OLUWATOSIN ATALA narrates the tale of a woman who went to great lengths to show love for her husband who, as fate would have it, turned out to be not the angel she thought he was, but a snake in the grass. Read on…

THE man standing before them had paint all over his face. The paint was in different colours and carefully smudged in an effort to create a result that would scare people or at least make them think the one with the painted face had something they didn’t – that he could consult with the supernatural.
Foluke looked at the rest of the costume that completed the scary look.
She had come with Dare, her boyfriend of one year. He was about to propose, but he wanted some sort of assurance that she would never leave him so they had travelled from Ibadan to a very deserted area on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway.
She had been surprised and mildly scared when Dare had turned off the main road into the bushy area off the road.
Dare adored her and she loved him deeply. Although he did not have much money, Foluke was convinced he had bright prospects. He was the one driving her car to this place he called “the fountain of love”.
There was no fountain here and she wondered if the herbalist even knew what a fountain meant.
The herbalist took a chicken, passed it round her head seven times and around Dare’s head seven times, then he said a lot of incantations, so much, that Foluke was beginning to feel hunger pangs before he was done.
After that, he cut Dare on his wrist and let the blood spill into a calabash. He also cut the chicken’s head off. Swirling them together, he had mixed them and asked her to drink.
She had been scared out of her mind. She turned to look at Dare’s usually emotional face which was now placid and thinking of her mother, she drank the blood concoction.
She did not want to remain in her mother’s house getting nagged every day to find a husband. She also drank because she thought Dare was going to do the same.
This wasn’t so. Even after the herbalist told her she could never date any other persons while Dare was alive because she was tied to him for the rest of his life, she was still too shocked to say anything.
As Dare got into the driver’s seat and drove off, she asked why he hadn’t drank her blood. “You know I cannot cheat on you. Getting a cut and giving you my blood shows how dedicated and committed to you I am”, he had replied. She wanted to protest but did not know what to say.
As they drove back to Ibadan he asked, “by the way, will you marry me?” This was said so nonchalantly that he seemed to be asking under duress; as if he would have no intention of marrying her if he absolutely did not have to. His voice was devoid of the adoration he usually showed. “Yes.” Foluke replied.
The marriage took place five months later. Foluke had to sell her car to sponsor the marriage and all her savings were spent on getting their own place and furnishing it.
Shortly after their marriage, Dare would come home complaining about his job. He would request for garri and would drink it with N5 naira sugar before going to bed, telling her to cook the remaining small rice or yam or spaghetti, whichever was remaining, for herself in a concoction as there wasn’t money to cook it with eggs or beef or even good stew.
She had loved him more for always leaving the good food to her whenever he did not have money, which was almost all the time. The mornings after, he would give her 50 Naira to manage for the day saying he would trek to work.
He worked in one of those factories where only machines should be allowed to work because the workers were at great risks of losing parts of their body if any slight mistake occurred either on their part or on anybody’s part.
Foluke would go to church praying for Dare that he would not lose his hands or legs or even his ears, praying that he might not die, that he would not become paralysed.
She prayed that his salary would be paid on time, praying always for him and never for herself.
Her brother, Tade, sent her some money; 60,000 thousand Naira and she decided to buy some palm wine for Dare to celebrate.
Not wanting to spend any of the money on transportation, she trekked the long way to a bar that she heard sold fresh palm wine.
It was a long journey but she was encouraged by the thought of how happy Dare would be.
She had prepared a hearty meal for him too. They might even have sex, she thought. She had been celibate for seven months now and not by any choice of hers.
Dare was always tired and she was not the type to demand first, her mother had told her she should always be available for her husband.
It wasn’t said that her husband had to be available for her. Blaming his job for his daily tiredness, she had remained silent and kept hoping he would notice her availability and want her.
She got to that popular junction where the bar was and wanted to turn back immediately.
No responsible woman should be seen at such a place, she distressed.
There were money changers about and around all the big cars.
The type she hoped Dare would someday be able to afford. She missed the convenience of being able to drive around to places.
