Burning Coles - Episode 1

“You must be out of your rotten mind!” Mr Cole bellowed.

“Me, I’m not out of my mind o” Mrs Cole replied, bunching up her husband’s T-shirt in her fist, she rocked from side to side, ready for a fight. “Have I asked too much? All I need is some money to take care of your children.” She shouted back at him almost shedding tears.

He chuckled sarcastically. “Abi e ri obirin yi ni? (can’t you see this woman?),” he clapped his hand in amazement. Then immediately, the sarcastic smile on his face turned into a frown. “Woman, listen to me and listen well. You have no right to tell me what I am to do for my children. Is that clear?” He spoke firmly with alcohol heavy on his breath.

“Don’t you have any shame Akin? Your children are in their rooms and can obviously hear you shouting at me” she told him as she released his T-shirt from her grip.

“There you go again, calling me shameless. Funke, I’m shameless abi? (right?)” He asked, tapping his chest with his hand.

“You said it yourself, I didn’t say anything.” She eyed him.

“Wo, iwo obirin yi, waa rin nkan ti ma se si e leni (look, you this woman, you will see what I will do to you today)” he said and rushed at her.

Funke was standing opposite him, the wooden centre table in the sitting room stood between the both of them. She ran in an anticlockwise direction when she saw her husband coming towards her from the left.

“Where will you run to now, with that your sharp mouth?” He asked as he caught her by her left arm and raised his right hand, ready to hit her.

“Daddy please don’t beat mummy again” Bolu, their seven-year-old cried as she stood some meters away from them.

They turned and saw their young, innocent daughter looking fearfully with tears rolling down her face. Mrs. Cole felt so sorry for her as she wondered how long she had been standing there and how much violence the poor child had witnessed not just at that moment but in her seven years of existence.

“Go back to your room now!” Mr. Cole shouted at her.

Bolu stood there crying.

“Are you deaf? I said go back to your room before I come and beat you!” He shouted louder still holding on to Mrs. Cole who stood there helplessly as she watched her child scamper away.

“Let this be the last time this repeats itself” Mr. Cole warned his wife as he flung her arm out of his grip and she landed on the couch.

She quickly got up and moved a reasonable distance away from him before she said, “you need help, you need serious help, even your children are afraid of you.” She shook her head and walked away.

“You are the one that needs help, useless woman,” He retorted, panting and sweating. He plopped into his favorite seat opposite the TV and continued drinking his beer.

Mrs. Cole was fed up. Frustration and misery had become her acquaintances. She went into the house to check on her children, the only reason she was still in the marriage.

The Coles lived in a rented three-bedroom bungalow. Their three children: Seyi, Bayo and Bolu occupied two of the rooms while the third being the master bedroom was for Mr. Cole and his wife.

Mrs. Cole went first to Bayo’s room. Immediately she opened the door, he jerked and hid something.

“What’s that?” His mother asked him.

“Nothing mummy, I just wanted to…” he was trying to cook up a lie when she cut in.

“See, I don’t have your time right now,” she was too tired both psychologically and physically to argue with him. “Dinner will be ready in 30 minutes.” She said and left the room.

Bayo was thirteen years old, the second child and only boy. He was in SS1 and in recent times loved staying in his room. No one really knew what he spent most of his time doing behind closed doors. His room in itself was almost always a write off; it wasn’t palatable enough to make one want to perpetually remain locked in it. Mrs. Cole couldn’t fathom why he hardly came out. The windows were always shut making the room very stuffy. His dirty clothes littered the floor and the ‘clean’ ones were never folded or hung. His bed was never laid and his bathroom was an eyesore.

Mrs. Cole was tired of telling him to tidy up his room, these days, she’d just enter the room, say what she had to say and leave.

She went to check on her other two children, Seyi and Bolu who shared a room. Seyi was sixteen and the first child while Bolu was the baby of the house. If Seyi could have her way, she’d have wanted to have a room to herself but with the number of rooms in the house she had no choice but to share with her sister. She couldn’t wait to leave the house. She had just finished secondary school at Federal Girls’ College, Ipetumodu, an all-girls’ boarding school and she earnestly prayed she would get admitted into the higher institution that year. She desperately wanted to leave the house for anywhere more peaceful, even if it meant leaving on the street. She was fed up of the consistent rancour and fighting between her parents and couldn’t stand it anymore.

