"How is the Hassan house treating you?"

I sigh and cover my legs with my ankle length ball skirt. I watch her quietly.

"They treat me well enough Mother." She shakes her head.

"So, you won't say this time that your husband beat you?" My eyes fly open immediately.

"What do you mean 'say'?

She spreads out her hands and crosses her feet at the ankles.

"You lied last time to get out of the Hunkur's house. Don't lie this time." She says and anger wells from deep inside of me.

"What so you mean I lied?" She smiles and waves her hand.

"Nadir's mother says they treated you very well and didn't deserve the things your husband did to their son." I blink.

And raise my hands to cup my lips and face. "Nadir's mother said that to you?"

She nods stupidly. I scoff with a sad smile.

"So, you'd rather believe a stranger than your own daughter?" Her face changes.

"What do you mean a stranger, sometimes I'd rather trust a stranger than my own daughter who will stab me in the back with a poisoned knife."

What does she mean?

"Who stabbed you in the back and how does it relate to Nadir's wickedness or his mother's lies?" She hisses and shakes her hand in my face.

"That bitch's daughter is the backstabbing, you are the wicked backstabber." I shut my eyes slowly, tears make it hard to, my eyes hurt. Painfully.

"Why can't you accept that Baba cheated on you, that he is the one whom you're supposed to blame. Not Safiyya or her mother, now even poor me." She stretches out her hand and slaps me.

"I regret the day I allowed you to stay in my womb, if you'd turned out dead, it would have been better, at least I'd have given birth to a better one that would have been like me and wouldn't betray me."

Her words hurt more than the slap but I'm too angry to think it over.

"Let me start from the very beginning, Did you know that Nadir beat me, that the first night after I was taken to his home, he held my body down as he raped my body repeatedly. Did you know? No you didn't." I question her and answer my question at the same time.

"Did you know he treated me like a slave, like a lowlife, like a lowest of the low lows? Now you know. The day I came home here, what was your first question and how did I answer you?" She doesn't reply.

"I told you clearly that I would not stay with a man who slept with men and women. Didn't I?" She nods reluctantly at the sound of my loud voice.

"Good, so next time one liar spits lies to you, tell her, that her son lies about his sexual orientation. That he swings both ways." I carefully sit on the rug again, she's changed the colour to a deep chocolate.

"I didn't know all that." She says and I scoff. How would you know?

"But it doesn't take away the fact that you betrayed me deeply." I purse my lips to hold the words that I know I would regret later.

"It would have happened sooner or later." She leans back on the sofa.

"What do you mean? Sooner or later?" She mimics my voice.

"Your husband cheated Mother. Don't forget that, he lied to Safiyya' mother."
She hisses loudly.

"Lies? That slut just found a meal ticket and stuck to it." I gape at her.

"Can we start by you stop calling her a slut? And father lied to her. He even agreed." She hisses making me roll my eyes.

"So now you are on her side?" I look upwards for help from heaven.

"I'm on the side of the truth Mother and you need to accept it." Her face contorts angrily and she begins to blubber angrily.

"That's why you can't find someone to love you like your father loves me." I jerk my lips wryly and wait for her to finish. I'd like to ask her what love is in her own dictionary.

"If this thing Baba does to you is love, then over my dead body, I don't want even a percent of it." I don't notice the slap until it has reached me. She slaps me again.

"Get out, just get out and never come back here. You are an ungrateful bastard like your father said." I carefully pick up my bag and walk out of the room.

*****

"I'd like Jollof rice and grilled fish. Thank you." I hand the menu book back to the waiter.

"I'd like the same, thank you very much." Adeel says and hands the menu book back too.

"Beela, so, all that happened and you didn't say a word?" I sigh and lean back my comfortable chair in the restaurant we are in, we are at a private table, a little separate from others and in a quiet part of the restaurant.

"I just didn't think it'd be worth talking about. Besides, how did you know?" I remember just crying in my car as I drove home and I wiped my eyes carefully before going into the main house.

"Your mother called Maama, she said some really scathing things that I won't tell you about, but, I need you to know that I'm on your side everyday and always." I sigh and tears spring to my eyes.

"Thank you." I say sincerely meaning it.

"You are welcome. Our food is here." I see the waiter coming to our table with another waiter on his heels. They set the table carefully and I pull my plate of rice closer to me after inhaling the party aroma.

"There's nothing like party Jollof rice."

I laugh and begin to chew carefully. He pulls my grilled fish plate close to him and I protest with a sound. The fish was expertly grilled and I was expecting to finish every single bit of it.

"You have yours, eat it." I eye him in mock contempt.

"I'm simply taking it away to debone it for you. Ya Allah." I laugh quietly and settle back to eating my rice.

"So, have you thought about what to do with the money Baba left you?" I look up to him. His question makes me nervous and my answer may look a bit unserious.

"I haven't really concluded. I have only begun feasibility studies of the make up market in Nigeria, to see if my products will be useful and make useful profit." He nods.

"I know a good company, they could help your work very discreetly." I nod and smile.

"You know the business grew two percent in the last quarter, those stuffy suits began asking for five percent next quarter." I laugh and he joins me, his father's board had been really reluctant to letting him take over completely, but after the profits and bonuses, they completely became receptive to the idea of him.

"They are always all for their profits." He laughs and I look at him as he laughs, he's become so much more beautiful since May last year when we married.

He stops laughing and looks at me with tenderness in his eyes, I flush and smile at him.

*****

Hi y'all,

Mercifully, network has allowed me to shine. Hehe.

So, what do you think? Are we getting there?

So, please, Biko, ejo, edakun, please leave a comment. I loooooove to know what you think.

This chapter is for hawwa_aliyu, badmuswaliyyat and hajiyaammi.

Thank you all for being such amazing people ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️.

See y'all when I see you. Put me in your prayers please.

Tainz,

TheOmoope.