MY FATHER’S FARMLAND (Part 11&12) – OPEYEMI AKINTUNDE

PART 11
“MY FATHER’S FARMLAND”
©️Opeyemi Ojerinde Akintunde

Sukki found himself in front of a church, the disappearing charm landed him in front of a church. As he raised his head, the first thing he saw was a banner…

“ Theme: No Condemnation in CHRIST JESUS!”

He looked around in fear to be sure no one had seen him appear there suddenly, but what met his eyes was another banner at the entrance of the church…

“ JESUS IS THE ONLY SAFE WAY, ANY OTHER WAY LEADS TO DEATH”

Those words struck Sukki, it meant something very deep to him…

Ope and Oba were happy when they saw Ola seated on her bed…

“ Thank God, You are fine…” Ope said with a sigh of relief the moment she saw Ola…

“ Ope, you can see she is fine…” Oba said and all Ola could do was respond with a smile…

“ Any food in this house?” Oba said going into the kitchen. Ope sat beside Ola, but she suddenly felt something was amiss when Ola didn’t say anything…

“ What is wrong?” Ope asked Ola

Ola wanted to say “ Nothing” but no sound came out of her mouth. Ope jumped back and beckoned on Oba…

“ Oba, something is wrong with Ola?” Ope said

“ What?”

“ Ola say something…” Ope said frantically but as Ola tried harder, no sound came out of her mouth..

Tears flowed out of her eyes as she knew she would have to do the explanation she didn’t intend to do…

Ope begins to scream and cry…

“I knew something had gone wrong with Ola , I knew it… Ola What happened?”

Ola gave then a sign to please give her a pen and paper, so she wrote with the little strength she could gather…

“ I was attacked by armed robbers last night, I was hit by a charm and raped…”

Ope collapsed….

Now, the attention shifted and Ope was the one who needed help.. Ola and Oba tried splashing water on her face, but she wasn’t responding.

Ola took the paper and wrote “Hospital”. Oba nodded and they both dashed out of the room, with Oba carrying Ope. As they stepped out, Ola remembered the money and Oba remembered the money Micheal had given Ola through Ope. It was in Ope’s handbag . They both dashed back into the room and picked the different pack of money…

It was around 7pm and Ope wasn’t yet awake, although she was breathing as she laid on the hospital bed…Oba had been looking at Ola hideously as he was silently blaming himself for his Sister’s defilement, but like Ola knew what was going on in his mind, she took Oba’s phone from him and typed …

“ I know what’s going on in your mind, you think it would have been better if you were the one who was in that room and I was in the hostel… No don’t think that way, because if it had been you, the armed robbers may have killed you.”

Oba read the message and could not help but shed tears. If Ola was not ever going to talk, he wasn’t going to talk either…He typed on his phone

“ You are right… but what are we going to do about your voice?” Oba handed the phone back to Ola and interestingly Ola smiled as the texting thing seemed like fun…

“ We can speak to the doctor about it and besides I enjoy this texting thing… Let me enjoy it while it lasts..,”. Ola handed the phone back to Oba who could not help but smile at the last part of the text.

“Ola! What a beautiful and strong soul, she is strong as our father”Oba reasoned quietly… Oba took his sister by the hand and walked to the doctor’s office. Oba explained the situation to the doctor, who told them she might need to see a speech therapist. The doctor also advised Ola should take time to rest because of the rape. He gave Ola a pill that would protect her from unwanted pregnancy.
Ola complained of soreness in her private part. The doctor told her it was normal and that she should try to get some ice packs to relief her of the soreness…

Meanwhile, Sukki was seated at the corner of the church. They were having Evening service. Although Sukki Felt out of place, but it felt like something was pinning him down…He was looking for where to stay. He entered the church with the intention to lie that he was disowned by his father who is a herbalist, because he just gave his life to a Christ, but the words of the pastor was piercing him more..

“ It doesn’t matter where you are coming from, it doesn’t Matter what you have done, God is opening His arms wide to Recieve you… it has to be today. A time is coming where you won’t have your father or your mother and the only person who will be able to save you is Jesus… Now is the time to give your life over to Christ.” The pastor was saying

Sukki knew it was time to give His life to Christ. He just knew this was it for him. He had been escaping this, but he knew if he missed this, he could be dead soon…

Sukki walked to the front and knelt before the Lord….

********

“ God will punish him wherever he is, He will never know peace in Jesus name. Joy will be far from him all the days of his life” Ope was saying after she woke up from her unconscious state…

Ola had written the whole incident down and explained in details all that happened…

“ You can’t go back to that house!” Oba said

“ And lose a year rent?” The business minded Ola texted to Oba.

She continued “ I will be fine!”

Ola gave a stern look and Oba knew that whenever Ola gave that look, it was final.

Ola returned back to her house and on Oba’s insistence, she bought a strong iron door to replace the wooden door.

Oba and Ope made sure they visited every other day to ensure she was fine, but Ola didn’t like the arrangement as she knew it would affect their academics….

She visited a speech therapist and the bill she was given scared her. She felt if she paid that huge amount of money, she won’t have enough money for her business….

