Thankfully, I'd ended the video call just in time.
Just. In. Time.
His filthy messages—those scorching, sweet sins—were buried under innocent apps like a buried body wrapped in Bible verses. Hidden in plain sight, masked by calculator icons and Bible apps, looking pure on the surface. Like Sunday clothes that hide the bruises you don't talk about.
But the boy—God bless his stupidity—didn't know when to stop.
He kept calling.
Again.
And again.
My screen pulsed with betrayal:
"Babe 💕💋💖"
A digital kiss of death.
Each buzz was louder than the last. Each one a scream I couldn't muffle. It wasn't just a ringtone—it was a countdown. A ticking bomb under my pillow.
Tick.
Buzz.
Boom.
Then came the summons. The six words that shattered what was left of my fragile calm:
"Your uncle wants to see you."
My stomach didn't just drop. It collapsed, folded into itself like origami made of shame. My soul followed suit, clinging to the inside of my ribs for dear life.
This wasn't just any uncle.
This was the uncle. The one they called "The Drill Sergeant" behind his back. The one who believed sleep was sacred and discipline was divine. A health guru. A life coach without a license. The man who swore by 10 PM bedtimes like they were Moses' Eleventh Commandment.
And I'd broken every rule in his gospel.
At 2:07 AM.
I shuffled out of the room like a ghost, the cold tile numbing my feet. My legs trembled, knees knocking like a guilty conscience. Every step down that hallway felt like I was walking into my own funeral.
He stood tall in the center of the living room, shadows clinging to him like judgment robes. The dim light above cast a halo around him—twisted, ironic. A saint of discipline, ready to deliver damnation.
His voice came low, slow, dangerous:
"Why. Are. You. Awake?"
My aunt stood behind him like a shadow that hissed. Always there. Always watching. She didn't need words—her expression did the cutting. Lips pinched. Eyes sharp as blades. Arms folded like she'd been waiting for this moment all her life.
Then it happened.
The phone—my phone—lit up again.
And there it was.
His name.
The hearts.
"Babe 💕💋💖"
Not saved under a disguise. Not hidden in a random contact. Just bold. Blazing. Blasphemous.
She moved with the speed of judgment. Lunged for my phone like a lioness pouncing.
My fingers fumbled.
Too slow.
The screen unlocked itself like it, too, was a traitor.
She saw the messages.
One. After. The. Other.
Her gasp was sharp. Her eyes? Wilder than a wildfire in harmattan.
"Open the locked chats!" she barked.
Her voice echoed with accusation and triumph.
I clutched the phone like it was my last defense. Like it could protect me from the fire gathering in her lungs.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I lied.
My voice cracked, barely a whisper, a leaf in a hurricane.
She scoffed. Loud. Mean. Mocking. "So the three calls that came in while you were 'sleeping' were from ghosts?"
I blinked, my throat suddenly dry.
How did she know?
I had silenced the world. Set my phone to "Do Not Disturb." Covered my tracks like a seasoned criminal.
But somehow… she knew.
And she wouldn't stop there.
She opened the messages. Read them aloud. Slowly. Clearly. Each word another hammer to my spine.
"I want to taste you."
"Next time, no bra. Just skin."
"I dreamt of your lips, your thighs, your…"
I wanted the ground to open and consume me whole. Wanted the earth to swallow me and spit out a version of me that had never touched that boy, never replied to those messages, never entertained the thrill.
I wished I were the poison I joked about months ago. Lethal. Fast.
"Shut up."
My uncle's voice cut through her performance. He didn't want to hear it. But it was too late.
The damage had been done.
He stepped away.
Silence.
Then footsteps.
He returned with koboko—the ancestral whip. Coiled. Waiting. Its very name whispered dread.
I stopped breathing.
The air turned to glass in my lungs.
"Lie down."
Just like that.
No questions.
No space for explanations.
No trial. No jury.
Just judgment.
I didn't move. Couldn't.
I stared at him. My uncle. The man who once gave me a ride to school on a rainy day. Who once bought me groundnuts because I reminded him of his sister.
Now, he stood like an executioner.
I tried to cry. Tried to speak. The words jammed in my throat like traffic in Lagos.
"Please—"
The first strike landed.
Hot. Sudden. Sharp.
My lungs gave up the ghost.
The second came fast.
The third, faster.
Each stroke was a sermon. A punishment wrapped in tradition. My body danced without rhythm. My mouth opened in screams that shook the walls.
Doors opened.
Lights flicked on.
Faces peeked.
Spectators arrived.
The family gathered, robes still clinging to sleep, eyes still red with dreams. They watched like it was a movie. Like my pain was entertainment.
My phone? Gone.
My pride? Torn into ribbons.
My night? Over.
But pain has echoes.
The next morning, I refused to move. To blink. To speak.
I curled beneath my bedsheet like a corpse waiting for burial. My back was on fire, every breath a reminder. My eyes, swollen. Salted shut.
My chest felt tight.
Tight in a way I didn't have words for
Tight like sorrow had moved in, paid rent, and was now rearranging my ribs.
But in that house, silence was seen as defiance. Rest was rebellion.
The door banged open.
They stormed in like soldiers.
My aunt again.
Dragging her words like whips.
"Lazy girl."
"This is how they start."
"Girls who sleep too much and sneak around."
No one asked if I was okay.
No one asked why.
Or how.
Or what drove me into that boy's arms, into that screen, into that hunger for words that made me feel seen.
I was yanked up.
Dragged with slaps and condemnation. Shame piling on like bricks in a drowning pocket.
"This is how children become useless."
Their voices fused into a chorus of disappointment. A choir of blame.
And me?
I was silent.
Still.
Cracked.
As daylight broke, I broke too.
But not all the pieces were visible.
Because that morning, I didn't just carry welts on my back.
I carried something else.
Something no one saw.
Something I couldn't even say.
A secret.
A dark, aching secret that pulsed inside me like an echo I couldn't silence.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever .