chapter 4
675 Words
The House of Fear
My aunt’s name was ogo. She was the last child among seven children in my grandparents’ family. Sadly, both of my grandparents had already passed away by that time.
She was married to a man named Pascal, the father of her children.
Today she has three children, but when I first arrived at her house, she had only one child and was heavily pregnant with another.
At first, I thought I was coming to Lagos to help my aunt and maybe start a new life. But very soon, I began to see things that frightened me deeply.
Her husband was not the kind and loving man people thought he was.
Behind closed doors, he was a completely different person.
Sometimes he would beat my aunt badly.
The first time I saw it happen, I was terrified. I had never seen anything like that before in my life. The shouting, the anger, the fear on my aunt’s face — it all shocked me.
My heart would race whenever I heard their arguments starting again.
Sometimes he used a cane.
Sometimes a stick.
Sometimes he slapped her or hit her with his hands.
Other times he would knock her head or push her around the house.
Watching those moments made me feel helpless and afraid all the time.
Even worse, sometimes I would get caught in the middle of their fights.
That house slowly became a place of fear for me.
Yet, despite all the beatings and arguments, my aunt stayed in the marriage.
Sometimes I wondered why she continued living with him after everything he did.
There were days when the situation became so bad that we had to leave the house for a while.
During those times, we would go and stay with another one of my aunt’s sisters.
Her name was Mamma.
Sometimes we stayed there for two weeks.
Other times we stayed for three weeks.
The longest time we stayed there was almost three months.
During those months, I was not going to school.
I had never been homeschooled either.
I was simply at home all day.
No school.
No pocket money.
No new clothes.
Nothing.
Most of the time, I just stayed indoors doing small chores or sitting quietly.
Sometimes my other aunt would treat me badly too.
She spoke harshly to me and made me feel like I did not belong there.
It hurt even more because my own aunt — the one who brought me to Lagos — was too busy dealing with her own problems to really protect me.
One day, after many weeks away, we finally returned to my aunt’s house.
Her husband had gone to work, so we thought it was safe to come back and settle again.
But something happened that day that I will never forget.
Not long after we arrived, my aunt’s husband suddenly came back home.
The moment he walked into the house, tension filled the air.
He began shouting at my aunt immediately.
He accused her of leaving the house and embarrassing him in front of others.
The argument quickly became worse.
I stood quietly in one corner of the room, hoping they would forget I was there.
But suddenly everything changed.
In the middle of the argument, he turned his anger toward me.
He called my name loudly.
My heart began beating very fast.
Before I even understood what was happening, he grabbed his belt.
Then he started beating me.
I did not even know what I had done wrong.
The belt hit my body again and again.
I cried loudly, hoping someone would stop him.
But my aunt just stood there.
She did nothing.
In that moment, I felt completely alone.
The pain was not only in my body but also in my heart.
That day I realized something painful.
The house I was living in was not a home.
It was a place where fear lived.
And that was the moment I truly began to understand the kind of life waiting for me in Lagos.
- Writer
