"I know you have always been the black sheep of this family. If not for the distinct resemblance between you and me, I would have sworn the nurse had mistakenly exchanged you with another child. You are such a foolish girl. Idiot! Onyiala! Ewu!" Mama moved closer to Helen and began hitting her ferociously. Helen moaned in pain
"Mama, please. I beg you in the name of Jesus. Please o. I promise I will not try it again o!" Helena groaned and cried to be released by her angry mother. Mama released her but not until she was truly satisfied with beating her last born child thoroughly.
"Just try it next time then and see how I am going to strangle you to death. Arrggghhh! You even had the guts to go and report me to that witch at the hospital. You want her to kill me just like she had killed my son? Oh, both of you want to share my son's properties. My son's sweat, abi? Amadioha will strike both of you dead! Mama cursed.
"Mama, including me, your daughter?" Helen asked disgustedly. Mama wanted to move closer to her and beat her blue-black again but Helen quickly ran out of her reach.
"Why not wait for me and see if I will not empty the foolishness of your brain? Idiot! Listen and listen good, if you don't leave for school tomorrow morning, I will personally chase you out of my house. Useless girl!" She hardly finished talking when a knock on the door interrupted her.
"Who is there? Please, come in." Mama replied after hearing the knocker's response. Uncle Thomas barged into the sitting room.
"Mama, warn your daughter for me. I don't know who sent her the useless message she has been delivering up and down. Look here, your mother can start caressing your scale fish skin. As for me, Mba! I will beat the stupidity out of your dull brain. Numbskull!" He wanted to press further when mama move closer to calm him down.
"It's okay. I have warned her seriously today. She dare not repeat such a mistake. Mama threw a stony look at Helen who quickly knelt in an act of apology.
"She dare not. Or else, I will make sure I deal with you mercilessly. Stupid girl!" He retorted while he moved forth to go into mama's bedroom.
"Mama, please, we need to talk" He stopped halfway to inform mama while he proceeded into mama's bedroom.
"All right. I will join you now" Mama replied and then turned to Helen who was still kneeling.
"Let this be the first and the last time you will ever go to meet that foolish woman. I have just seized your phone and I will not return it to you until further notice"
"Mama, please, there are lots of assignments to be done on that phone. I might fail my courses woefully if I refuse to deliver the assignments on time" Helen said amidst tears.
"You must be very stupid for what you just said! So, you left such important things undone, and instead, you were walking around to go and meet one bastard that killed my only son. What for? So that you can conspire on how to kill me and inherit my late son's sweat? Ask me for that phone once more and see if I will not smash it on the floor. Idiot!" She hissed.
"Mama, I said we need to iron some matters out. Or do you want me to leave?" Uncle Thomas blurted impatiently.
"Please, don't go. I am coming my good brother" Mama left Helen in the sitting room to join uncle Thomas in the bedroom for the confidential discussion.
Helen was so baffled over how mama and uncle Thomas knew about her visit to Ngozi at the hospital. She couldn't believe that her family could be so cruel to turn blind eyes to what Ngozi was passing through even when she has just delivered a baby boy; A heir they ought to cherish and adore. She wondered what Ngozi could have done to them to warrant such treatment. She never prayed for such an experience in her future husband's home.
Johnson had sternly refused to take up a second wife as advised by mama and the entire family base on the fact that he had many properties and they wouldn't want Ngozi and her children to inherit everything. That wasn't enough reason to treat her harshly to this extreme?
"God, why??? Why have you chosen me to be among this family Why did I have to come through this woman? God, why did you have to create wicked people among the innocent ones? Why do I doubt your existence at times? If you are up there as you made us believe, then, why do you have to allow Aunt Ngozi to suffer this way?" She thought deeply.
She wished God would just destroy all the wicked people by striking them dead but then she had a rethink. If God should grant her wish, that means her mother would die a painful death and everything around her might collapse in a short while. She would become motherless and the future would be somehow unpredictable. She knew her uncle to be a very selfish man who never cared about anyone else but himself. Whatever uncle Thomas had in mind was only for his benefit and mama. She believed her uncle had a plan to make matters worse for Ngozi and her children. She just hope God would guard and protect Ngozi from their evil schemes.