The Elites

Chapter 119

Lady K
One month later!

Kodi let out a shaky breath. She was nervous, really nervous. She scanned her eyes around the huge room filled with a lot of tables and inmates with their families on each table. It was visiting day and she had no idea what was going to happen the moment Susan walked through that door.

Prison was the last place on earth she ever thought she'd have a reason to go to, the irony of life. It had to be her own mother behind those walls and she was the one that made that possible. Maybe if she had just done what Susan had asked of her, if she had just helped her escape, she wouldn't have had to go through the heartaches and guilt she had gone through for the past one month. Everything had fallen into place now, everyone was happy but she still felt so guilty.

It was the first time. The first time since Susan's arrest she ever visited. She wondered if Susan hated her for what happened. For ratting her out. Did she want to see her? Did she still consider her as her daughter? A lot of thoughts had crossed Kodi's mind. She felt Nick slowly reach for her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. He was giving her all the courage she needed. Unlike her, Nick had come to visit their mother a lot since her imprisonment. He was even present at the hearing the week before. Kodi couldn't bring herself to be present on the day her mother was put in handcuffs and declaimed guilty of drug abuse, murder and attempted murder. Seven years imprisonment.

She took a deep breath.

"It's going to be okay." Nick assured her to ease her tension. He knew how hard this part was for her. It was hard for him at first too. Kodi nodded. She believed him. After all, he had pulled her here on his own. She trusted him at that moment. They both turned to the door.

Kodi swallowed hard when she saw how a police lady pulled her mother slowly into the visiting room in handcuffs. She looked a mess. She had a black eye and was limping too like she had been beat up a lot and it broke Kodi's heart to see her like that. Susan had lost herself in jail. She had forgotten that the life in jail was different and no one was anything in there. She had bragged a lot to a few inmates and they had taught her a lesson like they knew how to. Susan took a slow scan around the room. Her eyes hurt. You could see the blood on her left sclera if she looked at you. Kodi held her breath when she saw how easy it was for Susan to find them. A tiny smile appeared on her face as she started to find her way to them, limping. Kodi squeezed tighter to Nick's hand.

"Mum," Nick got up smiling brightly. He walked quickly to her and hugged her. Unlike everyone else, Nick had been the only one that cared enough to visit Susan from time to time since her conviction. He was used to seeing her like that. He led her slowly to the bench so she could sit across them. Susan smiled at him as he found his way back to Kodi and sat beside her.

Was that it?
Her mother used to be so powerful, so elegant and with so much pride and class, just looking at her sit there with her hair in a mess and her clothes really untidy... down there, it was like she was just...nothing. Susan slowly traced her eyes to Kodi, her face brightened when she saw her. It had been weeks. Kodi kept her watery eyes glued to her. She wasn't sure she had words to give. Coming there had to be a bad idea. Nicholas was wrong, it didn't make her feel better, It just made her feel much worse. She did that. She did that to her Mum. She made her mum like this, so pitiable. She pitied her mother and she couldn't help herself from feeling so horrible.

"How have you been?" Susan asked her, letting the smile on her face stay. "Have you been eating well? What about school? Do you still read as you used to? Do you still attend your after school lessons like we agreed on?"

"Mum," Nick added, "Kodi came first in her class' weekly test again. All perfect scores."

"Really?" Susan leaned closer to her, excitement in the tone of her voice and her eyes.

Kodi looked away and sniffed. She couldn't. She couldn't bring herself to look anymore. Her heart was tearing apart and she was going to cry. Her guilt was eating her up. A drop of tear fell from her eyes to her hands. Nick slowly turned to her. He could see how she was breaking apart. They could all see it. He slowly turned to Susan. She frowned. She knew exactly why.

"I'm sorry." Kodi finally let herself say those words. "I'm truly sorry, I'm sorry I did this to you, I'm sorry I told Dad about everything, I'm truly sorry." She sobbed. "I'm sorry I'm weak and not as strong as you wanted me to be." More tears fell from her face. "You must have suffered a lot because of me. You must hate me."

Susan let out a really deep exhale and reached for her hands. She managed to hold on to them even with her handcuffs on both hands.

"Look at me." She told her. Kodi shook her head. She couldn't. Susan exhaled again. "Chikodi, look at me."
This time, her tone was a little bit more demanding. Kodi found herself slowly lifting her face to hers. Her eyes were really glossy, Susan's too. Susan sniffed and then let herself smile a little bit.

"There's nothing you can do that can make me hate you." She told her. Kodi pouted. "As a matter of fact I'm proud of you. You made the right choice, the smartest choice to be the best version of yourself, better than the parents that gave birth to you. You are pure and better than all of us. You remained kind and wise and rational and that's what makes a perfect woman."

Kodi cleaned her eyes with her other hand.

"I just feel sorry towards you." She slowly turned to Nick and reached for his hands too. "Towards the both of you."

"Mum," Nick called her. She shook her head, trying to push back the tears in her eyes.

"I should have been a better mother, a better person. I should have spent my time raising you both well, raising you to live for yourselves and not for me, not for my selfish interest and I didn't realize how I ruined your life until this moment. Being here, being in prison made me realize a lot of things. Nothing in the outside world matters when you're lonely. There's no point in losing yourself and gaining the whole world and having no one to celebrate it with. Family, family is the greatest gift of all, the best gift in the world, the only people that would stick by you no matter what. How you treat them and hold on to them matters and I did wrong to so many of them, so much wrong that I can't take it all back even if I wanted to. But I'm not sorry about it. Maybe I would someday but not just right now. I'm not sorry about the decisions I made. They weren't the best but they were for you both, my family." She turned to Kodi.

"So don't you ever think I'd hate you for making your own choices, for making the right choices, for doing what you had to do to survive and not lose yourself. Do you understand me?"

Kodi nodded. She squeezed her hands.

"Mum, just a little bit more," Nick told her. "Just endure everything for a little bit more time."

She nodded.

"We'd never leave you." Kodi continued. "We'd come visit everyday, I'd do well in school and be good to Dad and my brothers. I'd do well so I can give you everything you always wanted and when the day comes for you to leave this place, we'd be together again, all three of us, like we used to. Nothing is going to change." Kodi sniffed.

"Me too Mum." Nicholas sniffed. "Me too."

Susan sniffed. She nodded. She believed every word they said. She believed in them. Her children. Kodi leaned closer to her and helped her clean her eyes and then reached for the tiny basket beside them. She rose it so Susan could see and then placed it on the table. Susan gasped.

"We brought you food." She said, trying to force a smile on her face.

"Kodi cooked all of them specially for you."

"Really?" Susan asked as Kodi got up and started to set the table for her. Just like that, just as she had hoped, her family was finally complete again, not all of them anyway but the two most important of them all and hopefully, one day, she was going to gain her redemption again. One day, she was going to be able to gain everyone's forgiveness again.

Maybe, one day.