Torn Between Two Wars 'My Father Killed My Mother'

My name is Dimeji. I grew up in a family always riddled with problems - I mean matrimonial problems. What always caused these problems was my father‘s insatiable hunger for women. Though my family is a monogamous one, the extramarital affairs going on were greater than the intimate promiscuity of a Casanova. Whenever you see my father, what you see is adultery and fornication. My father never sees a woman and lets her go. He doesn‘t discriminate - whether you‘re ugly or beautiful, he must just have you willy-nilly. He doesn‘t care whether you‘re dull or brainy, so far as you‘re a woman.

My father and my mother had been living together for quite a long time. I‘m the first child and just 18. Many a time, my mother would engage my father in long quarrels. They would wrangle and fight and neighbours would gather. The cause of these fights, of course, was my father‘s incessant flirtation with women. I just don‘t know why a married man should run after other women. My mother always felt cheated whenever she suspected my father‘s extramarital engagements.

Truly, she always spied on my father. No matter how he dodged her, she always came to know. And whenever her investigations proved right, the situation would be stormy in our home. Thunder would roar. Then fight would erupt. These fights always gave my younger brother and me great concern. It affected us psychologically, I must confess. We felt the pain and the agony anytime we witnessed our parents fighting. At times, I wept silently and asked myself why I was born into this unhappy family. Though my father loved my mother, he just couldn‘t help flirting with other women.

”Then doom‘s day approached. It happened this way: my father was befriending one light-skinned and plump woman. The woman was beautiful and always flashy. Many times, my mother would see the woman in his car. She would complain bitterly about his unfaithfulness, but my father would just pet and flatter her. And the dispute would subside. But this was just for a brief moment, because the following day my mother would see another woman with him. And a fresh quarrel would erupt because my mother would flare up and make trouble.

One day, my father went to a party with the light-skinned woman. My mother, somehow, got wind of their outing and she was ready for him when he returned. A terrible storm had gathered in my mother‘s mind. That day, my father arrived as usual and met my mother fuming and waiting. Then a fight began instantly. Curses, abuses, vituperations and tirades kept flowing harshly between my parents. Suddenly, the devil struck! My father picked up the loud speaker in anger and threw it at my mother.

It hit my mother on the head and instantly, she collapsed. She was unconscious for sometime and later gave up the ghost. She was lying there in front of me - completely dead! My father was shocked. He thought she merely fainted. He moved closer and touched her, trying to revive her. But there was no sign of breath in her. He started sweating profusely. He didn‘t know what to do. He almost collapsed. He wailed painfully that he had killed my mother. He swore repeatedly in front of neighbours and passers-by, who had gathered, that he didn‘t intend to kill her. He swore with tears in his eyes.

But the most painful and heart-rending thing was that the calabash had broken, remaining the shattered pieces. My mother had died. We cried. Some minutes later, four policemen arrived. My father was arrested and charged with murder. Since then, he has been in prison. Actually, I don‘t like remembering this sad experience. Anytime it flashes through my mind I hate my father and myself. If I had the strength, I‘d have killed him too!”