Perfect Submission

Another child has been killed by yet another house-help – this time they are both males. The boy, a child of 3, was placed inside an oven and left to cook while the house-help watched through the glass screen. The mother of the child came home earlier than usual and saw a large crowd gathered at her house. The neighbors had smelt something burning and quickly rushed to the scene. By the time the father arrived, the help had been taken to the police station and the child to the mortuary. During interrogation by the officers, the help, a boy of 13, showed various burn and machete marks all over his body where the woman and her husband had abused him. When asked how he came to be in their service, he replied, “She’s my mother’s cousin. My mother sent me to her house after my father died to work for her and in return, she’ll send me to school. I went for a few months but I rarely go to school now since she had the baby. She makes me stay at home and watch over him. I am sorry I killed the child – I don’t know what made me do it. It’s the devil that pushed me. But the way they treated me was not fair too. I am somebody’s child as well.”

You and your husband sit on your posh sofa in your luxurious living room watching the gory images fly by your screen. Your wife is in a state of shock; she has her arms wrapped around herself as if to prevent her heart from jumping out of her chest. Your face boldly displays your indignation and disgust: how could a child harbor this much hate and take it out on a baby?! A helpless toddler! You think of your own three babies and you feel sick to your stomach. You are shocked and scared. You both are. You have two girls helping you tend to your babies. If helps keep killing their master’s babies’, how soon before it would be your turn?

You shake your head, unable to bear the thought. No, when you go into the older one’s room tonight, you’ll have a word with her. You’ll tell her that if anything should happen to your family, you would begin visiting her younger sister, a child of 12. That should definitely scare her into obedience. You forgot, while crafting your master plan, that no one sticks around to be caught or punished after a crime has been committed.

Your wife is making her own plans as well. She would reduce the work of the girls and add some benefits. The older one, now 15, is a woman already. She would need sanitary towels, bras, panties, perfume and deodorant to take care of that stench that is her body. You would look through your perfumes, find the one you like the least, dilute it with Jik and air freshener and give it to her. You won’t complain anymore when she sneaks to take toilet rolls or steal your pads for her period. Maybe you’ll look for some cheap ones she can use. If you don’t find one cheap enough, you’ll buy toilet rolls. You can easily get used panties and bras down in the village market. That particular market is very unhygienic and you hate going there, but you’ll make the sacrifice. You’ll also get her some new dresses, perhaps the very unfashionable ones you hid at the bottom of your box. Your sisters-in-law got them for you and they are absolutely hideous, but you couldn’t bring yourself to throw them away. She would outshine all the other helps in the church anyway, and if after all you’ve done for her she raises her hand against your children, you would beat her sister so much that no one would be able to recognize her. You love your children, and would do anything to protect them. You seem to have forgotten, that the mother of those girls love them too and would do anything to protect them as well.

You abuse her children because you can and when they abuse your own children in return you call it wickedness? What are you, then, if not the devil himself? Your children are young and innocent, but the 12 and 15 year olds you rape every night aren’t? Maybe you didn’t abuse the children. You provided for their needs, you paid their fees, you fed them often, you clothed them, you didn’t molest them. And so because of this we should give you a medal? Would you have done less for your own children? If you don’t have it in you to love another woman’s child, why did you take them? If you needed a help, you should have gotten a grown adult that would kick you when you came into her room at night or quit if you dared to raise a finger to hit her. You should have gotten a young man who will demand good pay for good work done and who will not depend on you to be fed or clothed. But no, you didn’t want that. You wanted someone you could cheat, someone you could bend to your will, a docile servant, a humble slave that would submit to your lordship in everything. You didn’t want any challengers. You wanted someone you could handle easily, someone who would offer perfect submission. How then can you say that you didn’t deserve what you got?

Oghosa Osadebamwen

My name is Oghosa and I love novels almost more than anything else. I have a degree in biomedical science and an unearthly interest in comedy and grammar. When I'm not reading, travelling, writing or doing what healthy people do, I spend my time laughing, watching comedy, playing games, talking with my few friends and family.

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