Being seen at such a place had spoilt a wedding. She had attended the wedding with the good women’s group from church.
A cousin of the husband who had not previously been introduced to the wife said he had seen her thrice before, all times at a bar, and because ladies who were seen in such places at night were automatically considered one of the money changers, the wedding had been called off, right there in the church.
Foluke hurried towards the guy making suya ( a spicy shish kebab like skewered meat which is enjoyed as a delicacy in West Africa) to ask where she could get palm wine when she noticed a gleaming head. She turned to look at the man whose bald shining head so resembled her husband’s when she recognised the man as Dare.
He was sharing a bowl of pounded yam with a tiny girl and had one hand lodged under her gown.
Foluke moved into the shadows and watched as they finished the bowl and then Dare ordered two bowls of pepper soup and three bottles of star beer.
They drank one each and shared the third like an affectionate couple.
It felt surreal, like she was watching a movie. This was the same Dare who would come home saying hunger was about to kill him or telling her that he had almost fainted on an equipment at work due to hunger pangs.
Dare and the money changer finished their meal and stood clinging to each other like parasites whose very existence depended on one another.
He flagged down a keke marwa (tricycle) and the girl climbed into it awkwardly in her too high heels.
Of all the men with jeeps and who could at least have taken her in a taxi, if not in a jeep, she had to chose Dare who took her off in a tricycle, Foluke wondered disdainfully. She wondered how much Dare would pay her or if she was one of those who you only had to give supper and they opened up.
Foluke stopped and turned an okada (a commercial motorcycle used as a vehicle for hire in Nigeria).
She climbed astride and held on to the back of the okada tightly, as if holding on for her life, she tried to push away all thought of what just happened and held on to the last of what she had thought her life was.
However, half way through she stopped the bike man, paid him and continued walking back to her one room home.
She met Bassey and his wife. She considered pretending she did not see them. Bassey’s wife, who nobody in church knew by name, had one arm slung across Bassey’s right shoulder as they walked side by side.
Foluke turned to greet them and they replied warmly, though Bassey’s wife gave her that look.
It was the look she gave all the women in church. She had only just started attending Believer’s Assembly after her marriage to Bassey and she seemed to not know if she should be wary of the other ladies or not. So she gave every lady that look.
It was not a mean look but it was not a welcoming one either. It was scrutiny and mild dislike well concealed with just a hint seeping out.
Foluke walked quickly past them wondering about Mrs. No-name Bassey.
Why did no one know her name? Why did no one ask Bassey what her name was? Maybe they did and Bassey doesn’t know either, she thought patronisingly.
Why did she continue to attend Bassey’s church if she felt all the ladies there were a threat to her? And why on earth did she marry someone she really towered over?
She was like a mansion and he a hut beside her.
Bassey was a good man, Foluke knew that. Igbo men were like that, she muttered. She turned back to see if they were still behind her.
They were, although she was now far ahead.
There they were walking hand in hand, looking like lovebirds on their honeymoon, even four years later.
She had tried to push all thoughts of Dare away but those thoughts now came flooding in.
Dare used to be like that, she thought nostalgically.
No sooner had their honeymoon ended than that phase of their life ended alongside. But she had been blind and lived in a fairytale where Dare was a knight in shining armour.
Dupe had warned her that all men were like that, she had disagreed saying Dare wasn’t like all men. But alas he was. But wasn’t short Bassey a man too. Did his shortness make him any less a man than Dare was?
She couldn’t leave Dare. She couldn’t go back to living with her mother and she feared the stupid “fountain of love” might actually have some power. Then she would die if she left Dare as the man said.
“Considering all the Yoruba films I’ve watched, you would think I would have some sense”, she said aloud.
A man passing by her thought she was one of those mad people who dressed well and looked as normal as normal people.
She struggled to overcome the strong feeling of dejection that tried to drown her. She hated Dare and this hate made her think she was capable of doing anything to him. Nothing could save him from her wrath. She wished she was Bassey’s wife.
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