CHAPTER FOUR : Weekends that didn't belong.
717 Words
When Victor left for the university in Yaya Town, the compound did not change.
The same roosters crowed.
The same buckets scraped against cement floors at dawn.
The same voices called her name before sunrise.
Everything stayed the same.
But something inside Doris shifted.
The first night after he left, she lay awake longer than usual.
The room felt quiet
too quiet.
Her fingers hovered over her small phone.
Should she call?
Would he be busy?
Would he answer the same way?
The phone buzzed before she could decide.
Victor calling.
She sat up quickly.
“Hello?”
“You sound like you were waiting,” he teased.
“I wasn’t.”
“You were.”
She turned her face slightly, hiding a smile he could not see.
“How is it there?”
“Big. Loud. Different.” He paused. “You would like it.”
She swallowed.
Different.
Different sounded like something she didn’t have.
Back home, things tightened.
With Form Five exams approaching, pressure multiplied. Mama Rachael became stricter. Pa Fong grew more distant. The second wife watched more closely, as if waiting for something to go wrong.
Doris felt it in everything.
In how she spoke.
In how she moved.
In how careful she had to be.
One evening, after being scolded over something small, Doris walked into her room and shut the door harder than usual.
The sound lingered.
Her phone rang minutes later.
“What happened?” Victor asked immediately.
She frowned. “How do you know something happened?”
“Your breathing.”
She slid down to the floor, her back against the door.
“I’m tired,” she whispered.
“Of school?”
“No.” A pause. “Of everything.”
Silence stretched between them — not empty, just heavy.
“Come visit,” he said gently.
She hesitated.
“I can’t.”
“You can."
His voice didn’t push.
It just stayed.
And that was how it started.
The first lie burned in her throat.
“Mama, we have a school trip to Yaya Town this weekend. Extra lessons.”
Mama Rachael did not look up from her files.
“Who is paying?”
“The school is handling it.”
A long pause.
“Be back Sunday evening.”
Doris nodded, her heart racing.
The bus ride felt like escape.
Wind against her face.
Voices that did not belong to the compound.
No one calling her name.
When she saw Victor waiting near the campus gate, something in her unclenched.
“You came,” he said, that calm smile already in place.
“You told me to.”
He laughed softly. “So you listen?”
“Sometimes,” she replied, a small smile forming.
That weekend felt unreal.
No chores.
No shouting.
No measuring of her steps.
They walked around the campus slowly.
“You could study here one day,” he told her.
She looked around — the buildings, the students moving with ease, like they belonged to themselves.
“Do you really think I can?” she asked.
“I don’t think,” he said, leaning slightly closer, his voice lower, “I know.”
Sunday evenings were always harder.
Leaving felt heavier than arriving.
On the bus back home, she replayed everything.
The way he looked at her.
The way he listened.
The way he said her name — slowly — whenever she doubted herself.
His touch…
But secrets have weight.
One evening, as she packed to leave again, her younger sibling stood at the doorway.
“Why do you travel more now?”
“For school,” she replied quickly.
The child did not move.
Just stared.
Doris adjusted her bag, avoiding the gaze.
She was the first to look away.
She told herself it was nothing.
Just being a teenager.
Just breathing.
Just finding space.
But somewhere deep inside, she knew the truth.
She was building a second life.
A life that did not exist inside Pa Fong’s compound.
And second lives are not easy to protect.
Especially for girls who are already carrying too much.
she didn't know if she was ready for the consequences of rebellion...
but it felt good... so
" I choose my peace"
for the first time she had chosen to do something for herself.
- Writer
