Her Fate- Stories

Ugonma stared unseeingly into the space in front of her. The space in front of her started from her tear-blinded eyes, in the dock where she stood, flew over dozens of heads, to the presiding judge’s horn-rimmed spectacles which she placed aristocratically a good distance between her eyes and the slope of her well-carved but sagged nose. It seemed the state had specifically chosen a woman like herself, who from the facts presented, would not waste time to pronounce the ultimate penalty for a crime of this magnitude. Being a legal person herself, she had come to observe this fact herself, from her over ten years of involvement in jurisprudence. Male judges would like to go over the facts over and over, seeking any semblance of an opening to inject leniency, but not their female counterparts.

She opened the large notebook, and made some notes.

Allen stared longingly and lovingly into Jenny’s eyes, hands interlocked with hers as they sat too close for comfort on the three-seater settee in his living room. They were in that posture for the better part of three minutes. Three minutes which saw lots of thoughts criss-crossing both minds. Three minutes which contained meditations and unspoken sentences that wondered what life would have been if they had not met by such stroke of happenstance. For Allen, he wondered how on earth he had made the mistake of considering Ugonma for a wife material, not to talk of the malady of marrying her. Here was a more beautiful, more mannered, more homely; a more humble replacement who was everything Ugonma was not, staring him full in the face. As a matter of fact, it was good riddance Ugonma had gotten the hell out of his life. What better gift could God and life give to him in female covering other than the Mona Lisa whose soft hands he wished he wouldn’t have to let go of?

  On Jenny’s part, it was a scheme well played out; it was a joker in this game of cards, a sucker punch in this boxing ring. Ever since she had set eyes on Allen at Surprises, the image of his slim handsome features had secured accommodation in her head, and paid rent in hard currency, from days to weeks to months before today. She had even stalked him to his house on one occasion, and got disappointed at what she found out, right that first day. But here she was anyways, in not only his house, but his arms, and that was all that mattered.

Presently her thought flow and pattern was rudely sliced in two by Allen’s probing lips and tongue, which performed better than Schlumberger’s drills in her mouth. They were engaged in the session of unhealthy mouthing for what seemed like a while, and it seemed to have the potential of graduating into something on a more intimate level, judging by the roving motion of both their hands on sacred parts of their anatomies. It did not end well, though.

    The curtains directly facing them parted slowly to reveal an average heighted silhouette obstructing the rays of the sun which seemed to approve of their romance, feeding them warm rays to add pep and steam to the mutual expression of love. The image which appeared in the house, the means of which awed the both of them, had a bland look on her face, was dressed in a white flowing gown which left the contours and ridges of her physique open to imaginations and wild guesses. She said nothing throughout the two full minutes she regarded them, and the stroke of the second minute saw the first long and thick tear course from her eyelids, through the length of her oval face, graze the tip of the fabric just above her breast and drop right on the top of the Persian rug. She had gathered enough steam and offence to fuel her assault. Her best friend’s large lap was already curled round her husband’s. There was nothing more to imagine. She lunged forward.

With the speed that would make one ask where her diving medal was, she was airborne already, and landed dastardly on the both of them. She remained there long enough, still not a sound escaping her lips, and when she got up, she knew she was ready for whatever the outcome would be. The knife on her left hand had dug too deep for survival into Allen’s mouth and throat, and stuck out on the nape pf his neck behind him and pinning him to the sofa. With his eyes rolled unnaturally open, and motionless, he stared horribly at an impending afterlife, and it did not look good at all. When she removed the knife, bloodied as it was, she did not feel a tinge of regret. With the same bloodied hands, she snapped his eyes shut, and moved on to the next one.

   She, too, did not deserve pity.

In a most cruel manner, she plucked the knife from Jenny’s breast and with it cames unbowelling spurts of blood and light tissue. She was very, very dead, and she did not consider it worthwhile to mete the same treatment to her that she did to her husband. She left the house, her clothes and body a sorry, bloody mess. Without a care in the world.

