I was at an entrepreneurship seminar learning about how to make door mats when I had this strange feeling of anxiety. As my heart beat violently against my chest, I jumped up from my seat.
“What’s wrong Edna?” asked Hilda, my best friend as she looked up at me from the doormat she was working on.
I looked around wildly and realized that a few other women were staring at me.
“My daughter, Cathy is in trouble,” I blurted out.
“How do you know?” asked Hilda in shock.
“I just feel it, let me try to call her,” I said agitatedly. I then sat down, took out my phone and tried to call Cathy. However, the phone went unanswered.
“Where did you leave her?” asked Hilda.
“I left her home.”
Hilda sighed, “Edna, you are obviously just exhausted. You can’t just anticipate that your eighteen year old daughter is in trouble.”
“It could be true; a mother has been blessed with that motherly instinct of sensing if their child is in trouble,” said Peter, a business man who was sewing his doormat next to us.
“Try calling Natasha, your neighbor,” suggested Hilda.
With my shaky hands, I dialed Natasha’s number and she picked up at the second ring.
“Mrs. Edna, is anything the matter?” asked Natasha
“Mrs. Natasha, please search for Cathy at my house,” I said before I cut the call.
A few minutes later, Natasha called me: “She is not in your house, though the door is open and her phone is on the table.”
I sprang from my chair as my anxiety shot up like lightening.
“Wait…I’ve also found Don’s phone on the table—” said Natasha.
“What?!”
Don was a young man who had been trying to get my daughter pregnant. I had once caught them a few weeks ago under a Mango tree kissing while Don was rubbing Cathy’s exposed thighs as if he had participated in giving birth to her.
“And I’ve noticed that only Cathy’s bedroom is locked. I’m trying to open it.”
I froze as I felt air escape my lungs. Without realizing my actions, I was already heading outside.
“What’s wrong?” asked Hilda.
I broke from my trance and stared at Hilda and Peter who had followed me outside.
“Don, that son of Adam wants to destroy my daughter!” I whispered furiously as I tried to control my shaky hands.
“Get into my car,” instructed Peter.
We all clambered into Peter’s car and as he drove us to my house, I silently prayed for Cathy’s safety. When we reached, we found that Natasha had already managed to open Cathy’s door.
Cathy’s bedroom was empty, but what I saw on her bed made me gasp: A small portion of Cathy’s white sheets were covered in blood. I could also smell Don’s cheap perfume in the room.
“I didn’t find them in the room when I finally entered. But the bedroom window was open, so they must have escaped through the window,” said Natasha.
I bit my lower lip and sank to the floor: what has that boy done to my daughter?
A few minutes later, Hilda, Natasha and Peter were calling Don’s family members while I tried in vain to control my tears which were pouring out furiously.
“They have found Don at a restaurant eating lunch but Cathy is not with him,” said Hilda after she hung up.
We all left the house and went to the restaurant, were we found Don, smartly dressed and eating Samosas.
“Where is Cathy?” I asked furiously when I finally approached Don.
Don looked at me as if I was crazy.
“Don’t act innocent! You left your phone at her house!” said Hilda angrily.
“Cathy is… Cathy is…” stammered Don.
“We don’t have time for your nonsense! Take us to where Cathy is!” thundered Peter, dragging Don to his feet.
A few minutes later, Don was leading us to a deserted road. As we walked, it started raining heavily and Don started protesting about getting soaked, but I slapped him and pushed him forward. I didn’t care about being soaked as long as I found my daughter.
We stopped at the roadside and Don pointed at the drainage flowing violently with water.
“She was hiding here,” he said quietly.
I frowned as my heart- beat hammered violently against my chest. How on earth could my daughter hide here?! My body shook with terror as I stared at the dirty flowing water in the drainage.
“Are you sure you are telling the truth?” asked Hilda disbelievingly.
Just then, I saw a hand flowing in the violent water before sinking. At first, I thought I was dreaming, but when the hand popped up again, I immediately recognized Cathy’s gold watch dangling on its wrist.