Her being temporarily dumb was not going to kill her dreams. She had to push forward.

Ola wrote to the Landlady About relocating… and would appreciate if she could have a refund of her rent. Ola explained she had been having nightmares as result of what happened to her in that room. The landlady was very receptive and in fact told Ola she would help her get a better apartment …

The landlady made some calls and surprisingly one of her friends who was a dealer of Eggs wanted to rent a room out. The landlady took Ola there to see if she would like it…

Fortunately for Ola, the house was behind the University where Ope and Oba were. The house also had good security. Ola nodded in excitement and she was all smiles…

The landlady paid her friend and Ola went back with her to pack her things…The plan was for her to move in the next day, but Ola had a strange dream on her last night in that room….

PART 12
“ MY FATHER’S FARMLAND”
©️Opeyemi Ojerinde Akintunde

Ola had seen herself in her room in the dream and a lady had brought her baby clothes. Female baby clothes to be precise…

“ Take it, it is for your baby OluwaSunmibare” the lady had said

Ola had smiled and said…

“ Aww… thank you…” Ola had replied in the dream

Ola woke up voicing the name in her heart…

“ OluwaSunmibare…OluwaSunmibare” She repeatedly said in her heart. She tried to translate the Yoruba name to English…

“ God has pushed me towards goodness”…

“Hmmm… A baby? Am I pregnant?… the pills…I used the pills the doctor gave me for five days…, but hold on what’s the date?” Ola thought silently as she looked for her phone…

“July 12th… Oh my God I am 3 days late..” Ola thought in her heart…

“ God please don’t let me be pregnant, I am still dealing with the hurt of being raped, please don’t add pregnancy… I am still trying to see how to feed my siblings and I, please don’t add any other mouth… Who is going to pay for the diapers, baby food, clothes… God please…”

Ola stood up and with firm determination, she told herself she wasn’t going to go for a pregnancy test… She believed strongly she would see her period soon…

“But what if I am really pregnant?” Ola reasoned quietly as she was packing her clothes. The landlady had volunteered to help her pack her belongings to the new house with her car

“ If I am pregnant, it will be too much for Oba and Ope to handle” Ola thought silently…

“ Then it is better I know my fate” Ola concluded in her heart

The pastor of the church Sukki had found himself had taken his case seriously. He had made room for Sukki in the church store and he made it compulsory despite his busy schedule to have daily Bible study with him.

The same night Ola had the dream about Someone giving her a female baby cloth, Sukki also had found something intriguing and haunting to him from the Bible when he was flipping through the Bible…

“Deuteronomy 22:28-29

“If a man finds a girl who is a virgin, who is not engaged, and seizes her and lies with her and they are discovered, then the man who lay with her shall give to the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall become his wife because he has violated her; he cannot divorce her all his days.”

His heart broke as he remembered the strawberry girl… In all his moments of mischief, he had never raped a girl, the strawberry girl was his first, and she was a virgin unlike all the loose girls he had been sleeping with…

Sukki realized this verse showed that God was not happy with him for raping the strawberry girl and the only way he thought he might be able to correct his error was to marry this girl…, but Would she want to marry a man like him…?

“I was a former rogue who had raped her, I had dropped out of university because of cultism related issues…I am the son of a herbalist…” Sukki thought as he sat on the soft mattress in the store room that had been provided for him…

Ola sat at the medical center shaking, she saw the look on the nurse’s face when she handed over the result to her. Ola knew that look… the look of condemnation…

As Ola opened the result her fear was confirmed. She was in deep soup. She was pregnant….

Ola couldn’t help but cry out at the hospital, she burst into loud tears that attracted people’s attention.. She however received sly comments that showed people had judged her wrongly…

“Look at her, you should have known this would be the result after enjoying what is meant for adults” said an elderly woman

“ She is just shedding fake tears, before you say Jack Robinson, she will go for an abortion “A man also said

“ This generation lacks youths with the sense of morality…”

Ola wished she could scream out loud to defend herself… She rushed towards one of the nurses and grabbed her pen and wrote boldly

“ I WAS RAPED BY ARMED ROBBERS”

Ola raised it up for everyone to see as she was crying profusely…

The atmosphere changed, there was silence everywhere, as those who had condemned her felt ashamed…

“ God, who can question your ways…” A lady who had been silent all the while burst out in tears as she knelt before God…

“ I dare not question you,you made a young dumb girl get pregnant after rape, but I have been praying to you for 7 years for a child, and all I hear in my Spirit is WAIT… I dare not question your ways but show me mercy too” The woman kept crying and the nurses went close to console her…

The atmosphere was filled with “Hmmm…” from different quarters… and Ola’s compassionate self suddenly felt pity for the woman.

If only she could swap wombs with this woman. If only the baby in her womb could be transferred to the woman… Or should she bear the child and give her/ him to the woman..?

Ola reasoned quietly as she kept tearing up and asking God Why He was allowing all these to happen to her…

Then she heard her conscience say to Her….

“ Skilled and Trusted Soldiers stay at the front of the squad at the Battle front”

“ What did that mean?” Ola reasoned silently to herself as the woman came close to give her a comforting hug…