Apex Bank Father’s Daughter: My 6th Pregnancy Broke Me

Fiction Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. The second blue line was darker than the first. I sat on the cold bathroom tiles at 4:17 a.m., holding the pregnancy test like it was a death sentence. My phone screen glowed beside me: Tuesday, October 14, 2026 . 4:17 AM. No music. No cars. Just the hum of the AC and the sound of my life crashing. “God…” The word scraped out of my throat. “Not again.” This was the sixth time. Six. Five tiny graves in my past, all because I followed a woman with a sweet smile and poison in her perfume. I crawled back to my bed and reality dumped on me like a bucket of ice water. I started weeping. Not the fine, Nollywood tears. The ugly kind. Snot. Shaking shoulders. The kind that makes your ribs hurt. “How I wish I had obeyed my spirit!” I punched the mattress. “The very first day I saw Toke at that salon in Lekki, something in me screamed run! Her lashes were too perfect. Her smile was too wide. Her compliments came too fast.” “Bimpe, omo Apex Bank! Your skin is like milk, baby girl. You should be a model, not just a banker’s daughter.” I was 22, stupid, and hungry to be seen. My dad’s love was solid, but it was… safe. Toke offered danger dressed as sisterhood. “I wish I didn’t follow her!” I screamed into my pillow, but my duplex at Orchid Road swallowed the sound. “I wish I never let her into my inner circle! I wish I had neglected her smile, her ‘urgent 2k’ requests, her midnight ‘girls’ trips’ to Abuja!” Each “trip” ended the same way. Hotel rooms. Old men. Brown envelopes on the bed. And 6 weeks later, a test stick with two lines. I threw the pillow across the room. It hit my framed NYSC photo. Me, Dad, Titilayomi, and Moyo. Dad was in his Apex Bank senior staff agbada, chest puffed out. His girls. His pride. He had no idea his first daughter had become a graveyard. “Oh God!” I stood up, pacing. My silk bonnet slid off. “I’m pregnant AGAIN! This is number six! Five abortions, Lord. Five! Dr. Sani at Rosehill already warns me my womb is ‘tired’. Am I going to kill another child? God, have mercy on me!” My name is Bimpeoluwa Adeyemi. I’m 28. First child. First daughter. First disappointment. I lost my mum when I was 19. No sickness. No warning. She kissed us goodnight on a Thursday. By Friday morning, she was cold. The autopsy said “cardiac arrest in sleep.” But how does a 42-year-old woman with no BP, no diabetes, just… not wake up? Dad didn’t cry at the burial. He just held me, Titilayomi who was 14, and Moyo who was 10, and said: “Your mother is resting. I’ll be mother and father now.” And he was. Mr. Kolade Adeyemi, Deputy Director at Apex Bank, kept his word. He never brought a woman home. Never missed a PTA meeting. When I got admission to Covenant University, he bought me a Camry “so no boy will use car to impress you.” When I complained about hostel food, he rented me a 2-bedroom flat off campus. “Your mum would want you soft, Bimpe. The world is hard enough.” It took him 4 years to stop wearing his wedding ring. I found it one morning in his drawer, next to Mum’s rosary. He caught me holding it. “Don’t tell your sisters you saw that,” he said, voice thick. “Let them keep believing I’m Superman.” That was Dad. Superman with an Apex Bank ID card. He gave us everything… except the ability to say “no” to predators. Because it all started the day I left home. Three years ago. I was 25. I had just moved into my own place. Dad paid 2 years rent upfront. “You’re a woman now. Learn independence, but call me if NEPA takes light for 1 hour.” I was free. No curfew. No “Bimpe, who is that boy?” Then Toke walked into Life. Hair salon at Circle Mall. I was washing off a bad frontal. She was in the chair next to mine, getting a 40-inch bone straight. “Girl, your face card never declines,” she told me. “You work where? Model?” “Uh, my dad works at Apex Bank,” I said, because I was proud. Stupid, proud. Her eyes lit up like Christmas. “Apex Bank? Baby girl, you’re already soft. You just need the right circle.” She paid for my hair. She took my number. She showed up at my apartment the next Saturday with a bottle of Veuve and two business men from Abuja. “They’re just friends, Bimpe. They love to sponsor beautiful, intelligent girls. No stress. Just dinner.” Dinner became hotel rooms. Hotel rooms became envelopes. Envelopes became “Bimpe, you’re late again. Here’s the number for my doctor.” Pregnancy #1: I was scared. Toke said, “It’s just a clot, baby. You’re too young to be a mother.” Dad was in London for an Apex Bank conference. I bled alone in that Rosehill clinic. Pregnancy #2: I cried. Toke said, “Apex Bank daughters don’t raise bastards. Think of your dad’s reputation.” I believed her. Pregnancy #3, #4, #5… I stopped crying. I just showed up at Dr. Sani’s with cash. Each time, I told myself: “Last one. After this , I’ll block Toke.” But she always came back with a new wig, a new iPhone, a new “client who really likes you, Bimpe. This one can pay your rent for 5 years.” And now… number six. I looked at the test stick again. The blue line mocked me. My phone buzzed. Dad. 4:32 a.m. “Keke mi, I had a dream you were crying. Are you okay? Jesus is with you. Call me when you wake up. Love, Dad.” I dropped the phone like it was fire. He still called me Keke mi — my bicycle. Because when I was 6, I fell off my pink bicycle and he carried me 2km home on his back, singing “Bimpe mi, ma foya.” How do you tell Superman that his daughter is a cemetery? I went to my wardrobe and pulled out the small box under my winter coats. Five hospital cards. Five receipts. Five dates I’ve never told anyone. 2019. 2020. 2021. 2022. 2024. And now, 2026. I held the new test stick over the box. “Should I make it six graves, God? Or…?” Outside, the Lagos sunrise was starting. Street vendors were setting up. Danfo already blaring. The world was moving on. But Bimpeoluwa Adeyemi, Apex Bank father’s daughter, was stuck on her bedroom floor, holding her 6th sin, wondering if her dad’s God still wanted her. It all happened the day I left home. And today, I wonder if I can ever go back. End of Chapter 1