How To Love

My sister was the most sensitive and emotional of the three of us. She gave too much. Love, money, time, effort, and often to the wrong men, her body.

I worried about Lade a lot. I feared that, one day, she would fall into the hands of a man who would recognize her weakness and take advantage of it.

So I questioned every new guy she fell in love with weekly, her boss who needed her to work weekends without extra pay and her flatmate who stayed with her but wasn't paying a kobo, yet consuming Lade's meat, milk and space. My sister was a gentle soul and i needed to protect her so i told them off, stood up for her, did the things she was too shy to do and generally watched her back.

And that time when Lade came to me with her eyes full of stars, my heart sank because i knew she had fallen in love once more and the scumbag would lie to her, use her, take her money, and leave my sweet, loving sister heartbroken again.

So i fought tooth and nail against her relationship with Ebube, but for the first time in her 26 years, my sister stood her ground and refused to give in. Ebube was her soulmate, she said, they were heading to the altar, she insisted. But those were words Lade spewed on a regular. Soulmate, Soulmate. Yet she met a new one every month. No one told me soulmates were like those tracts handed out at the junction by evangelists anxious to redeem your soul. Just come and pick another one when you're done with the previous. You know?

Lade proved me wrong this time. As i stood at the altar that day watching #LadEBube20xx exchange their vows, i knew I should have been relieved and happy for my sister, but I wasn't. I couldn't explain why, but. i. just.... knew.

I don't believe time flies but it was already 3 years and a baby later when Lade and Ebube's house was broken into. After a thorough ransacking, the head robber fancied to shoot Ebube in the groin just for the thrill of it, but my sister shrieked and jumped right in front of him, sobbing and begging for mercy. 

All efforts to get Lade out of the crosshairs of the gun proved abortive as my sister further clung to her husband like a leech and refused to let him go. They later reported that the head robber looked at the couple with amazement and pronounced Ebube a man lucky yet unworthy of such deep love.

I think that's when Ebube began to hate Lade. 

Several times, Lade came to me with eyes full of pain saying Ebube wouldn't eat her food, touch her or even talk to her. The times he deigned to throw a few words her way, they were so caustic that she was often reduced to tears.

I comforted my sister and told her it would pass, but in my heart, I knew it wouldn't. Offering her life for a man like Ebube who was innately selfish and downright arrogant had been the ultimate sacrifice and he couldn't stand being in her debt like that. He hated himself for seeming like a weak man whose wife had to come to his rescue and therefore, became the hero in the retelling of the story.

#LadEbube were headed for the rocks and no one could stop it. 

So when I spoke to him on the phone, I told him i knew. And when i begged him to let her down easy, he stammered and bleated in denial like a baby goat who has just lost it's mother, but i told him to call me when he did, so I could come get my sister and take her home.

The day Ebube finally left my sister was just like other days, traffic laden and foggy with the smells and sounds of Lagos, so it took me a bit longer to get to their house after the initial phone call from Lade sobbing heart wrenchingly. She told me Ebube had walked out on her, and could I please come for her and her child? She didn't want to be here anymore.

I got on the road immediately but i arrived later than I should have. I don't know who to blame for that.

As I walked into their house, i saw a crowd milling around an object of obviously intense fascination. They parted as I approached and i swayed slightly on my feet when i saw my sister lying peacefully on the interlocking tiles.

She had jumped down from the balcony and only the pool of blood seeping slowly into the cracks and crevices between the sandy tiles belied the seemingly quiet nap she was having.

I came to take my sister home but i was too late. So we took her home, six feet below the ground where her total and selfless love would not be required, appreciated, or thrown back in her face.