Dysfunctional Family - Season 1 - Episode 17

4 years ago

Dysfunctional Family - Season 1 - Episode 17

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Being thrown out of the place you’ve known and called ‘home’ all your life is one of the most painful things I’d gone through back then. And note, I said ‘one of the most painful things.’
I had packed my bags quite alright and had pleaded with Dad to at least throw me out in the morning and all he did was threaten to behead me if I continued testing his patience. I wondered why Janet was even trying to talk some sense into him when she was the root of all the drama currently going on. Had she kept her mouth shut, I would have found a perfect way to divulge the truth to Dad because I knew one way or the other, the truth always comes to light. And no one can hide a pregnancy they are planning on keeping but no, she just had to snitch.
I had packed my bags quite alright. Let me be practical and say I’d packed my bag.
I joined a narrow path and wondered where I was going to spend the night. At my friend’s place? No, my friend lived in Makululu where I couldn’t go at that late hour. Maybe a neighbour’s place? Hard luck. I never saw eye to eye with most of my neighbours.
Ah, Chris’ place then? Perfect. He had put me in this mess after all.
I took the phone he’d bought for me months ago, from my bra where I usually hid it, and gave him a call which went unanswered.
I gave him three more calls and still, he didn’t pick up.

“What do I do now?” I bit one of my fingernails.
It was terribly dark as there were no stars nor moon in the sky and it looked like it was going to rain.

I heaved a deep sigh and carried my bag on my head. I knew where Chris stayed so that’s where I was headed.
I trekked for minutes and joined a narrow bushy path. The path was creepy but there was nothing I could do as that was the only road that led to Chris’ place. I was walking in the dark, along a narrow and lonely path I knew led to my science teacher/lover/soon to be baby daddy’s place. There were trees on both sides and they kept on making weird noises. I was dead scared and was shivering but continued walking as I had no choice but to walk. I had walked for minutes and minutes and yet had run into no fellow human being.
“God help me,” I muttered.
Rustling sounds gripped my attention and I feared for the worst as I looked over my shoulder. I expected to see a wild animal or something but was relieved to see a fellow human. My relief didn’t last long when I noticed the fellow human was a man.
I increased my pace and so did the man.. I then broke into a sprint. So did the man.
He was chasing me and seemed to be catching up when I threw my bag into the brush and increased my pace more. I ran as fast as my legs could carry me.
My pursuer seemed to be having the time of his life as he purposely didn’t want to catch up with me. I know this because he was only a few metres behind me and a man of his statute should have caught up with me by now.

My legs were almost failing me and I was quickly running out of breath…but I had to run. For both my baby’s and my sake. I stumbled over a rock and fell into the brush with a scream. The man who appeared almost as a shadow in the darkness hovered above me for a while and laughed, a hollow and scary laugh. “You’ve got quite fast legs, neh.”
“What do you want from me?” I panted while trying to get up but my legs where entangled in some thorns so I couldn’t. I felt the thorns dig deep into my flesh with a searing a pain.
“You want to know what I want from you? Fun.” He bent down and pushed me farther into the brush while I pleaded with him. I’d have to be the dumbest creature on earth not to have figured what he was after.
“I can not see your face,” he whispered in my face while pinning my arms behind me with one of his strong arms. “That’s gonna make this experience even more fun.”
I wiggled and tried to fight my way out of his strong grip but all my strength and effort went down the drain as the man was too powerful for me.

“Please..I am pregnant.”
“And so?”
“Can’t you have mercy on my unborn baby? Show some sympathy on a poor orphan like myself. Let me go, please.”
“Nice try..trynna play victim? I’ve heard better sob stories. Now here’s how this is gonna go…the less you try to put up a fight, the faster all this will be over. Do you hear me?” His breath was so terrible it brought bile up my throat. The man sounded insane and a professional rapist so I decided it was time I pulled the help card.
“Help! Somebody help me!”
“Really? You’re pathetic..” he growled and seconds later gagged my mouth with a cloth he ripped from his shirt. “Let’s see how you gonna make noise now. This is going to be fast by the way so just relax and think of me as one of those hot guys you drool over. Close your eyes even..and enjoy the experience.”

Enjoy being raped? Nigga was beyond crazy.
It was no use screaming as only muffled sounds came out of my mouth so I began to kick as he pulled down my skirt and ripped my shirt off. My phone was in the bra and he somehow didn’t notice it as he hastily ripped my bra off too.

I was still kicking and seemed to be only turning him on even more as he pinned me harder and managed to pull down his trousers and boxer after he’d done away with my undies.

“I hope you’ll enjoy this as much as I will,” he whispered in my ear and entered me.

A part of me died at that particular second. I shut my brain and closed my eyes as he t----t harder and harder. But I couldn’t shut away the explosive pain of dry sex. I was getting bruised down there but what did he care? As long as he enjoyed the experience, that’s all that mattered to him, I assumed.
After what seemed an eternity, he finished doing his job and put on his clothes while I lay on the grass sobbing.

“Get a grip,” he hissed and threw my clothes at me.

I fumbled for my phone, hurrieldy turned on the torch and aimed it at his face. I badly needed to see the face of the man who had just raped me..who had just raped a pregnant woman.

“What the heck- You’re one dead b---h!” he kicked the phone out of my hands and leaned down with force.

I felt my belly explode with pain..he had just buried a knife in it.

