HIM HER & I (Part 29&30) – OPEYEMI AKINTUNDE

PART 29
“HIM HER & I”
(A love Triangle)
©️Opeyemi Ojerinde Akintunde

With Mmesoma’s help, I recklessly abandoned myself to God. I went back to the basis.

I started chasing after God and not men. At that point, I knew I was no longer interested

in men or marriage.

Was I created to just get married, have kids and die? No! God must have created me for

more.

I started attending a Bible believing church close to the house. The Church was a

holiness and Word grounded Church. I grew in the Lord and committed myself to the

service of God.

It was there I became a Lady of virtue.

I went through the drilling of God. It wasn’t easy but God’s Grace was sufficient for me.

I also worked on the evil Spiritual covenant between my Uncle and I. I stood on the

Word of God claiming the new covenant I had in Christ and breaking all negative

covenants.

I used my money for the Lord, as I also concentrated on my business. The Gas station

Odi bought for me had been under the supervision of a man, but when I got a hold of

myself, I decided to step up in all aspects of my life, which one of it was been serious

with my work…

Along the line, I met different men wanting a relationship with me, but I knew I wasn’t

ready yet. I knew I was not yet at the Spiritual level I was aiming for, so I humbly turned

them down.

This went on for another two years. Two years of self-development and self-love. I got

to love and appreciate me.

One faithful day, I had gone out for my early morning cry as usual. I wanted to continue

my mother’s legacy, so for close to 6 months I had been on the road everyday

evangelizing from 5:30-7am, before going for my daily business.

That day I was led to go to a new environment to do the morning cry. As I was

preaching, I kept hearing a familiar male voice preaching on the next street. As I was

approaching the end of the street, his voice was becoming clearer.

“Bro Stephen!” I screamed in the midst of preaching…

We both ran towards each other like two friends who had not seen each other in a

while…

“Sis Timi….”

We comported ourselves as we rounded up our morning cry….

“Sis Timi, my goodness! If someone had told me I will set my eyes on you today, I won’t

believe….I am so happy to see you”.

We spoke at length in his vehicle which was an exquisite one. He asked about

Jadesola. I told him about all that had transpired and he was short of words. Jadesola’s

disappearance hit him the most. We exchanged contacts and promised to keep in

touch.

After departing from each other, it dawned on me that I didn’t ask him if he was married,

but did it make any difference. The last time I saw him was close to 8 years ago, I knew

in that time he would have gotten married.

We established a mutual friendship and chatted occasionally.

There was a nudging in my Spirit to go back to my father and ask for his forgiveness for

absconding. It was a difficult thing to do but I knew I had to, but I was scared of my

father. When I got there, you would not believe who I saw there….

***********

As I alighted from my car in front of my Father’s compound. I saw Jadesola reading a

Bible. She was taller and looked very beautiful. She was already 18 approaching 19

years.

“Mummy…” Jadesola said on recognizing me

“Jadesola!” I said in what was not more than a whisper

“My God! You are alive… my daughter is alive” I said screaming loud.

My father and my other family members rushed out. There was mixed reactions, some

were happy to see me, while some were angry at me, but I cared less. What I was

concerned was how my daughter I had not seen for close to 5 years was standing right

in front of me…

“How did you get back here? What happened, I thought you had been killed by the

Kidnappers when all efforts to rescue you proved abortive…”

“God saved me…!”

“I know… but how did it happen?”

“I remember Aunty Rose the caregiver whispering to me, that we had been kidnapped,

when the cab we took went off the main road. When Aunty Rose and the other

passengers started asking why the driver went off the main road, the man seated

beside the driver drew out a perfume and sprayed it in the car, immediately everyone

went to sleep, but as for me, it threw me into my asthmatic crises. The perfume smell

was choking and I could not breathe… I kept coughing very strongly as I was struggling

for breathe…

“Action, this small girl is not sleeping, it seems she is an asthmatic patient, this one may

die with the way she is coughing” the man who sprayed the perfume had said.

“So what should we do?”

“Let’s dump her body, if she survives her luck and if she dies her luck too “

The car had stopped and they threw me out of the car, with my school bag. After they

left, I kept coughing and it felt like I was going to die. Suddenly I heard a woman’s voice

who was singing and worshipping God. I had struggled to get closer to the voice… From

a distance, she heard a loud cough

“Who is there?” She had said as it was already dark…

I couldn’t talk as the cough was overpowering my ability to speak. She raised her torch

and saw me. She rushed at me when she saw that I was a school girl…

“What are you doing here, little child?”

I brought out a paper and scribbled “Kidnapped”, hoping she could read and write.

“You were kidnapped? So you escaped?” She asked and I nodded in the affirmative….

She pulled me into a little hut and brought out a bottle of palm oil mixed with salt. She

gave me two tablespoons of it and the cough in no time subsided.

The woman told me she was a prophetess who lived in the city but spent some days in

the bush to be alone with the Lord. I stayed with this woman for three years as I could

not remember the way home, but by the third year, we had come to visit one of her

family members around here. The moment we passed here, I screamed….” Mummy,

look at my house”. She had stopped and brought me here, the moment Grandpa saw

me, he screamed my name which gave the prophetess assurance this was my

home….” Jadesola said

I wept as she narrated how God had taken her through this Amazing journey.

“We didn’t have your number to contact you and I couldn’t remember the way to our

house… How is Daddy?” Jadesola had said

“A lot has happened Jadesola… I now understand why God allowed what happened to

you happen, I guess God knew I couldn’t train you in the way of the Lord, so He sent

you to a prophetess who could give you that training… “

“Is he dead?”