‘I do not like the way my husband shouts at me’,  Ugonma dropped as she collapsed into the sofa in Jenny’s apartment. She held out a glass and it was promptly filled up for her. Don Simon’s blackcurrant. Ten percent alcohol. She downed it in one swig, and held out her glass again.

‘For the flimsiest of reasons, he just raves and rants. Nothing I do ever pleases him. The other day, just because there was a little too much salt in the soup, he nearly flung it at me. Of course that was the end of the meal for him, and he hasn’t spoken to me for days on end. Is this how marriage should be? What have I entered into?’

Jenny regarded her for a while, saying nothing, drink in hand. She took another gulp of the dark red liquid. It was now she considered replying her friend.

‘You are stupid, do you know that? Very stupid. This was the exact same thing I went through in the hands of my former husband. That figure-head and a cheap excuse for a man. Look at me now. Am I better off or not? If I need a man I just buy one off the shelves. I can’t take or tolerate an abusive man, under any guise. Just because he paid a pittance of a bride price? In this day and age of equal rights? Continue with him, till he kills you, and attends your burial with your high school friend, if he ever attends at all.’  She ended the chide with a loud, menacing and concluding hiss.

The obstinate hum of the engine of the Mercedes as it taxied to a stop in front of her window made Ugonma stir from her sleep. Parting the curtains a little, she was not surprised it was her husband, who was right home on time. She jumped on the bed, wondering how she was going to cope the next five hours he would be home, how to cope with his persistent nags over things she considered trivial..

The door clicked, and turned. He let himself in.

Allen wished there was more work to do at the office. He was infuriated his boss had insisted he would personally take home the statistical analysis the United Nations had contracted their firm to do. That woman’s whining and sulking over little corrections he tried to administer for her own betterment almost made him wonder who he had married, and if this was actually his house. What he saw when he entered the bedroom he shared with his wife made him more annoyed with his boss.

  The tufts of hair littering the tiled floor was reminiscent of a local hairstylist’s space on a busy business day. On the wooden wardrobe hung a wet large skirt, dripping with latherish water. There was a brassiere, a blouse, and two tops on each of the four corners of their bed like a beacon landscaping the area around the bed from desperate land poachers. To make matters worse, there she was, lying spread-eagled in mock-sleep, he was sure, pretending not to have heard the door click.

‘Ugonma, what is this?’

 The next day, Allen came back to find his house devoid of each of his wife’s belongings.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

With a satisfied smile on her face, Jenny took a long look at the mirror, and started oiling and pan-caking her face. Last night had been anything and everything but unsatisfactory. Allen was surely a heart-saver. He reminded her fiercely of her first love, Dennis, who defined romantic love in its deepest and truest import to her. She knew where she would be by now, had that cruel accident not rudely snatched him from her.

 

  They were meeting again tonight. She expected nothing less. He even wrote her a touching,  deep-worded poem which he slipped into her bag when she was busy with the menu. She was going to marry him straightway if he asked.....

   ‘So Jenny, you have the heart to do this to me? You have the heart to snatch my husband? My best friend whom i confide in? Whatever have i done to you to deserve this?’ Ugonma had stormed into the room, seething with a rage that had potentials.

‘Relax, Ugo.....what are you talking about? Which husband? The one you said you didn’t love anymore? The one you said shouts the life out of you? The one you accuse of raving and ranting? The one out of whose house you moved? I do not consider Allen your husband. No one treats her husband in the manner you have done. Besides, i love men that shout. It has a way of adding the spice of challenge to our romance.’

The next ten minutes was spent reviving Ugonma. She ended up in the hospital, looking up into the kind eyes of the handsome doctor.

‘From the evidences before me and the honourable men of the jury of this court, i hereby find you guilty as charged, Ugonma Nnakwe. Nothing should have warranted you to take two lives, under whatever level of provocation. The society ought to be rid of sociopaths like you. You are hereby sentenced to death by the hangman’s noose. I rise.’

Her soul had long risen, up and away, to an inevitable hereafter.