…Life is about rules and regulations; it hurts to play outside them!
One thing William loved about the church was that they taught girls how to take care of their guys. That could be the reason why his relationship with Bukky had lasted longer than others because girls seldom held his interest for long.
He answered the altar call, said the sinner’s prayer, went to Holy Ghost class, got baptised again, this time by immersion in water because Bukky advised him not to mention to the pastor that he had infant baptism – ‘It’s so not Christianity,’ she said. ‘It’s not found in the Bible.’ So, he kept silent on that to please her because he had protested in private.
At the Holy Ghost classes, she had told him what to do – ‘Just repeat one syllable several times and you’ve passed.’ He did. He also passed out of New Believers’ Class and got received into Miss Wesmor’s organised society.
Shortly after, he met the Marriage Council, professed his desire to marry Sis. Wesmor Bukky Jack.
“Yes, yes, yes! God has spoken to me about him,” Sis Wesmor said to the Marriage Council.
They went through The Intending Couples’ Classes and learnt nothing. A Saturday came when they stood at the altar facing each other saying, “I, William Tijani Aremu, take thee Miss Bukola Jacqueline Wesmor to be my lawfully wedded wife…”
As Mrs Bukola William Aremu, she was perfectly happy for three months. Then her husband suggested that they begin to watch pornography on Sunday evenings. He needed something to kick-start him for the week ahead for he found life with her a little boring.
He loved clubbing, she loved church-related activities; he loved drinking but she would not touch alcohol with a long spoon. Parties were his turf; she would not move her body to any secular rhythm but loved jiggling in church.
So, they adjusted on so many things. In his own way, he loved her, only he was becoming frightened of the monotony their life together was sliding into. Sunday evenings were exceptionally boring – what with the choir singing drowsy songs and the preacher’s sermon so sleep-inducing.
Sis Bukky vehemently objected at first to the issue of pornography as private entertainment for the family but then she had a rethink. He was her husband after all and had given in to her on so many issues.
“Okay,” she said, “let’s do it.”
They began to watch. He always was instantly thrilled and took her on afterwards. But she saw no thrills in the X-rated movies and was mostly bored and often repulsed. Nevertheless, since it made him happy, she obliged him.
Now, he looked forward to Sunday evenings and even hummed and tapped his foot to the choir ministration and said the benediction loudly – anything to move the Sunday service on and bring it to a close so that they could go home, entertain guests Sunday afternoon; settle down in the evening to watch their secret movies and act them out.
He brought different blue films, some even with good storylines. Then, one Sunday night, he slotted in a dangerous one, one with a little bit of violence and he instantly enacted it out in front of the television set.
More dangerous ones followed; non-violent ones were abandoned. Soon, she began to use foundation powder to cover bruises sustained during the dramatic enactment of the X-rated movies. She protested, he pleaded.
Bukky became pregnant. She doubted if he understood the implications of his insane demands on her in her condition. He began to demand strange postures. Some days he would tie her hands and legs and have her spread-eagled on the bed; whip her silly with a horse whip; whip and knock her about wearing knuckle-length iron-studded leather gloves before the act. After the act, he would kneel beside her and weep louder than she, pleading all the time that it would never happen again – which he kept his word until next Sunday evening.
Her health became endangered and so were her face and her limbs and her back which stopped the horse whips. She began to take time off work, not from morning sickness, but because of the bruises. Not long after, she began to feel some creeping motions in her body as if some slimy living things were slithering about inside of her.
All the tests she underwent in the best hospitals in Nigeria came out negative! She had nightmares of snakes and knew not what she had contracted that could not be diagnosed. She suspected that it was from what she and William were doing. Who would she talk to about them? Who would she turn to? William wasn’t a Christian – he was a patchwork she put together. She bore it bravely praying that God would change him but heaven seemed brass.
The violent adult films continued, accompanied by the beatings and the tears; the pleadings and the regrets at the end. After two lost pregnancies, chronic terrible aches and pains and bruises that could no longer be concealed, Bukky needed no prophet to tell her that William was a sex pervert. He was a pervert in an Italian suit; an executive pervert with a fat paycheque, a ritzy apartment and a sleek ride.
She sought for an escape but feared he might kill her. He had bought some dangerous weapons for the enactment of the porno. At one time, he licked the blood that dripped down her arm from the whiplash!
Colleagues asked questions; brethren asked questions – lies upon lies, pretence upon pretence followed one another in hot pursuit. Make-up could no longer hide the blue-black bruises.
Bukky lost another pregnancy and barely escaped with her life. She woke up one morning in the hospital and half her face was gone. William was on his knees by her bedside, weeping and saying how much he loved her and how he would be more careful next time. She nodded her agreement and said they would give it another shot. When he left, she called the police and had him arrested lest she goes home and poisons his food.
They kept him there while he ranted and raved saying how church people were hypocrites and how they renege on their promises – didn’t they vow that until death would they part? Why was his wife talking divorce now? Was one not supposed to enjoy one’s wife the way one deemed fit? When he ran out of steam and reality sank into him, he signed the papers that he would never go near his wife. He also agreed to the dissolution of the marriage.
Sis Wesmor is a different sister now. She loves the Lord and treats His saints right. She agrees that God’s gifts make rich and bring no sorrow. She has acquired in a painful trip, that fruit of the spirit called patience. She realises that all that glitters are not gold. Now, she prays for a God-fearing man and waits for God to give her such a man. She waits and has no plan B!
The end.