“No, we are just separated!”

“The baby?”

“I lost her!”

“No!”

Jadesola broke into tears and I wrapped her in my embrace….

*******

Much later, I knelt before my father….

“I am sorry for absconding, I am sorry for keeping away from you all these years…I am

sorry” I said weeping before my father…

He kept a very firm face but his emotions betrayed him as tears dropped from his eyes.

I knew I had cause my parents a lot of pain and disappointment…

“Dad, I know I have not been the child you wanted me to be, but I want you to know I

am no more that girl, I am a changed girl who is more passionate about getting things

right and fulfilling destiny. I want to make up for the years I wasted, Just find it in your

heart to forgive me… I thought marriage was the ultimate not knowing that God was the

Ultimate… I may not be able to follow your religion but I promise to be a good child to

you” I said

My father had wept and prayed for me. I insisted that he and Jadesola come spend the

weekend at my place after narrating all I had been through. He agreed with me.

My father on getting to my home gave me an advice that got me back to my parent’s

house…

PART 30
“HIM HER & I”
(A love Triangle)
©️Opeyemi Ojerinde Akintunde

“Timileyin, this house is too big for you as a single lady, why don’t you sell it and invest

the money. You can return back to my house or rent a smaller apartment. I know you

are not thinking about marriage but I am very positive God still has someone for you”

My father had said and as a new creature I checked with God and I got a positive

response from God.

After a week, I moved back into my father’s house and it felt like God took me back to

restart my life.

Fresh suitors started trooping in, But I was not about to make my old mistakes.

I started praying for direction as to who was the best out of them all.

The dream I had years back resurfaced again, as I saw my late mother sending

someone to give me a new pair of shoes…

On waking up, I understood what this meant, Brother Stephen. I had been fortunate to

meet Brother Stephen weeks back but ever since we started chatting, he never asked

me any personal question. He knew I was no more with Odi as I had explained a lot to

him, but he never spoke about his status.

I didn’t want to be too forward so I just called him and informed him Jadesola had been

found and we wanted to come pay him a visit.

He was really excited about it, he sent us his address and I was surprised to find out he

lived in the elite part of the society. I wondered if he just moved there recently as he

couldn’t be coming for the morning evangelism he used to have with my mother, all the

way. Things must have changed for Brother Stephen in between the years.

We arrived at the address he gave us and I had to give him a call before knocking at the

gate. I didn’t want to believe Brother Stephen could live in such an expensive looking

house. He affirmed that was his house telling us to use the bell as he had informed the

security man of our coming.

I used the bell and the security man opened in no time, we were ushered into a beautiful

living room, I looked around and saw only Brother Stephen’s portrait, no wife, no

daughter, no son, I quickly calculated…

“Jadesola..!” Brother Stephen said as he stepped down the stairs, Jadesola ran up the

stairs to meet him halfway…

“Uncle Stephen…”

“Wow, my Jadesola is a big girl now, Grandma’s pet”

Jadesola laughed. Brother Stephen and I exchanged pleasantries and I just couldn’t

help myself…

“Wow… great things have happened to you in the past 8 years, “

“Hmm.. we thank God, God has always been good to me”

“When did you move to this area?”

“About 12 years ago”

“12 years… You mean you used to travel all the way to evangelize with my Mum”

“Yes… nowhere is too far to go for the gospel…” He noticed I was looking around, then

he said “You never thought I would live in a house like this?”

“Truth be told! Yes” I confessed and we laughed about it

“Well, I thank God for the gift of writing, it has been fetching me good and clean money.

I have about 40 bestseller books written by me…”

“A writer?” I asked as I was not much of a reader and didn’t know a lot of Authors

“Well, one of my popular books is “Dive in now!””

“What? You wrote Dive in now?” I asked remembering I had seen that book with Papa

way back in our university days. Papa had sang praises about the Author…

**********

10 years earlier

I had met Papa at the fellowship center reading a book, he was so engrossed in it that

he had no time for any chit chat with me…

“What’s so captivating about this book?”

“Everything, this man Stephen A.A is such a deep writer, he knows how to break

Scriptures down. I wish I could meet him one of these days. He is someone who I will

love to mentor me… “Papa had said

“Really?” I had taken the book from him and looked behind to check the Author. Unlike

other Authors, his picture was not there and there was little information about him.

“I hear he is a private person and doesn’t want to be known by the society, that is why

he didn’t release his surname, we his readers just know him as Stephen A.A

PRESENT DAY

I looked in shock as realization hit me… Sometimes Awesome gifts could be wrapped in

unlikely packages…Brother Stephen was who Papa was looking up to back then and I

was thinking Papa was the ultimate, When in the real sense, God brought Bro Stephen

to me on a platter of gold through my mother. I looked at the Awards that decorated a

wooden shelf with the name STEPHEN A.A bodily written on them…

“But something is missing in all of these achievement” I said hoping this shoe mum had

presented me in my dream had not been worn by another…

“What?”

“I can’t see the pictures of your wife or children”

“Well, that’s because you ran away from me” He said laughing

My heart skipped a beat as I wondered if we could go back to how things were but

unfortunately for me the love triangle syndrome repeated itself in my life

“But thankfully, my bachelorhood days are almost over, I have a single sister, my

pastor introduced to me. We have been talking and she seem really cool, so I am just

seeking the face of God. For years I have waited, I have met several ladies but God

kept saying No, but hopefully I am positive God is going to give me a go ahead

concerning Sister Carol…

Sister Carol … That was her name….