“That should teach you a lesson or two.” and he was gone.
But not his face. He was a stranger, yes, though now his face was and would forever be imprinted in my mind.
In spite of the unbearable pain, I rolled over and crawled towards my phone on which I dialled Christopher’s line.
He picked up after quite a number of rings. “You’ve been blowing my phone up with calls, what’s up?”
“I am- d-dying, Chris.”
“Dying? How? Where are you, Julie?”
“In some brush along the road- th- that leads to your house..please save me.”
“Julie, just hold on I’ll-”
I couldn’t make out the rest of what he was saying as I let go of the phone and lay on my back..I was light headed and the pain wasn’t helping matters.
Within seconds, I blacked out.

☆☆☆

When I came to, I was laying on a hospital bed. A friendly looking nursing was hovering over me.
“I’m happy you’ve regained consciousness..you’re in the hospital by the way. Am Juliet.”

We shared the same name? “Am Juliet as well.”

“So I’ve been told..um-”
“Water. Can I please have some water? My throat is dry.”

“Sure.” she poured water into a glass from a jug and handed it to me, pitifully watching me gulp it down.

I tried to sit up but she stopped me. “You’re not well, you’ve just been stitched up.”

And then memories vividly came flooding in so I held my belly and cried, “My baby..is my baby okay?”

The expression on her face spoke volumes but I still hoped what I was thinking wasn’t what was going on.
“The baby’s dead, Julie.” it was Chris who replied. I glanced over the nurse’s shoulder and saw him standing in the doorway. He took quick strides and came to sit beside me. “Am sorry.”
Call me a cry baby but I broke down and wished I could just die. The pain of being raped, stabbed and having a miscarriage was just too much for me to bear.
Chris hugged and sweet talked me. Telling me how I was young and would eventually have another child. If I had the strength in me, I would have castrated him for being so insensitive.
In the end I ended up crying in his arms cause I so needed a shoulder to cry on.
Janet showed up to visit me hours after I’d regained consciousness. I was just from giving a statement to the police who assured me they were going to do everything in their power to look for and arrest my rapist when she arrived with a basket of food in hand.
“Take that poison back with you, please.”
“Julie, need I remind you Janet’s your sister and only wants the best for you?”
“Don’t talk of stuff you know absolutely nothing about, Chris. This wretched Janet here is actually the person responsible for my calamity.”

“How?”
“Ask her.”
“I’m sorry,” she quietly said from where she stood. “I shouldn’t have blurted the truth out to Dad thus am truly sorry, sis.”
“You’re sorry? Unbelievable! Janet, will sorry bring back my child, will it erase the shame and pain of going through rape? Will it reverse anything at all?” “It won’t..But I have to say it anyway. I am-”
“Truly sorry?” I scoffed and she nodded.
“Fine..you’ve said your piece,” I was trying hard not to curse her. “Now leave.”
She put the basket aside and said, “I hope you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me.”
“And I hope you’ll suffer immensely for everything you’ve done to me.”
“Juliet!” scolded an embarrassed looking Chris. “Don’t be like that! She’s just a young girl and your sister!”
“You know what, Chris. Just leave me the hell alone cause you’re seriously draining me with your irrelevant lectures. Leave!”
Chris left a few seconds after Janet and once alone, I cried myself to sleep.

That’s when the nightmares began and through them, I re-lived my entire ordeal.
I was released from hospital a few days later and let me just point out that Dad had never made an effort to come see me whilst I’d been confined to that hospital bed. What sort of father does that?

From the hospital, I went straight home and for the next two months, Dad barely said a word to me no matter how hard I tried to strike a conversation with him.

One day he showed up home with Chris, Chris’ uncle and aunt and ordered I give them seats and something to drink.
I did as told and was headed into the house when I heard him say, “Come sit beside your husband, Juliet.”

Husband? Since when?

I sat anyway.

Dad was saying, “My people, it’s been two months since I discovered your nephew here was sleeping with my daughter and had knocked her pregnant whilst at it. What am trying to say is you people didn’t pay us any money for damage but that doesn’t matter anymore as sadly, Juliet lost the baby in the worst way possible. That’s not the sole purpose of this meeting though.”
“Tell us the sole purpose then cause we too have things to do,” replied Chris’s aunt.
“I hereby demand Christopher Shamabanse becomes a man and rectify his mistakes. In short, I demand he marries Juliet as soon as next week.”

“Excuse me?” said Chris in disbelief. “No offense but what makes you think I’d like to marry your daughter?”
“Whatever made you stick your manhood in her will make you marry her.”
“I don’t want to marry him,” I chorused and that earned me the ugliest of glares from Dad.

He said, “What makes you think you have any say in this?”
We all argued for over an hour but in the end, Dad won. Chris who was fuming rose to his feet and swore, “You’ll all regret forcing this cheap and loose girl on me.” with that, he rudely walked out of the compound .
His uncle was saying, “Go and pack your bags, dear. You’re coming with us.”
I wasn’t listening. Chris had just called me a cheap and loose girl and that had hurt me so I ran out of the compound and began wandering around the township. It was almost as if my life had come to a standstill and I just wished I hadn’t been born into this world in the first place.

I was still wandering around when I saw Janet clad in her school uniform. She was with a couple of friends and they were laughing their stupid asses off.

I wiped my tears and channeled all my pain into hatred, diverting it towards Janet. “You’ll one day pay for every single tear I’ve shed, Janet,” I mumbled and branched off into another road.