Lydia's pain

Lydia's pain Episode 2

About a year later, I woke up with Mom's lifeless body lying beside me. Joshua and I almost cried out our lungs, we had become orphans.

After Mom's burial, Mom's cousin took Joshua, she said she could only take care of one of us. She then took me to that Dad's friend who inturn said that I couldn't live with him, that his wife wouldn't agree.

He suggested taking me home to Dad's place and Mom's cousin agreed. The day we arrived that place, nobody wanted to talk to me both young and old cos they still remembered what played out the day Dad was brought home for burial and how I leaked their secret.

We met a middle aged man and this old woman that fainted the day we brought Dad in this old looking living room. I knelt and greeted them but the old woman didn't respond and looked away, while the man answered.

It happened that, the man was Dad's younger brother while the woman was Dad's mother. The man was also an officer serving in another state there, and he wasn't present during Dad's burial.

When Dad's friend told them that he had brought me home to stay with them, the old woman refused but the man said he was going to take me with him to his place, saying that even though Dad did nothing for them when he was alive, he wouldn't reject me. Dad's friend thanked him, and he left giving me some money.

Two days later, it was time for Dad's brother to return to his own place and he took me with him.

Arriving at his place around 9pm, his wife frowned as soon as she was told that I was there to live them and she said that I was not going to sleep in any of the two bedrooms. It resulted into a serious f!ght that they stood yelling and barking at each other.

I took my bag and I went outside to sit on their corridor. I cried like never before. I missed Mom, Dad and Joshua so much.

My uncle had three children, two boys and a girl. One of the boys who was my age brought food and water to me but I shook my head and told him that I wasn't hungry, as my uncle's voice and that of his wife traveled far from the compound.

"We are used to them" The boy said, and I again shook my head.

Well, that night, uncle took me into their store room, where I passed the night on a mat.

The wife didn't bother to even give me food the following day, it was still the same boy that brought food for me, his own share.

That same night, I laid on the mat thinking about my life when the door opened. The room was dark and I didn't have a torchlight so I didn't know who it was. The person approached, forcefully took off my undies and I was rape-d at just 9...
... Of course I always tried and struggled to scream but this person always covered my mouth and would then have his way and after then, threaten to kill me if I screamed.

The first time it happened, after the person was done, he left immediately but not without his threats. I laid there helpless and could not scream cos the pain was too much to bear. I could not talk, get up or scream. I couldn't even move my hands and legs properly, all I did there was silently pray for a miracle.

The following day very early in the morning, uncle was already set for work. He came into the store room to drop some money for me in case his wife wouldn't give me food when he saw me on the floor bleed!ng from my pr!vate part, almost lifeless.

I was in this dream, in a colourful garden when Mom came to me. She asked me to go back and check Joshua, that Joshua was crying. As soon as I turned back in that dream, I started to hear my name, "Lydia! Lydia!!" from afar, and then I jerked back to life only to realise that it was my uncle that was calling.

"What happened to you?" I heard faintly but I was too weak to respond, and then I was rushed to the hospital.

After a few hours, I had recovered a little. Uncle asked me what happened and I told him that someone forced himself on me but to my greatest surprise, he didn't believe.

He told me his children couldn't do such, and definitely not him, even forbidding it. And that maybe a thighf broke into the house. I thought about what he said and I believed to an extent.
After I was discharged and we got home, my uncle's wife didn't even say a word to me. She didn't know that such happened though and Uncle asked me never to mention it to anyone that they would mock and insult me with it later. Uncle asked me to lie down on the long couch in the living room so I could join the rest of his family in watching a program on TV, that he needed to go to work and tell them the reason for his absence.

His wife just couldn't wait for him to leave. As soon as he left, she asked me to get off the couch and sit on the floor if I really wanted to watch the program. I got up and found it so difficult to sit on the floor cos of the pa!n down there.
"Come, I don't understand. Are your buttocks paining you that you cannot sit on the floor?" She quizzed folding her arms but I stood with head bowed, staring at the floor.
If you cannot sit on the floor, oya go into the store room. You're still a stranger, let me not push you outside yet" She said.

I was walking away from there, unable to walk properly. I was just wobbling like a duck when his children busted into laughter except for the one that gave me food the previous day.

"Come come come" Uncle's wife called, and I again wobbled to her.

"What is wrong with you?" She asked, almost smiling but I told her it was nothing, standing there visible shaking already.

"No... No... Nothing ma" I stammered, too frightened to look at her.

"Nothing abi?" She probed and I nodded sporadically.

She giggled, and then clapped her hands three times.

"No wahala, go inside" She said and I again wobbled out of there sh@mefully cos her children wouldn't stop laughing except for that same one who later came to ask me what happened to me but I told him it was nothing.