Mrs. Cole opened the door that led into the girls’ room. There were two beds which were positioned parallel to each other with Bolu’s bed being closer to the door and Seyi’s own farther away but closer to the window. Mrs. Cole found Bolu on her bed crying while Seyi sat on hers, backing her sister and whoever it was that cared to come into the room. Her ears were plugged with her ear phones as she faced the window and focused on her phone.

Mrs. Cole saw Bolu crying, went to her bed and sat beside her.

“Bolu, I’m sorry you had to see that again.” Mrs. Cole knew it wasn’t the first time Bolu witnessed a physical fight between her parents and she doubted it would be the last. “It was just a misunderstanding between your dad and I,” she tried to explain to her.

Bolu hiccupped a sob, “mummy will it ever end?” She asked as tears rolled down her cheeks.

Her mother was silent. “Come here” she said and hugged her tightly. “I hope so, I really do.” Her eyes became moist with tears, she fought back the tears. “We’ll be fine, you hear?”

Bolu nodded.

“But guess what” Mrs. Cole pulled Bolu away from her embrace and with a smile, looked at her.

“What?” Bolu asked less concerned.

“I’m preparing your best food,” she smiled and hoped that will cheer up her daughter.

Bolu’s somber face broke into a smile. “Dodo? (fried plantain)” She asked hopeful.

“Oh, I thought it was beans,” Mrs. Cole teased, holding back her smile.

“Noooooo mummy I don’t like beans.” Bolu folded her arms and looked away.

“How won’t I know my baby’s best food? Don’t worry, I’ll give you the largest portion but you must promise to eat your rice and not waste it this time around” she fondled with her nose.

“Okay I promise” she smiled.

“That’s my baby” she stood up from her bed and walked towards Seyi who didn’t seem interested in what was going on in the house any longer.

“Young lady” Mrs. Cole, standing some meters away from the foot of Seyi’s bed, called out.

Seyi heard but didn’t respond, she hid under the disguise of her ears being plugged and continued fondling with her phone.

“Seyi, I know you can hear me, come to the kitchen and help me round off dinner” she told her.

“I’m not hungry” Seyi said without removing the ear phones or looking in her mother’s direction.

“Whatever, just leave me” Seyi waved the back of her hand at her.

“Okay I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to act like “I-know-all”, will you forgive me?” she smiled.

Seyi didn’t respond.

“I’ll tickle you oh, I don’t care who is watching” she told her.

“Ok beebee, I’ve heard” Seyi had no choice but to comply, she was very ticklish and knew that Sope never made empty threats especially when it came to tickling her in the public.

When Seyi got home that evening, she picked her phone and checked if she had any new follower on Instagram. Lo and behold, there he was ‘officalgokeup’. She smiled and took a comfortable position on her bed as she fed her eyes with his posts. They were mostly pictures of himself and a few with his friends. A particular lady’s picture kept recurring and Seyi started wondering who she was. She tried to check if she was tagged but didn’t get as much as her name. “Who is this girl?” she asked herself but before she could get a response, a direct message came in from none other but her new crush, Goke.

“Hi”

“Hello, I see you’ve found me” she replied.

“I told you I was going to search for you. I’m a man of my words.”

Seyi smiled. She liked the sound of that. “You have nice pictures” she paid him a compliment.

“I was just going to say that about you too. You are really beautiful” he told her.

He was the first person to ever tell her that. The secondary school she attended was an all-girl’s school. That, together with the fact that she didn’t really have male friends made all this very new to her. Her mom also was always too busy fighting with her father to ever tell her how beautiful she was. Every time she looked at her reflection in the mirror, all she saw was a regular face, nothing out of the ordinary so being told by a guy that she was really beautiful was new and definitely sparked up something in her for the guy.

“Thank you” she replied.

