My late grandfather was a ladies man, he had a number of wives and about sixteen children this makes his last child my age mate (I am 21), as my grandfather grew older some of the children were given out to older children to be cared for. My dad got the second to the last child, Jide who came from the village when he was about thirteen years.
I have three sisters so, it was a little different having a boy around. Jide was not like us, he definitely had many fascinating stories and experiences to share, he used words like “awe” (my friend) a lot, and when we went to fetch water, he says mo n lo odo (I am going to the river), and those moments were really amusing, he could barely read or write (though the best in his school back in the village), he was put in school, we grew up together we introduced him to everyone as our brother, we all slept together in the parlor, my mom treated him like her own, and everything seemed fine. Nobody foresaw any evil.
One morning my elder sister complained about happenings in the midnight, my brother crawling up the cushion touching her, and she felt his penis right on her thigh, who knows his real intentions were, she shrugged him off but couldn’t sleep till morning. My dad, a disciplinarian flogged him thoroughly. My mummy made so much noise about it, we thought it would stop, and that would be the end.
But I promise you, it was the beginning, you just couldn’t sleep off somewhere. One of us would feel a hand in our privates, felt his hand on our breast, and you woke up and can’t sleep again, you feel so disgusted with yourself and him anyway. There is this fear of the unknown, it could happen anytime.
The most painful thing is my brother denied most of it, a particular case he begged us not to tell our mom, promising that would be the last, we didn’t, we believed and we felt what is the point, telling hasn’t really helped anyone, he has been flogged, reported to persons and no change, but that wasn’t the end, it was like he was possessed. One person would complain about hands or penis somewhere on one part of their body even neighbors sometimes.
You can’t imagine the contempt that rises up within me, the bitterness, sometimes I feel like having those moments again and having the opportunity to throw a blow or cause serious injury. You are just mad even though after few days everything goes back to normal, we talked normally again. You never really get over it.
You know none of my sisters mentioned anything about him going all the way down, but I tell he could have done it. Tears form in my eye as I recall the helplessness, the lies, the abuses. Those are memories that don’t go away in a long time.
It took a moment of soul cleansing and God for me to forgive and really take the bitterness away. I don’t know how my sisters feel about the situation, we all never talk about it.
One thing I am certain about though is that no girl deserves to be abused like that, it’s humiliating.
Hmmmm
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