I promised, so here I am!!!♥️♥️♥️

Who's ready for this one?🌝

~DABI~

The silence in the air was so loud.

God knows it may have been a good thirty minutes. It may have been a good thirty minutes since we all stood there in the living room like statues, still and straight, not daring to move the slightest muscle in our bodies even though heaven knew that we were wrecked, absolutely and wickedly destroyed with the merciless tension from the deafening silence that lingered in the air like an absolute bastard.

And as the time rolled by in all the silence, all our anxiety only kept building up, getting worse and worse, and we stood there to feel its full brunt like it was a punishment. We did not look to the other. Side talks were out of the question. We just stood.

By we, I mean me, Marcus, and of course, Mama Acha. The three of us were partners in this, and neither was ready to utter a word just yet. Neither of us was ready or bold enough just yet to look directly at the man who sat there in front of us. Whether we looked or not, the weight of his glare on all of us could not be missed. Marcus's father was boring holes into every damned pore in our skin. 

He sat there on the main couch of the living room, a perfect spot to oppositely face us and have a perfect view of the three of us altogether. And good lord, he stared. Glared. He death looked. We didn't have to look back at him to know. Like an evil spirit, we felt his gaze heavy on us, following us closely, carefully, in every way deadly.

And his silence. God forbid.

There was something about his silence in pure anger that could raise your heart to your throat. It made you want to choke on your own spit. And with every second that passed, there was that everlasting chilling effect from it that did not falter. The chills passed through, like a slimy, lithering snake, into every tiny vein of your body, into every marrow of your damn bones, and raised the hairs on your skin, dotted it with the finest goosebumps. 

It made it so difficult to breath. Literally. You would have wanted to breath when you noticed that you weren't, but every breath you'd inhale, you'd innocently forget to exhale. And when you did exhale, it was only until you had this maddening choking sensation from breathlessness that you'd remember that you were supposed to go over the process again.

It was the most uncomfortable thing I had ever had to experience all my life. I barely knew the man, but he already scared the absolute crap out of me. 

Mama Acha cleared her throat.

It was about time.

"It was wrong to not tell you about this, Solomon," She said to him. "But we were only trying to help this little girl find a place to stay for the mean time."

I was surprised at how firm she sounded as she spoke to him. It started to look to me like the whole time, she may have been more occupied mentally with looking for words to say for damage control, than being afraid of the consequences were were about to face.

He looked directly at her and I was stunned at how well she stood her ground and looked him right back in the eyes, unfazed by the death glare he had zeroed in on her.

"Obianuju," He said to her. His voice, husky. His tone, deadly quiet. 

"Yeah," She quipped without much a care in her tone.

"You know how I feel about having strangers in the house," He spoke.

For a slight moment, I saw a shift in the dead emotions on her face. Her eyes had flickered with concern hinting at its slightest, and she blinked a number of times more than necessary, clearly in discomfort and a tad bit of guilt.

But that was it. She said nothing afterward.

Her husband carried on.

"We had an agreement on this entire topic when we got married," He said to her. "And then, you still had the effrontery to go ahead with your son and disrespect our agreement."

 I was not sure how to elaborate how I felt, but it was an uneasy feeling.

It was like I was the reason why a whole family was about to start having some series of serious issues that could have been avoided.

And that feeling sucked.

I couldn't even bring myself to look at any of their faces anymore. Not just the father. Mother and son too. I just stayed still and kept my head down to focus my gaze on the tiles ground of the Living room.

"How important was this girl to all of you that you didn't mind risking it all?"

It was an open question.

The microphone was open to both Mama Acha and Marcus.

However, neither of them said a word.

And even Mr. Acha knew this; their silence spoke volumes.

He needed no words confirm. Their silence was enough to tell him everything he needed to know. And with an absolute look of appal on his face that lasted for over a minute on his beloved wife and son, he simply could not believe the both of them.

However, I should have seen it coming.

Maybe if I did, it would not have massacred me the way it did.

By it, I meant that look of death that transferred in slow motion from the darkened hooded eyes of that beast who was Marcus's father, and landed, closed in in a thorough, critical menacing look that was directed solely on me.

It felt like someone punched me in the gut.

A second was all it took to wind me of all the air and oxygen that was in my system.

I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. His stare on me was blood curdling. Petrifying. It was hell on earth. 