“You are welcome. I didn’t see any guy in your pictures, does that mean you don’t have a boyfriend?” he asked.

Seyi felt that with that question, he was being too forward but gave him the benefit of doubt “he is probably an open person” she told herself.

“No, I don’t” she replied hoping that response didn’t make her appear weird. She knew that it was the norm for ladies her age to have boyfriends and had always wondered if there was something wrong with her for not having one. She sometimes wondered if she was ugly or unattractive. She had gone to the extent of wearing short and exposing clothes to get guys’ attention but this only attracted good-for-nothing fellows who wanted to destroy her life and it earned her insults from her mother.

It was one day when her mum sent her to the market to get some things for the house and without her mum knowing, she wore a short skirt and tight off shoulder blouse. Right from the moment she stepped out of the gate till the time she got back, she received nasty comments from different guys. First it was the gateman at the estate’s gate that told her he wanted to marry her then the Hausa meat seller at the market that called her “fresh meat” and the worst was a beggar by the road side that told her to follow him home. Did he even have a place he could call home? She was so disgusted and told herself that was the last time she was going to dress that way. As if all that was not enough, when she got home and her mum saw her, she pounced on her with insults.

“Seyi, is this what you wore to the market?” her mother asked with utmost surprise. She couldn’t believe her eyes. She didn’t wait for her response “is something wrong with you?”

Seyi knew what she did was wrong so didn’t bother arguing or defending herself. She remained quiet all through the time her mother scolded her. She received the insult of her life that day and didn’t need a prophet to tell her never to repeat it again.

However, now meeting Goke, she felt there was something about him that was different from the other guys. He gave her the kind of attention she had been starved of from her father and guys in general. She was eager to know more about him.

She summoned courage to ask him if he had a girlfriend. “How about you, I saw a lady featuring in a number of your pictures. Is she your girlfriend?”

“Hehehehehe no o, she is my younger sister” he told her.

For some reason, that last message he sent brought her some relief.

They went on to exchange phone numbers and asked a couple of questions. She got to know he was a final year architecture student in Shinning Star University but was on holiday.

“That’s the same university my father lectures in,” she informed him.

“Wow what a small world.”

They moved on to phone calls, that was the beginning of incessant chats and calls between the two of them. She became pretty addicted. Within an hour of not hearing from him, she’d either send him a message or call him. She didn’t even notice she was the one initiating 90% of the conversation they had. All she knew was, she liked the feeling it brought. Her phone became her best friend, she was not away from it for more than a maximum of 5 minutes except when she was asleep and it was the very first thing she searched for the moment she woke up. Now she had a reward for her little relationship with her phone: a scald on her thigh from hot oil.

Her mom brought her food and asked her to sit up to eat. She did but with her eyes glued to her phone. She had just opened her chat with Goke and realized all he said last was ‘kk’. He had not checked up on her since them, she was greatly displeased.

“Drop your phone Seyi and eat your food” her mother instructed her.

She reluctantly placed the phone down, still wondering why Goke had not chatted her up for over 5 hours.

She ate her food and took her drug and after some minutes told her mum she was ready to go to her room.

“Okay dear” her mom said as she gradually lifted her up from the chair and supported her as she limped to her room.

After sorting out Seyi, Mrs. Cole entered Bayo’s room and carried Bolu to her room. Then she went back to the sitting room and finally got the chance to rest her aching back. She didn’t even realize she had not eaten since morning. The last and only meal she had had that day was bread and egg which was breakfast. She was too tired to eat anything now. She lay down on the three-seater sofa and waited for her husband to come. Since that unpleasant incident when he beat her blue-back, she decided to make the sitting room her temporary room till he returned after which she’d go in to sleep.

He finally returned at 12:30AM. She opened the door for him. He reeled in as usual but didn’t insult or abuse her as was his usual custom. Mrs. Cole was too exhausted to start a conversation about how he didn’t care if Seyi was alright. She just locked the door behind him and went to bed.

Thanks for reading, subscribe and stay tuned to this page for the remaining episodes. Episode 2 drops tomorrow. Please share one thing or the other u learnt from this story in the comment section. I love u all 😍