“CATHY!” I shrieked hysterically as I advanced forward. Before I could be stopped, I had already jumped in the drainage flowing with dirty, rain water. It was there that I realized that I didn’t know how to swim. The violent water felt like devil’s claws as it pushed me forward. Before I knew what was happening, a strong hand had gripped my waist and carried me back to the road. When I looked at my savior, I realized that it was Peter who had dived in to save in.
“Cathy!!!!” I wailed as I attempted to jump back in the drainage.
“She will be fished out,” said Peter as he gripped me. By now, we had already attracted attention and a few people with umbrellas gathered around us.
“But she is drowning! My baby is drowning!” I screamed hysterically as I tried in vain escape Peter’s grasp.
A few minutes later, a few strong men, who had been summoned dived in the drainage and fished out Cathy. When she was gently laid down, I crawled towards her in tears and checked if she was alive. But, her lifeless eyes showed that she was dead.
Cathy was dead.
An unearthly scream escaped my lips as I studied the girl I had birthed, loved and raised. Her neck was sliced and blood oozed from it. She also had wounds across her face as if had previously being beaten. Judging from her appearance, her death did not result from drowning in the drainage.
Suddenly everything made sense: the strong sense of anxiety which had enveloped me at the entrepreneurship seminar…the bloody sheets in Cathy’s room and Don saying that she was hiding in the drainage.
My Cathy would never hide in the drainage no matter how much trouble she was in.
“It looks as if she was murdered,” said a few onlookers who had gathered around us.
“DON KILLED MY BABY!!!!” I shrieked hysterically.
“I didn’t kill her! Ma Edna, I know you don’t like me but you should know that I would never kill your daughter!” protested Don pathetically.
“But then how did you know that she was hiding in the drainage?” asked Hilda.
Don scratched his head, “she was alive when I took her there…”
I studied him and noticed a small jewel- incrusted knife in his pocket which he always proudly showed off. A few minutes later, the police and ambulance came and I wept when Cathy’s copse was released from my hands.
After being threatened to be beaten by the angry crowd, Don finally accepted that he had murdered Cathy. He’s explanation was that when he had come to visit her; she had welcomed him and led him to her bedroom. Once there, she refused to have sex with him because she wanted to honor her mother’s wish of wanting her to remain a virgin until marriage. But then, he got really angry and raped her. After raping her, she threatened him that she was going to make sure that he was going to be arrested. This scared him to the point that he beat her and sliced her with his knife until she died. He then hid her body in drainage.
“I didn’t mean to kill her. I was just trying to discipline her so that she could obey my orders to remain quiet. She was being disrespectful,” he said.
Hilda, who looked horrified stared at him, “you wanted her to respect your orders after you raped her?”
“I didn’t mean to rape her. But I’m a man with needs and she was my woman. She was supposed to do what I told her,” he tried to defend himself pathetically.
“SHE WAS NOT YOUR WOMAN! THAT GIRL YOU RAPED AND KILLED BELONGS TO THIS WOMAN,” thundered Peter as he pointed at me, “SHE HAD EVERY RIGHT TO SAY NO TO YOU AND YOU, DEMON, HAD NO RIGHT TO CHOOSE THE BEST FORM OF PUNISHMENT HER!”
Don whimpered in fear, “but my father always says that women are supposed to fear men and do whatever they order them to do. He beats my mother and makes sure that she fears him. And my mother supports that because she has never had him arrested and tells us that when men beat their wives, it means that they love them! I’m sorry that I went too far! Cathy was just too stubborn!”
I stared at Don with hatred as thick toxic anger rose in me like thick smoke. As I slowly stood up, I grabbed the knife in his jean pocket and tried to stab him. But I was held back by my friends.
“LET ME GO!” I protested as I violently attempted to free myself from them.
“No…let the police handle this Edna,” said Hilda softly as if she was talking to a child.
As I watched Don get arrested, I realized that I’ll never be normal again. The pain I felt as a mother was so raw and bitter that all I did was to scream. Don had removed my sun and replaced it with a deep scorching darkness which choked me to madness.
And all this was because of how he was raised by his parents.