He looked at me and whatever gave me the guts to look back at him, I don't know. Maybe it was all sue to the fact that I was frozen on the spot. I couldn't move anything, not even my head this time. And as I stared back at the face of this man, it was like I was staring at the devil.

The devil, a conspiracy theory says, was ridiculously handsome - contrary to popular urban beliefs, of course. 

Well, this man, Solomon Acha, as he was called, could face off with the devil.

He had eyes that shaped just like Marcus' - big and brown - and asides their potentially similar looking build, that was right about it for the duo's resemblance. Their eyes told different stories too. While Marcus told a story of peace and love, this man told war and bloodshed. With thick melanin that glowed through dark, dark skin, he could have been given his own throne. His full, proud beard that clothed the chiselled jaw he could have flaunted was thick and black, with bits of grey that looked too perfectly streaked to be natural, and a shiny silver ring, illuminating with old, twinkling like a star just in the middle of it.

With fine lines around his under eyes and forehead, one could have easily told that he was aging, even if with grace.  And if there was something those urban legends were right about the devil, it was his ability to cause mighty chills, daunting and hair-raising ones. And may I say, even in spite of how stunning this man looked for his age, he still made me want to curl up into a ball and cry.

"How long has she been here?"  He asked his wife.

He specifically posed the question to Mama Acha.

She actually hesitated just a little before answering his question.

"Sometime last week," She said to him. "I think Thursday or so."

"So, today makes it the fifth day she has been living under my roof," He calculated it so.

"Precisely," Mama Acha nodded gently.

"And when was I going to know?" He asked again.

Silence.

Utter Silence.

He was never going to know.

"So, what exactly is her name?" He asked her.

I wanted to answer, but that question was not directed to me, so I might have as well shut up.

"Dabeluchi," Mama Acha answered.

"Her full name," He insisted.

"Dabeluchi Aurora Orji," Marcus cut in immediately.

He passed down an icy glare to Marcus who didn't even budge. 

"When I ask you questions, you can answer. I don't need your input in this, Marcus," He warned.

I wasn't sure I liked this man. I just didn't like him.

"And who are her parents?" He continued, looked at Mama Acha as he waited for an answer. 

"I have talked with her mum," She answered. 

"That is not what I asked, but what about her father?" He went ahead.

There was a lump in my throat immediately on hearing him mention my father.

God knows.

Only God could have known what on earth my father had been up to the whole time that I was away.

"I don't know anything about her father," She truthfully told. 

There was an undisguised look of pure irritation on the man's face.

"You housed a child in our home and you don't have full knowledge about her parents," He stated it to her like it was a huge abomination.

"I am friends with her Mother," She defended herself. "She's Igbo, just like us, and hails from Abia State."

"But you don't know her name," He raised a brow at his wife.

"We only talked two times or so," Mama Acha said.

I started to feel so embarrassed for her.

I understood her point of view completely, but I  could not deny that to an outsider, everything she was saying sounded so..... weird.

"Can you hear yourself, Uju?" Her husband said to her.

I understood that it sounded a bit off....

But, a part of me just felt it was wrong for this man to have a conversation that paints his wife this way right here in front of me and Marcus.

"What kind of irresponsible behaviour is that, Obianuju?" He scolded her. I could hear an edge to his voice and I felt even more humiliated for her. 

I wish we weren't here. I wish I wasn't here. Just so that Mama Acha could feel less embarrassed.

"Don't blame her, dad. It was all my fault," It was Marcus that dared to speak up in the middle of the heat that was in the atmosphere.

His dad looked to him and he stared right back with a determined look to face the consequences of his own actions in his eyes.

"I was the one who brought Dabeluchi into the house, not Mum, so if you want to attack anyone, it should be me." He spoke directly to his father.

There was an arc in Mr Acha's brow as he looked visibly taken aback at his son's sudden audacity.

"I only talked her into it," He continued saying to his father. "She was not comfortable with the idea right front the start, because she didn't want to go against you. We both let Dabi stay because she had no where else to stay. With all due respect sir, I don't believe we did a bad thing."

I swallowed. Hard.

Marcus was asking to be slapped.

Mr Acha was shockingly keeping his cool. He nodded to what his son said as though he was processing it and then, he folded his arms across his chest and studied the younger lad.

