Episode 2

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.

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