A.N. Hi my lovelyz, this right here is a new one!

This book means a lot to me; it's a true story about a dear friend of mine who went through a lot...we both truly believe that her story deserves to be told and heard by you all.

Please feel free to ask any questions, I will provide all the right answers.

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It all started when Eke stepped into the beautifully decorated restaurant of Metro hotel.

A set of complex emotions took over Michael. You could call it love, infatuation, or even lust; but whatever it was, he knew right then and there that he would regret his life's decisions if he ever allowed her to walk out of the restaurant without him by her side.

'Eke' who hadn't heard of her? The black beauty, the jewel in every man's eyes, the envy of women of all ages, the perfect balance between brains, beauty, and grace; and to top it all off, the daughter of a powerful business tycoon. She is what her admirers referred to as reaching for the impossible skies. She was out of anyone's league.

Michael knew all these intimidating attributes about her but he refused to let the excessive pounding of his heart or the never-ending discouraging pleas of his friends accompanying him at the restaurant to deter him from the task he was set out to accomplish. And although he knew his many limitations as a roadside motorcycle repairer, he was still inflexible to climbing the difficult, yet not impossible, mountain set before him.

And so it came to pass that Michael made his move and the beautiful, difficult mountain known as Eke succumbed to his bravery, smooth charms, sweet talks, and his never-ending praise and worship of her.

Going against her family's petitions and concerns for her future with a roadside motorcycle repairer, furthermore giving her detailed accounts of her past mistakes, Eke adamantly made her stand clear to them that if it wasn't him, there could never be anyone else. So yielding to her many tyrannical tantrums and overpowering theatrics, they finally gave in and allowed her to have what she so desired-marrying Michael.

*****

"For the last time woman, let go of my shirt before I snap your neck in half!"

Five long years had passed after their marriage, now with two very beautiful children Nellie and Peter Adeleke Michael, to show for it; one perhaps would have thought they would be living the perfect life; after all, they so earnestly did fight for their love but unfortunately, that wasn't the case for our-once upon a time- lovers anymore, their love had diminished quickly and soon, it became a star-crossed affair.

Maybe If Eke had any idea that her life would suddenly turn into a living nightmare after five years of hunger-sacrifices and ridiculed-marriage existence, then maybe she would have paid mind to the constant warnings that were so graciously provided to her by her family and friends to stay away from the ill-fated Michael Adeleke.

She couldn't take it anymore. The constant beatings from over-exuberance of drunkenness, the never-ending parade of his young, beautiful conquests, the relentless hunger and abject poverty, or the complete loss of self-pride and dignity, filled up her glass of tolerance until she was forced to crack and shatter into a million pieces.

Eke packed her bags and disappeared from his life, never looking back, not even at little Nellie who cried and chased after her until exhaustion took over her little heart and legs. Life could sting no crueller than this.

With two years gone and Eke never thinking it was wise to go back to Michael or at least, go looking for her children; Michael thought it was wise to find himself a new bride, and besides seven years old Nellie and three years old Peter needed a mother figure to look up to. On the account of that decision, Michael went ahead and married Gift, one of his numerous conquests that stood out from the rest, a young woman in her late twenties.

She was nothing like Eke; she lacked her kind of class or better still, the charisma that he so admired in his first wife and she wasn't even close to her beauty. But, Gift had what Eke never possessed -the willingness to put up with his numerous bad habits and that was enough to dime her the perfect candidate for the title Mrs Adeleke. And so things returned back to normal; the children now had a new mother, Gift had a roof over her head, and Michael now had acceptable freedom for exploration.

Six years into the alliance, life became unbearable for Gift. Anger and frustration became the order of her day, "For how long will this continue?" She would lament to herself; she couldn't fight the consistent hatred that was slowly eating away at her system like a termite-infested log. She desperately needed an outlet, a place to vent, and from that desperate need, her step-children whom she once loved as her own became her relief outlet.

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Hi, it's me again! I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to read through this chapter, it really means a lot❤

Gift couldn't bear any children no matter how hard she tried, it was simply an impossible task.

The mere sight of her husband's children irked her to no end. At this point, she was totally convinced that they did, somehow, have a hand in her bothersome futile condition. And so she took it upon herself to make them regret their wicked accomplishments against her.

There is this popular adage among Nigerians that states, "A child who will not let his or her mother sleep, would also know no peace." With those words in mind, Gift appointed herself as the 'demon tormentor.'

Thirteen years-old Nellie and nine years old Peter couldn't understand what possibly had gotten into their mother; she was recently always angry, she would hit them at any slight provocation and sometimes none at all, she never ceased to call them insulting names at any given opportunity and her eyes would skim over them every single time, waiting for them to make a mistake like a vulture waiting for its prey's final breath of life.

One would wonder, where was their father during all of this? Why did simply he fold his arms and watch his children suffer from the corner? The sad answer to that question would be that; he simply no longer cared.

Michael wasn't blind, he could see all the time's Gift has inflicted harm on his children, and at first, he tried making her fix her ill-treatment towards them, but nothing he said or did worked. Then things took a turn for the worse when his motorcycle repair shop mysteriously caught on fire. Rendering him jobless and dependent on his wife. Michael changed and suddenly, he began to dance to his wife's tones. Completely forgetting about his children's wellbeing, letting her run the house as she so pleased. Besides that, he wasn't always there to witnesses her cruelty. Why would he, when there were lots of bars and welling women that he could always hang out with?