"Son," He called him. "If you were so certain that you were doing the right thing, then, why was it so hard to inform me?"

"You wouldn't have understood," Marcus was direct with his answers.

The man laughed under his breath. He laughed and chills ran through me. With that smirk lingering there at the corner of his lips, he shocked me by standing up without a warning.

Mama Acha and Marcus didn't budge.

I did.

I stepped back once and staggered slightly.

Hah. God abeg oo. Why was he standing up?

Stepping up closer to his son with just two steps, leaving an arms length distance between them, he looked the boy square in the eyes, and said, "So, you went ahead to hide your little girlfriend in your father's house without his permission, and that was the right thing to do then."

The sarcasm that exuded off his tone was like deadly poison. 

"You know what?" He waved Marcus off, scoffing with dismissal. "I don't even blame you on this one, son." Casting one look at Mama Acha, he voiced out with a tone that was slightly raised than previously, "It's her fault at the end of the day."

I saw Mama Acha bite down on her lips and I knew she was withholding a LOT to say.

However, she chose to remain silent.

"It's your Mum's fault at the end of the day," He repeated to Marc, a sick look on his face that was between a manic smile and a pained grimace lingering there, "You're just a kid. She should have known better."

I could see that the fact that Mama Acha was being blamed for all of these killed Marcus. And if his father knew that and went ahead to throw the blame, then, forgive me to say, he was a terrible person.

"Stop blaming her," Marcus talked back to him. His voice, louder and firmer.

"AND WHY SHOULDN'T I?" My body shook, zapped with electricity as Mr Acha's voice bellowed all of a sudden raining hell and brimstone onto us.

Marcus had jolted ever so slightly that it was almost unnoticed.

Mama Acha? The woman didn't even shake.

"Why shouldn't I blame your mother?!" He shouted at his son. "All she ever does is spoil you rotten and that is why you are still as irresponsible as you are!"

That sentence made me flinch like a rock was thrown at me. 

"Do you think you are going to remain a child forever? Son, tell me, do you!" The man had lost it at this point and I swear I was expecting him to start throwing hands at Marcus anytime soon. 

"Sir, I–"

"Don't dare interrupt me when I am talking," Mr Acha cut Marcus off the moment he attempted to protest. "You had every chance before now to say all you needed to say and you missed it. You don't have a right at this moment to say anything defence of what you and your mother just did!"

Marcus's upper and lower lips fumbled against each other - an action that made me understand that he was holding back a mountain of words. 

His father scoffed bitterly and out from his mouth came words that shot at me like a double edged sword.

"Your brother would have never done a thing like this."

I felt that.

And sadly, the man was not even done yet.

"Do you hear me, son! Justice Acha would have NEVER done a thing like this, and if I have to keep reminding you over and over, that is one out of a million reasons why that boy will always be better a son to me than YOU ever will!"

That direct knock out punch to my face.

And I was not the one being verbally attacked like that.

My heart broke a thousand and one times hearing him talk to Marcus like that and I wanted to just run to him, wrap my hands around him and cry with him.

I was shocked, however, at how firmly  still Marcus stood his ground in the face of all of this. It was like he was unbothered by his father's words. It almost made me wonder just how long this had been going on. I felt embarrassed for not even knowing something like this about a person that I claimed to love.

And how long? How long had Marc had to endure demeaning and degrading words like this from his father? How was someone even able to chest in such brutal words like this? For him to be so stone cold and unmoved, he must have –

My words died in my throat as I noticed one action from Marcus.

He rubbed softly and briefly against the lower lids of his eyes before getting his hands down to stare at the ground with a straight face. 

It looked like a regular action and nothing specifically would have called attention to it, but I was quick and observant enough to notice it....

When Marcus's hand dropped down to his side, I saw that one string of liquid run from his finger and drop to the ground.

Tears.

It was tears.

It was tears that Marcus had wiped out from his eyes before choosing to act like nothing happened.

So, he did feel the pain. Contrary to what he gave off to anyone who may have witnessed the scene, Marcus did feel the pain of his father's words. He felt it enough for him to be compelled to tears.

That broke me beyond words. I was absolutely speechless.

And a part of me started to feel like all of this was all my fault.

If I hadn't made him keep me here, this scene would not have been happening right now.

