Friday came as usual, i got dressed for church practice. Osas and I strolled along to the church. This was the first time I’d be going to church practice without my father looking over my shoulder. Osas, although being a man servant who attends practice always, never went with my dad. He always came up with one excuse to leave earlier or later than us, or to drag behind long after dad picks me up. At 20 dad trusted him a little more than me. He was a student in University of Benin ( UNIBEN), so there was little dad could do to monitor him. We got to church about 20 minutes before practice time, and we parted ways. Osas went with his fellow man servants, while I left with my friends Ruth and Hannah.
Ruth and Hannah were the only close friends i have, we attend the same secondary school, and attend practice together.
They were about my age too. Mum knows them very well, and had banned me from associating with them. Both of them were very popular in church and school, for entirely negative reasons. Ruth in particular always filled my ear with stories of her rich boyfriends, most of whom had either just returned from Malaysia or Italy. She had a lot of expensive stuff to showcase every week. She spends her weekends in highbrow hotels in Benin city. She once showed me pictures of herself in kada plaza, somewere in Benin city, with one of her Malaysian friends. I do not even know were kada plaza is in benin. Ruth knew how to have fun, she had an exciting life going for her. I’m often left to bemoan my own lonely little life, in the cell my parents had created. Hannah did not have the same freedom as Ruth, her parents were just like mine. But unlike me, Ruth knew how to get around her parents. I knew she had a boyfriend, a man servant. I guess i was the one always left out. I kept thinking about how boring my life was all through the practice.