He rounded one last bend before he
got to his house and the street lighting there was non-existent so the place
was pitch black. It was through the silence and blackness that he heard a
sound, much like the whimpering of a hurt child. He headed in the direction of
the sound and when he neared it, he found it was a lady. An almost naked lady
with only panties and a bra for cover…………………
*******************
It took him just seconds of indecisiveness before he flew into
a flurry of activities. He took off the short sleeved shirt he had on, leaving
him with a white undershirt beneath. He approached the lady but as he drew
closer, the lady cringed away further into the shadows. “Calm down, I’m not
going to hurt you. See, I’m just covering you with my shirt, okay.” With that,
he draped the shirt around her shoulders. He took of the pants he was wearing
next, grateful to whatever had made him put on boxer shorts instead of briefs
that evening. It was also lucky that the girl was petite. He acknowledged that
it was far preferable that she be too small for his clothes instead of the
other way around, which would have proved a real challenge.
“Do you think you can get up and put
these on? They are my pants.” She nodded and yet she wouldn’t even raise her
head to look at him. He figured she was embarrassed so he gently placed the
pants in question by her side and turned around to give her some semblance of
privacy. After a while, guessing she would probably be done by then, he turned
around to find her head still bowed, albeit she had the pants on now and his
shirt all buttoned up.
“I live just a few blocks from here,
do you mind if I take you home for the night?” It was the first time she ever looked
up at him then and what he saw in her eyes wasn’t fear; it was terror. It gave
him a moment’s pause as to what had really happened to her. He thought he had
an idea of what it was but refrained from making any speculations. He must be a
real monster to confirm those fears she probably had. Since he was no monster,
he tried to allay her fears. “Look, you’ll be perfectly safe, I promise. My name
is George, you can call me Kwame. What’s yours?” he had no idea why he added
the Kwame bit but he didn’t have the luxury of time to find out before she
answered his question. “Laura.”
“Laura, that’s a nice name. So Laura,
is it okay if I take you home now?” she nodded her acquiescence. “Okay, it’s
this way. Follow me.” He led the way, not making any attempt to touch her this
time. Before she followed him however, she bent down and picked something from
the ground, but he did not ask her what it was.
His house, turned out to be a rented
single room apartment amidst others of same. By now, it was midnight and they didn’t
see anyone around as they made their way to his door. His room had the
furnishings of the struggling graduate he was. He had no bed so the queen-sized
mattress was on the carpet-less but tiled floor. The only appliances he had in the room were his
laptop, a tabletop fridge, two speakers which looked like they’d been separated
from their ‘home theatre system’ family and an iron. For kitchen appliances, he
had a single hot plate burner, a kettle, a blender, two saucepans, two buckets,
half a dozen plates and a few bowls, all packed up in a box along with some
spoons and knives. Apart from these items, the only other things taking up his
room space were a reading table and chair, two suitcases with clothes, and a
couple of footwears.
He told Laura she could go ahead and use his bathroom if
she wished and she jumped at the idea. He left the room alone for her but not
before he had placed some few necessities he assumed she would need; like a
fresh towel, some shorts and T-shirt which looked like they would be more
comfortable than what she was wearing, a comb and a tube of Vaseline, on the
bed for her. He figured twenty minutes was plenty of time to give her so he
stepped out and planned on coming back to the room twenty minutes later. He however,
left his phone which he could have used to assess the time in the room and he couldn’t
go back inside once he had stepped out so he just resigned himself to waiting
the whole situation out. It was while he waited that he remembered he still hadn’t
called Esther. He shook his head and knew there was going to be hell to pay in
the morning when he finally calls her.
After an estimated thirty minutes,
just to be safe, he left his balcony and re-entered his room but just to be
extra safe, he knocked first. “Yes, come in.” he heard a timid voice call from
within. When he entered, he found that she indeed looked more comfortable in
the shorts and T-shirt as he had thought she would. She was sitting on the only
chair in the room and she had his pants and shirt which she had worn previously
folded neatly on his reading table alongside the comb and Vaseline tube. Now that
there seemed to be no other pending activity for any of them to do, the room
was filled with a new kind of tension, for before, George had been filled with decisions
to make but now that he had executed the plans he had, he was at a loss as to
what to do next.
He got up and made for his suitcase
to take out two extra sheets. Replacing the folded sheet on his bed with a
fresh one, he took the old one and spread it on the floor where he planned to
sleep and took one of the pillows on the bed down. While he was doing this, he
casually asked Laura whether she lived around and she said no, and that she
lived at Kasoa. “Kasoa?” he asked.
Her story; she was on her way to Tema and
since she’d never been there before, she was told by whom ever she was visiting
to come to Community 1, BBC. She had chartered a taxi which was to take her all
the way from Kaneshie to the place. She had no idea which route led to the
place so she just sat in the cab and the next thing she realized, she was being
robbed at gunpoint. She was robbed of everything, even the clothes on her back.
She said the only thing the robber left her was a single sanitary pad which he
took from the whole pack she was carrying, while he left with the rest. A polite
robber, he thought to himself angrily.
They settled in for the night; he
sleeping on the sheet on the floor while she used his bed. In the morning, he
promised himself; we’ll see what to do. Before he went to sleep, he visited the
bathroom to relieve himself. It was after he turned to leave the bathroom that
he found the wrapper of what he could only assume to be that of the single
sanitary pad Laura had been left with, in the bin. The girl may not know it but
her time of the month was probably what just saved her from being raped. At least
that is one less thing for her to worry about. He thought to himself.
In the morning, when he called
Esther, she was justifiably mad but he managed to smooth things over. Then he
asked her to come to his place with a couple of her clothes and some feminine
products. She grew incensed and said she had no intentions of spending the
night with him. That made him angry. “Contrary to what you might think, not
everything is about you or sex, Nana.” He said to her. She would have just
gotten angrier had he not had the common sense to tell her a bit of the problem
he was faced with. She suddenly grew understanding and helpful when George told
her what the problem was.
Till next time!
***************HAPPY
NEW YEAR*************
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