"And you wonder why Justice is better than you at EVERYTHING, son?" This man did not even take a breather. "It's because he learned maturity at a young age! Something that is far from you, Marcus Bruno Acha!"

"Solomon, I think that's enough," Mama Acha stepped in, but she was completely ignored.

"Justice was not hiding girls in my house behind my back when he was your age," He shouted accusingly at Marc, "He wasn't whiling away precious time with stupid girls with absolutely no ambition; he was too busy working hard every second of every day and that, son, is exactly the reason why he left Castron High with such a legacy!"

This was not the first time this was happening.

I didn't need a saint to tell me that this was not the first time that Marcus's father was doing this. The moment that he brought his older brother, a pioneer CH student and sports legend into the matter, it was clear as crystal that it was not the first time he was doing this.

And my heart squeezed in pain for Marc. This was absolutely heart wrenching.

It killed me that I was to find out about this like this. This way. It shocked me that Marcus could have been going through such a terrible thing like this with his father and still, he was not any less of an absolute sweetheart to me.

How could the world give someone so much bullshit and they still were good people?

Marcus took a moment and glanced at me in his moment of shame and in his eyes, I could see the moistness. His eyes were so wet, yet his tears did not roll out. Biting his lips softly, he tendered an apology to me with his eyes.

What was he even apologising to me for? What did this boy ever do wrong to me?

I was the one who failed to see that something was wrong from the start.

But to think about it, he knew nothing about my family too. I had not even told him why I wanted to stay in his house in the first place. I had never told him anything concerning my Dad or Delilah and how the both of them treated my mother. I hadn't told him about how evil they were to her, how he let his own mistress live in our house, how he beat up my Mum for the slightest inconvenience to him and his 'lover', how they turned my Mother into a slave in her own husband's house, and paid no attention to her kids. Us. 

The only thing Marcus knew about Stephen was that he was my twin brother, who did not go to Castron High. He had no idea the guy had not spoken in ten years. He knew nothing on that side of the story. He knew absolutely nothing. 

Just as I knew nothing of him and his father before now.

It made me feel bad.

But, why did I feel bad exactly? 

I mean, this was our little 'pact' right. Our relationships was based off two agreements that we all had sworn to each other to keep.

The first one, on my request, was that no one in Castron High should know about us. We were like forbidden love. Classmates were triggered by the thought of Marcus Acha and Dabeluchi Orji being together. They were ready to tear us down. I was not ready for the drama, so I insisted, and Marcus, having that he could do anything for me, agreed. 

That pact was altered when Miranda Archibong first found out about us. And now, the likes of Sean Ayomide and JJ were also probably aware.

Our next pact was a mutual agreement between us. Whoever thought of it first, I don't remember. Our goal with each other was to stay away from our harsh realities - harsh realities of one another that we didn't even have the details of - and get lost in the love and peace we gave each other. To me, being with Marc was the only thing that gave me complete and total tranquillity and the last thing I wanted to do was use that short moment of peace I had to sulk about my family problems with the boy.

The serenity, the calm, our love, it was a drug. It didn't even occur to me until this moment that we were practically using each other this whole entire time, sucking out the peace that we so desperately hungered for from one another. In a way, it was sweetly toxic. 

But, it hurt me. It hurt me that our hunger for peace of mind made us overshadow the importance of talking about our problems and lifting each other.

Now, here I was, witnessing live and direct, a side of Marcus's life that I never seen before.

"How long did you practice on the field on Saturday?" His father threw a banger of a question at him.

I may have heard Marc gulp, but it may have been all in my head.

Saturday? Does he mean the same Saturday that Marcus had followed me to my Dance Class?

"And don't even lie to me because I will find out from the Sports Master, Mr Ado. How long did you practice on the field on Saturday, Marcus!" His father bellowed.

"I didn't have much time to do that, sir," Marcus's voice was surprisingly not wavering, "I had a lot of plans on Saturday especially and –"

"Plans with that girl, right?" He threw an accusing finger at me, luckily, not sparing me a glance.

"Sir, I–"

"So, this girl is now more important than your football career that is already on the line?!" He cut him off once more with a yell. 

"Solomon, he loves that girl! Give him a break!" Mama Acha shouted at him.

"Love? Love?!" The man spiralled out of control, triggered, wrecking like a man gone mad. "What does he know about love at his age! Are you the one encouraging him with this nonsense?"

