this world and made a speedy turn to the broad way which led to hell. Funny enough the Christian body I belonged to never for once asked me what happened. They would just see me and paint clown looking smiles on their no make-up wearing faces claiming to be concerned that I haven't attended church in a while.
Initially I felt like my life could be better or I could pacify myself for what happened, but when I went to Dr Okenwa's office the day the examination timetable was released for the next semester, he paid me no form of attention. And when I shouted and said “Sir I have been here for over 10 minutes and you haven't even looked at me", he looked up from the journal he was reading and began to laugh.
After laughing he said "wait o, do you want to sleep with me again? Thanks but no thanks Muna; my wife is at home. Go and study because your grades are not impressive anymore. Now leave my office". And he continued what he was doing.
  Wow! Where was his wife when he did what he did? At that point I felt like a pitcher dashed into a million pieces on the head it was confident it could always rest upon to be conveyed from the house to the stream and back. It was annoying, but with each passing day my disposition towards men grew awful and he was to blame.
   My careless behavior was my own way of saying no to the pain, and it didn't take long before I learnt the art of exchanging sex for grades. Right now, success could be gotten anyway, but I had slowly forgotten the teaching that what differentiated success from good success was how that success was attained and who or what aided its achievement. For those who claimed to be children of God and wouldn’t meet up at a hotel, there would surely be an amount of money you could never reject, so the Gp that barely survived a 2.5 hit rose quickly to a 3.8 and I was proud of myself. This was rising above the pain, or so I thought. I had endured all the things that happened to me and this was my endurance mechanism that seemed to be working out just fine.
  My colleagues at the department were tired of the petty backstabbing at this point, and the brave ones were bold enough to ask for the secret to my success. Success secrets would normally entail things about hard work, determination, consistency and all, but my success nuggets were one of a kind and could still assure you the expected end. The end justifies the means said Machiavelli and that was now my quote.
Months had passed, and the holidays were over. This was my penultimate year and I was getting tired. This life style wasn't any easier than studying and coping with academic challenges, it just seemed temporarily pleasurable and faster because it didn't require the right procedures and human beings most times are wired to reject following protocol.
  I sat down on my bed that day and wrote a piece that changed my life. I am not one of the lucky people who had their life changing encounters in trances, dreams or visions; I had mine from something I was inspired to write.
"How far can we really go in this world, this world with no compassion for its own?
How can we tell our parents who lived in the days were everyone went to school on bare feet that our shoes hurt?
What can we do if the ones we hoped would provide guidance are the ones who led us astray?
What if our only job was to obey but the apple of disobedience seemed more appetizing and we welcomed the serpent with arms open wide?
Why is the narrow way too narrow for the average youth to enjoy life?
How far can we go to undermine the erring body of Christ when Jesus dined with the sinners?
Who told us that asking all these questions ever meant that we would get answers in this lifetime?"
That was the last piece I wrote when I brought out the rat poison I had kept by my bed side to drink as I prayed for the angels to receive my soul. I knew I was on a double quick match to hell and it was funny because since I didn't want to tolerate the pain life came with, I wanted to die and end up in a place with more pain; the irony. What was funnier was how I constantly mocked the stupid people who took their lives and yet, here was I, on the pathway to take mine.
Suddenly my door crashed. Kcee and Sister Debbie ran into my room and quickly snatched the poison from me.
“Muna don't you dare try what I think you are about to do. Sister Debbie at your church came to the class I was reading at and asked me to bring her to your house. She explained on the way that she just had a leading in her spirit to pray for you and here we are, in your room after knocking for over twenty minutes”
  In that moment I began to remember all the pain I had been going through lately while my tears flowed. I sat with them and explained everything, and why I also couldn't tell anyone. I shared every single detail with them and that was a turning point to the road of recovery. That was a long road; the road to recovery and I was determined to recover fully and make a message out of my mess.
As the founder of The Muna Foundation, my speech at 2019 edition of “The Nigeria of my dream” event was short, but all I felt in my heart at that moment, I poured out in that speech.
"Maybe my motivation to put my writing to the test is a series of awful experiences I need to start sharing.
In a country that cannot cater for more than half of its population conveniently, so much crime abounds with no regard for humanity.
The little pennies some might have squeezed out from this very distraught place, is taken away by some who promise a brighter future with pounds, but end up carting away whatever the poor have left.
That's like stealing the crumbs of a poor man.
I cannot willingly recognize and respect my brother because we don't share a common tongue and I can't even breathe the same air with him because we believe in different powers beyond us.
I preach peace but the peace does not include being at peace with someone whose opinions don't tally with mine.
So we fight, quarrel, kill each other and pride ourselves in tearing down what the other person has built up.
Some hands grip tightly to collars and throats, some have machetes in their hands, others in their heads and some have those missiles for tongues. Children who know nothing about my indifference are made to suffer the sins of their fathers without any room for repentance, forgiveness or pardon.
The disposition to allow freedom of choice and behavior is absent, and with no regard for humanity and the similarity of the blood that flows through every human’s veins, we can't stand each other, we can't TOLERATE each other on this small piece of land we call a nation
I don’t care about you, so why should I spare your life?
This is what we all go through every day, and this is why our nation should be great again, and why we should work hard to make it the happy place we all dream of”
  The event ended well, and after talking about my experiences, my story so far, the Muna Foundation and giving the big announcement that Uche and I were expecting our second child, I felt so blessed for every disappointment, every trouble, and how God pulled me through it all. Sometimes endurance was the key, but other times, fighting those problems was better off than tolerating them.
I told Uche to drive slowly being careful of speed bumps because I didn’t want an unexpected delivery. The breeze felt fresh on my face in concordance with my soul and I smiled as we drove on.