The Crown and its Dress

The image to me is so vivid, that morning when the school holidays just begun and my brother, at his tender age, 7, had gone to visit my uncle and I chose to stay home. Time was quiet and the sun was tainted by clouds. Its a fantastic morning to be in bed, I thought to myself. Although my family considers themselves a priority in my life I missed no one and enjoyed being in my solitude. A voice pierced through my distant daydreaming.

"I should go jogging with you one time, eh? Abiodum suggested enthusiastically. I looked up to him welcoming himself in my room.

“I already jog with my friend,"  my disinterests in partnering with anyone, let alone an old man on such an intimate activity is invasive.

"Chai! you'll make time nah, Thula," he came closer as an attempt to nestle me in his arms. With a quick swerve I laughed as though we're playing tag. His protest was subliminal and by then I had led myself in an open sitting room space just a couple of steps outside my room.

The house stood with just the two of us in it. I knew my daydream was over when I saw Obiodum only his Jockey that sat a hand scale up his knees. His shirtless chocolate brown torso struck my eyes as he busied himself in front of me and tied his hand to my arm.

"I said NO!" my nudge drove shock waves through my body.

My mother visited me at this moment and like every other visit she's made in my subconscious, I knew I had a war to fight. He muffles a giggle at the sound of indistinct noise drawing nearer. My mother was now arriving. My arm swung out of his hand. “My child I dey ask you to clear the bathroom when you used it earlier,” his voice engulfs secrets only he knows now, is how I can only be a child to him when my mother is around.

A rush of excitement climbs up the stairs.  My mother carries a dress covered in its protector. Her enthusiasm surely resurrected my own. Abiodum grunted as he leaves the open sitting room. In me is a stark hesitation but my arms swing in to catch the dress. I rob myself of the idea that my 16^thbirthday must be the meaning of a righteous celebration. All I did for that moment of exchange was to stare in my mother’s twinkling eyes. I want to ask her about her sense, and trusting a man far from my family native origin to be her daughters keeper in her absence. I have, in my mind ,the narrative of a naive but firm girl who only responds when being spoken to. So in my attempt to smile and celebrate this moment, I walk briskly into my room with my outfit hugged tight on my chest.

The flashlight of my phone draws my attention. The blob of text reads:

"Happy birthday Phakathwayo, God bless you with many more joyful years my girlie."

My uncle's voice was embedded in the text, and in my mind I am hugging the respectful father I have found in him. The heartfelt emojis make his closeness so present. 

I guide the roughness of the white dress over my body. It holds me tight and outlining my curves. A gush of heavy air comes out from my chest. 

My hands brushed seductively over my dress. It’s so well fitting. Being 16 was a number different to the thick bones and heavy meat that carried my spirit. I tie my dreadlocks into a bun and put over my head a golden allice band.

Chattering erupts and I’m remind of time. "Thula, come nah, let's go," my mother calls out. In her tone, is the integration of Abiodun’s protest. I lace my white modern pencil heal ankle strap with such speed and walk to the parking lot full of haze. My mother hails past me pressing her need to use the bathroom. I walked further approaching her 2016 two door KIA Forte Koup, and am met by my mother's child from church, Abidemi. Abidemi’s enthusiastic birthday wishes crowd me and we set to get into the car.

"She will sit at the back," Abiodum eyes arrange the seating of Abidemi and my own. In a gaze of his demand I prepare my armour of stubbornness. I open the passenger seat of the two door car, without hesitation Abidemi enters to the back seat. My crown was a heavy load but taking it off was not an option.  I entered the front seat tightening my posture to sit. In his control he snatched the papers laying by the cabinet in front of me.  His rash boisterousness scattered pages of words to the floor. Although I sat confused of a sudden harsh reality that Abiodum was orchestrating my life, he spoke at me with an underlying demon with which he wrestles. I served the moment as a saviour to assist but I passively sat in my seat waiting with Abidemi who stared like a prisoner at Abiodum. The atmosphere was dense, this time I see him in his purple t-shirt and brown pants, and so militant in his aggression.

CLANG!

The spasm of my arm that met my door's forceful close threw my chest back. My yelp was subtle. Clog, the door of the driver’s seat closes. "Don't come back with Thula," Abiodum finally gained the courage to be direct. I hoped his words were gathered by the encouragement that came from the last few pages he was picking up. I understood then what he meant, and instead of being beaten I did not anticipate that my resilience to freeing myself from silence would lead to a consequence of vicious impeachment. The engine of the KIA was smooth when my mother started the car. She sat silently looking ahead at our home, and without a word changed the gear from “park”to “drive.”

Abiodumo wasn’t satisfied with his request to my mother and added, “And I want that money you owe me!” Defenceless, I sat between the complexities of two nations driven to war by the act of my courage.  Although I was more interested in understanding this Igbo man chasing me away from my own land, a land my own mother sustained with her work and made sure to nourish myself and my brother, I had to begin empowering the chains I saw in my mother’s history and in my own victory. More than the excitement of that realisation, I was already tired of the road ahead. 

In my white dress my confidence is lifted; and as sure in my excellent of my own clarity in self-love - for which I understand it’s candle white innocence - I then surrendered to the unknown new home ahead with time. When my mother could not negotiate my staying, I had no idea of what my empowerment plan would be. But in my dress and crown, I knew I had enough to lead me forward.

If it really was that his topless torso meant pleasure, I did not want to be a statistic of the #metoo movement on my 16th birthday. An indirect act of love overshadowed by lust would have been an assumed innocence of this man's sexual desires towards the daughter of his woman. We took off, and saw his aggression swell his face with anger. Subtly without any one’s attention, I pointed my middle finger to him and wished to have done it the first time he said to me, “you look sexy, eh.”