"I am not encouraging him with anything. You are being way too hard on him for something that's not deserving of such an awful backlash! What is your problem!" She shouted back at him and I flinched, swallowed hard, and prayed for the ground to open up and swallow me. 

"Can't you see that you are giving this boy too much freedom?" He fired back at her, and I shivered multiple times as I witnessed a fight between husband and wife that was caused by no other than me, "Can't you see how much all these careless training is affecting him?! Is it until the boy becomes completely useless in life that everyone's eyes will be opened? Our son clearly does not even have a sense of direction of where he is going in life! Does that not bother you at all, Obianuju!"

"Stop speaking ill words before they become reality!" She was losing her mind.

"This is our reality, Uju! The sooner you realise it, the better for the whole family! I am thoroughly ashamed to be the father of this good for nothing child and I cannot stress that enough!" He silenced the air with his words.

I tasted salty liquid in my mouth and that was when it occurred to me that I was in tears.

I was crying for Marcus.

I was crying for his mum.

This was so painful to witness.

I looked to the boy I loved and my heart broke in tiny pieces for every second I stared at him. He had his head bowed in shame and he looked at neither his father or mother. With eyes shut tight, I saw the tears that lines on his lids and dropped down on his face as he silently cried. He cried so silently that you could not even hear a sound from him.

My tears fell from my eyes without control as I watched him let out silent shaky breaths, squeezing his eyes shut as he broke down completely in front of all of us. He hugged the muscles of his hands, squeezed tight onto them like he wanted to by all means summon all the self control he had to stop himself from crying in front of us, but all to no avail.

It was the most painful thing to watch. Marcus was doubled over; he was literally digging his fingers into his own skin to stop himself, his shoulders quaking with his convulsing tears, his lips quivering and trembling as he started to let out the most heart breaking sobbing sounds from them, sounds that I had never heard from him in my life. They sounded like the most broken chords I have ever heard.

I couldn't hold myself any longer. My heart was breaking for him and I could not hold myself any longer. I launched myself towards him and wrapped my hands around his side, holding him like I was holding onto my dear life and crying onto the fabric of his shirt.

He felt my own tears sip into the fabric and onto his skin and that was more than enough for him to let loose. He cried like a child that he was. Held onto my hands that were wrapped around the side of his abdomen and doubled over more to reach down to my height as he cried onto them, and as his tears wetted the skin on my arms, poured a whole river into it, it was like ointment to my soul. I felt chills wreck me as we both cried in this heart wrenching, tender position, and he was shaking in my arms. He felt the chills too.

"Are you happy now, Solomon?"

That was Mama Acha to her husband.

I heard her but could see nothing blinded with tears and squeezing myself onto Marcus as hard as I could.

"Tell me, Solomon. Does this make you happier?" She said and I knew that she had gestured towards me and Acha crying in each other's arms. "When will you realize that this boy is just a kid?"

There was silence for the longest time and I didn't hear his father's voice.

Until I did.

"That's why your role as a mother is to lead him down the right path," He said. His voice was quiet and low. If I knew him as someone who had a heart, I would have said he felt bad for what he just did to his son. But, the man had no heart. "I see how much of a good job you are doing at that."

That was the last thing he said before he left us alone in the Living room and disappeared up through the staircase.

There was silence when he left and I felt Mama Acha's gaze on  us the whole entire time that we cried and bawled our eyes out in each other's arms.

"You both can skip school today and stay home if you want," She said softly to us. Her voice thickened as she said her next words, "I have to go upstairs and give my husband a little piece of my mind." 

She let us be.

And I thought to myself, at least she had the decency to do it in private. 

Unlike the man who called himself a father.

"I'm so sorry," I said to Marcus. I stood on my tip toes just so that I could cup my small hands around his face and look him in his tear filled eyes. "Marc, I am so sorry. I didn't know it was like this here. Are you okay?"

He took in a breath and wiped his eyes with a hand, shook his head and smiled through his pain.

"I didn't want you to witness that," He said to me. "I'm sorry, Aurora."

"For God's sake, Marc, what have you got to be sorry for?" I couldn't believe how precious this boy could be. "You have nothing to be sorry for. Nobody should be treated this way."

