FAÇADE: A STORY OF DECEPTION (EPISODE 7&8)

EPISODE  7

“I have been sleeping with men since I was 10 years old.

My first encounter was with our housekeeper at home, he raped me, and ever since then, I haven’t been able to take my mind off it. After I met you and we started dating, I booked a session with a therapist hoping to get some help but I couldn’t bring myself to tell someone else what was going on with me, I was ashamed, so I didn’t go to see the therapist.

When I was younger I used to think that I would end up being gay but I realized that I was still very attracted to women even though I couldn’t stop myself from having sex with men. But after I met you, I knew I would never be gay and I just wanted to spend the rest of my life with you so I promised myself that I would do everything within my power to stop the act, which I did.

Jason was one of the men I slept with during my university days and we both developed feelings for each other then, but he had to relocate to Canada with his family before he could complete his education, so we lost touch.  Last year when I went to Canada for a meeting, I ran into him and he invited me to his apartment, we eventually had sex. He also gave me some contracts which helped to boost my business.

Since last year, he has come to Nigeria 3 times and we hooked up during those times. When I told you that I would be going to Canada, it was to go and see him and finally end things with him. I didn’t want to end it over the phone because I knew that it would turn out to be messy and I didn’t want to lose the business coals in the process. But he suddenly called me last night to say that he decided to surprise me by coming to Lagos and that is why I had to go meet up with him and tell him that I wanted to end things.

Although things didn’t turn out well and he threatened to even ruin my reputation publicly, but I thought you already suspected something and I didn’t want you to go through the heartbreak of hearing confirmation from the public which was why I decided to come clean to you tonight.

If you decide to file for a divorce after this, I will understand, but please don’t take Nathan far away from me.”

EPISODE 8

Then he stopped talking and for the first time since I knew him, I saw tears drop from kola’s eyes, I saw his shoulder slumped and I just couldn’t help but picture the young boy who needed help but had no one to turn to.

Growing up in a rich family has its perks but sometimes, as a child, you would be left in the hand of nannies and housekeepers to take care of you and act as your parent because your real parents are career and business people, this was the case with kola.

Although both of his parents are fully retired from their careers now which is why they told us to always bring Nathan over to their house every Sunday which I knew they were using as an avenue to make up for the lost time they couldn’t have with their son while he was growing up.

One day when we went over to have dinner at his parent’s house, his mum told me how she regretted not spending time with her only son while he was growing up and advised me to balance my parental, marital and business life to not to make such a mistake with Nathan.

Just then we heard a loud banging on the door,

“Vivian it’s me Stella, please open the door” I heard Stella call out from outside the door

Kola looked at me in confusion, while I rush to open the door for her.

The moment I opened the door, Stella flung herself at me and gave me a tight hug. Then I noticed that she was crying.

“Stella, what is the problem, are you okay?” I asked in a panic

“No Vee, I’m not okay. After preparing dinner, I went to get ice-cream from that place you took me to the other day…”

The moment she mentioned the ice-cream place, I already figured out what she was going to say but I patiently listened to her rant about how she really loves ice-cream and couldn’t help but drive over there to satisfy her cravings. She always rambles whenever she is angry.

“So I got to the ice-cream store and as I was about to drop from my car, I saw Jude kissing a pregnant lady on the lips and opening his car door for her to enter. I didn’t want to cause a scene and I didn’t know what to do so I decided to drive down here to tell you that it is Jude who is cheating on me and not kola.”

“If only you knew that kola was doing worse more than cheating” I almost said, but instead my response was,

“I know Stella”

“Wait, what do you mean by you know?” She asked sounding confused

All these while, kola was standing in the far end corner of the living room, watching us.

“The thing is, I saw Jude with this pregnant lady in the mall yesterday but neither of them saw me and while I was driving back home this afternoon, I stopped by for some ice-cream and I saw her there again so I decided to talk to her, I lied that I was Jude’s cousin who just arrived from the USA and she told me that she was Jude’s girlfriend and she was carrying his baby. I was going to tell you about it but I didn’t know the right time to do it…”

“Hey Just stop right there.  Are you even my friend or my enemy pretending to be my friend? So you knew about this all along and you couldn’t tell me? What kind of friend are you?

Do you remember that the very moment my pregnant colleague from work told me she saw kola in the hospital with a pregnant lady during one of her antenatal visits to the, I called you immediately to tell you and we started searching for the truth but you knew about Jude and you couldn’t tell me? I am disappointed in you and you are not worthy to be called my friend.”  She spat at me and turned to leave

I held her back with her hands to try to apologize, but she pushed me away, got into her car, and drove off.

I just stood there watching as she drove off, tears streaming down my eyes and different jumbled thoughts running through my head.

Kola came to stand beside me and said,

“I wanted to tell you about Jude’s cheating but I had a lot on my plate too. He begged me to help him drive her to the hospital for her antenatal checkup on two occasions when he wasn’t around because she doesn’t like to go alone for her antenatal appointments. I couldn’t decline because he knew about my affair with Jason and I couldn’t risk being in his bad books.”

“Kola, I am sick and tired of all these, I don’t want to hear any more of it please, please! I just need to take a break and clear my head now.” I screamed as I stormed upstairs to get my bag, go find Stella and take Nathan so that we could all board a one-way ticket to Australia.

TO BE CONTINUED..

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In case you missed any of the episodes of FAÇADE, you can check them out: 1 &2 here  3&4 here 5&6 here.