*****

Gift walked into the children's room, with a blink, her eyes swept over their entire form and then rested upon Nellie. Her lethal stare felt painful and piercing making her eyes look dead and impossibly still. Poor Nellie gulped, blood draining from her face and her heart thumped erratically- mother was going to kill them, she just knew it.

"How dare you sit here, idle and lazing about! Did I permit you to take a break from your chores?!" She snapped.

From the corner of her eyes, Nellie noticed Peter jumping slightly out of fear from the sudden outburst of the only mother he knew, and sadness completely took over her. Once he had been a boy that was always so generous with his smiles and ever free with his speech but now, his smiles and laugher were completely gone from his eyes, and his customary excitements hidden away, never to be seen again.

Gift eyes quickly darted from Nellie to little Peter who was quietly sitting behind his sister on the bed trying so hard not to draw attention to himself, and instantly her already cold face hardened more-which didn't even seem possible to achieve-and Nellie began to silently panic.

"Peter, what are you doing here? Are you done selling the oranges I asked you to hawk?"

"Mum, I finished making the stew which you asked of me, and I also washed the clothes you brought out earlier this morning," Nellie said trying to distract their mother from her baby brother but this caused more damage than good.

"Shut up! I wasn't talking to you, and don't you ever call me your mother again! I could never beget monstrous children like you two!"

She stomped towards the bed and grabbed Peter by the collar of his shirt, dragging him out of the room, ignoring his loud cries and pleas. Nellie ran after them also pleading for their mother to have mercy on the little boy but her words fell on deaf ears as she continued to drag him out the front door, pushing him harshly onto the solid pavement.

"Don't you even think about coming back to this house if those oranges are not sold!" she yelled at him before quickly banging the door shut, locking it. Then she turned to Nellie, smirking with a wicked glimmer in her dark stares.

"So you think you can protect him from me, huh?" she snared, and the little girl gulped in terror.

Gift was a woman who never accepted things the way they really were.

She always believed in searching for deeper justifications for every situation that unnerved her and usually, her solution-seeking adventures always led her to the irrational side of explanations and thereby giving room for exploitation by numerous con artists.

She was usually kind and ever so trusting, she never for once thought ill of her stepchildren, and even when her friends tried to make her see the danger her stepchildren supposedly posed against her happiness, she still never saw them as anything but hers.

But, Gift had a problem—her very powerful belief in everything supernatural. According to Gift, a Prophet could do no wrong, a fortune-teller could tell no lie and the fear of witches, wizards, and demons were the beginning of wisdom. Hence, from her desperate craving for children of her own, it wasn't a surprise when on her innumerable children-seeking adventures, she fell prey to fake prophecies and false fortune-telling all pointing accusing fingers at the two innocent children she so adored and cared for as her own, labelling them as ‘demons’ capable of very dark sorcery.

In a typical African society, it is not an uncommon occurrence to label an orphan, a house-help, or even in Gift's case–stepchildren– the perpetrators of every misfortune that befalls the family they find themselves in.

It’s always easier to blame someone else for our misfortunes, instead of facing them head-on; and that was exactly what Gift did. Thus completely ignoring her medical test results which stated her infertility, she went in search of a face to vent her frustrations on. So, the false prophets and fortune-tellers, taking advantage of her desperation and naivety gave her what she wanted the most, a place to expel her vexations. And of course, they were handsomely rewarded by her for their erroneous help.

Gift made a pact with herself that as long as she lived and as long as they resided under her roof, they would never be seen as anything but despised vermin unworthy of being called human beings.

*****

“Nellie, Nellie! Wake up!” A nudge to her ribs made her jerk up, awaken, her eyes taking in every corner of their new room which was the size of your average broom cupboard and also a part of the small kitchen. Without a doubt, Nellie knew she had slept too long. She turned to Peter, noticing his shaking form and fear-filled eyes staring intensely at the door, and once again, fear found her. It spoke to her in its cracked voice, it asked her legs to go weak, her stomach to waver, her heart to ail and instantly, tears spilled from her eyes as she knew what was coming next.

A loud applaud came through the door. “Wow! Nellie, it’s so nice to know you now have the impunity to sleep beyond 3 a.m.” Nellie quickly got up from the hard ground —that was now their bed— to her feet, and immediately commenced apologizing to her stepmother.

“Oh, shut that hole on your face, I didn’t ask you to speak!” Gift screamed, anger boiling deep within her system, it swirled, hungry for destruction. Flames of fury and hatred were simmering in the small narrowing of her eyes thinking of the most brutally cutting ways to hurt them.

Hidden behind her back all along, what Nellie did not notice was a long whip that soon enough became apparent dangling from their stepmother’s hand like a tree branch swinging in the cold breeze but it was already pointless to run.

Their stepmother pounced on them, whipping every part of their little bodies until she satisfactorily drew blood from their tender abused skin. Pleased with her achievements, Gift stepped away from the crying children just enough to take in the sights of them. She bent low so she could stare them in the eyes.

“Clean this place up and get ready for today’s batch of hawking” with that, she left them staring after her with bruised bodies, battered faces, bloody tears, wondering how and why they suddenly turned from most loved to most hated by their once beloved parents.