"What are we going to do about you? How are we going to find you a place to stay? I could book a hotel for you for the meantime, okay? I will pay and everything and sign in in my Mum's name. If there is anything you need, you will call, okay?"

I didn't want him to keep doing this.

"Wait here," He was still so invested in my own well being even after having dozens of arrows thrown mercilessly at his back and chest. "Wait here, I will find a way to get my Mum to be alone, so we can talk. Don't go, please. Just stay here. I promise we'll find something to do for you."

I was shaking my head in protest, but he seemed too into his urgent need to help me out to even notice that I didn't want him doing more than he had already done for me. 

Marcus sprinted up the stairs immediately and there were tears in my eyes as I watched him. This boy was ready to risk it all over and over again, without a second thought, just because of me. I just couldn't understand the magnitude of his love. Or how I of all people deserved it.

Why me?

I couldn't.

I couldn't let him continue suffering for me.

I just couldn't do it.

Taking out a huge sigh of breath that I had been holding in the entire time, I turned around and started leaving the Acha Residence.

I had to save him this trouble. So, I would leave. That was what I would do. That was the right thing to do.

So, I left the house. And my destination from here? Only God knew.

Whipping out my phone at one go, I called the one person whom I knew would want me to run to them when I needed their help.

"Hello?" I spoke into the call, waited for them to respond.

"Hello, who's this?" Their response came.

I stayed silent on the phone and a multitude of things went through my head.

A part of me wanted to stop this. A part of me wanted to change my mind and hang up the phone, apologise for wasting their time. A part of me screamed that I shouldn't do this. As I stood there in front of the Acha Residence and turned my back on all of them, with a goal of doing what I was about to do, a lot of sirens blared in my head. 

"Hello? Hello? I can't hear you? Who's there?"

I stared at the phone in my hands and came to a conclusion.

There was only one thing to do.

Clearing my throat, I called her name, "Chika?"

I swallowed hard. Envisioned Chika Chioma on the other line and braced myself for this.

"Chika? It's me, Dabeluchi," I said to her.

"I can't hear a thing," She responded on the line. "Where are you? Can you speak up please?"

"I said it's me; It's Dabeluchi," I spoke more audibly.

"Oh!" She picked up fast. "Woah, are you okay, Didi darling? You don't sound too good. I hope all is well though. Are you in school?"

"I'm not okay, Chi," I said the truth.

"Eh?" She sounded confused. "I'm confused. What's going on?"

"So many things," I told her. "The truth is I had been living with Marcus Acha in his house since last week. I couldn't bring myself to tell you guys the truth all these while, and I'm sorry about that. But things have gone terribly wrong."

There was silence over the phone.

I saw it as a go ahead.

"I know I should be telling you all these in person, but I am kind of stranded right now and I need your help." I said to her.

"Stranded?" She said. "Stranded, where?"

"I will text you the details, but I need you to be here as fast as possible. I don't want Marcus knowing that I am leaving," I said to her. "Are you still in Soma's place or are you at home?"

"Soma's place," She repeated my words.

"Okay, but don't come with Soma, I don't want to stress her out," I told her. "You can tell the twins everything I told you and come with them too, but let Soma rest. She has been going through so much already with all the whole drugs thing, and for the fact she stole from Kaniru and they're out for her, it would be unfair to dump my stress on her. You understand, right?"

"Umm.... I guess so," Chika responded over the line.

"Thank you," I was so relieved. "I will text you where I am. Bye."

Quickly after hanging up, I walked to the Junction and decided to relay that address to Chika, texted it in details and forwarded it to her. One look at the 11 digit number, I relaxed in satisfaction, noting to myself that at least the Sisters were no longer left in the dark.

It was just a matter of time. 

They would surely come for me. 

Um.

Hehe💀. #sips harpic.

Okay! (*In fiery presenter's voice), soooo, how are we all feeling????💀

I know why I'm using these skull emojis, you may know too, you may not, but it's not my business sha but I won't say much.💀

Oh, and I cried a little when writing the Dacha crying scene💔 It's well sha.

And on side note, this day was the same day in TLT where Nova was blowing in school for being Mystery boy and if y'all remember in TLT, they talked about Marcus Acha in the classroom.....

It's almost sad how much we don't know about a person and we think we do. That's all I'll say💔

Anyways, see you all another time!♥️♥️♥️