I was in the SHS when my mother told me, “I’ve done my best bringing you this far. I don’t have the money or the energy to put you through another level of education so think of what you can do after here. I will look for help and push you through it. I’m tired of begging. I’m tired of people spitting on my face because I’m constantly at their door knocking for help.” I understood her. I understood her deeper than how she even meant it. I grew up knowing she is the only one I have. I didn’t see my father. To date, I hear only a name but no face to associate with the man who is my father. My mom speaks of him in whispers. My uncles and aunt talk about him as if he was a ghost. A ghost who appeared out of nowhere, impregnated my mom, and then disappeared. 

I don’t know him, my father. It has always been my mom playing the role of a father and a mother.

The day she told me my education was over after SHS, I told myself, “So what am I doing here? After all, there’s no silver lining in my story. What’s the purpose of studying hard when I know I will end up learning a trade anyway?” I gave up learning and started living carelessly but my friend Suzzy told me, “Help can come from anywhere when you least expect it but you have to be ready to receive it when it comes. What if after school you get someone who will help you? How can that person help you when your grades are poor? Just do your best and leave the rest to time.”

I sat up again, burned the candles from both ends, and learned as if my life depended on it. I completed school, came home, and helped my mother in the market until my results came. It was better than average. I could go to school if there was money but there was nothing so my mother put me in a fashion school. It’s a big fashion school here in Accra. Everyone there lived and breathed fashion. It looked like something they dreamed of becoming when they were young and then there was me who was doing it just because I had no money to pursue what I really loved. 

The owner of the school is a rich woman who came to school each day in a different car. She is well-traveled and talked about the places she had traveled to during tuition. Because of her, I believed I could make a better life for myself if I took the fashion thing seriously. On weekends, she’ll come to school with her husband and their two kids. While she teaches, the husband would be taking care of the kids. Goals, right? 

Somehow she noticed me among the lot and took interest in me. If she had a question, it was me she asked for answers. If she needed a helping hand, it was me she called. If she needed someone to run an errand for her, it was me she called. After school one Friday she asked me, “What will you be doing this Saturday? I’m having a party at my house for some friends. I will need a helping hand. Will you be available?” 

Early Saturday morning I was in her house, helping her to organize the biggest house party I’d ever set my eyes on. All through it, her husband was with her, helping, suggesting things, and moving things around. When she had to attend to something else, she told me what to do and left. Her husband came closer, telling me what to do and where to place what. I stayed with them all day until the party was over at around 11pm. She told her husband to drop me where I could get a car but he ended up taking me to my doorstep. He thanked me profusely for helping out and took my number and left. 

Days later, he started sending me inappropriate messages. I paid him no attention but he never stopped. If I posted a photo on my status on WhatsApp, he would come talking about my “raving beauty” and rant about my body as if I was some piece of meat. So I blocked him from viewing my status. One night, he called my number; “Where are you?” I answered, “I’m home.” He said, “Go out. I sent someone to give you something. He’s at your door.” I looked at the time. It was around 9pm. “Delivery at this time?” I went out and saw his car parked outside. The first question I asked was, “Where’s madam that you’re here alone?” He said, “Why do you make it look like I can’t live my life without madam? I’m here to see you. Let’s talk. I’ve come to make things clear.”

I sat next to him in his car and he proposed. I said, “No I can’t date you. Madam is too kind to deserve this from me.” He said, “From the outside, she looks kind but wait until you hear what she takes me through. Our second son is three years old already. Since his birth, we haven’t had shuperu. She wants me to be the one to cut the cord so we don’t get pregnant again. I don’t want to do it. If we don’t want to have any more children, there are so many things we can do. I won’t go that extreme. Because I don’t want to do it, she doesn’t want me to have shuperu with her. It’s been three years already. I’m a man so you can imagine how difficult that is.”

To me, that was their marital issue and I had no right to judge. I said no and continued saying no but he never stopped. Out of the blues, he would send me Momo. Out of the blues, he’ll send a delivery guy to my door with beautiful gifts. He sent me money weekly. He said, “Just say what you want and I will do it for you. That’s how serious I am.”  

At some point, I broke my resolve and agreed to let him take what he wanted from me. He came to my house often and we had a good time. Anytime he had to leave, he was sad. I asked him, “If you can’t stand how she treats you then why don’t you leave her?” He answered, “Hmmm, it’s not that easy. We’ve built so much together. The Fashion school you see is the least of our investment. If we divorce today, we’ll have a lot of difficult decisions to make. I’m not ready to go there.”

We dated for six months and I got pregnant. The truth of the matter was, I didn’t know who the pregnancy was for. I had a boyfriend who was very committed to me. I was sleeping with him too. I was tempted to give the pregnancy to my boyfriend but for money reasons, I decided to give it to my madam’s husband. I didn’t intend to keep it but I felt it was a wild card I could throw in and get a lot of money from him. He came to my house one evening and I told him I was pregnant. He asked me, “What do you want us to do?” I told him, “You are the man. You decide. Currently, I have nothing to lose. You have everything to lose so you decide.” He said, “We can’t have it. I wish we could. I love you so much to have a child with you but….” I screamed, “Are you serious? No, I can’t do that. What if it ends badly for me? You’ll go ahead and enjoy your marriage as if nothing happened, right?”

A little bit of drama just to raise the stakes.

Somehow, my boyfriend also got to know about the pregnancy. He didn’t ask any questions. He assumed the pregnancy was for him. He said, “Then let’s get married before the bump begins to show.” I told him, “I don’t want to have a child yet. Let’s get married the right way before we can think of bringing forth children.” He screamed at me, “Are you getting crazy? Do you know how some married couples suffer before they get a child? We have one. We can marry. So what’s your problem? I swear if you let this go, it’s over between us.”

I decided to keep it for my boyfriend and also keep it away from the husband of my madam. “I will get the money from him anyway and tell him I’d gotten rid of it.”

He gave me money. A lot of money do it and leave no traces. A week or so later, I had a WhatsApp message around 10pm. It was from him. He said, “I miss you. What are you doing?” He was missing me so I decided to use the opportunity to get something from him. I said, “I’m missing you but the pain I’m going through is so much. If I knew I would go through this lot of pain, I wouldn’t have done what you asked me to do.” From there, the conversation started sounding awkward. He asked, “What did I ask you to do?” I answered, “What are you saying? Have you forgotten so soon? The pregnancy…helloooo” He answered, “Oh the pregnancy. I nearly forgot.” 

I started having the feeling that he wasn’t the one I was chatting with. I called him on WhatsApp and he didn’t pick up. I called him on a normal phone call too and he didn’t pick up. He sent a message, “My wife is around. I can’t talk.” He never refers to his wife as “My wife” when we chat. He mentions her by name. I knew it wasn’t him so I stopped chatting. Later around 12am, I saw my madam calling. I said, “I’m dead.” I picked up and her first question was, “How long have you been sleeping with my husband?” I didn’t answer. I wanted to cut the call but I heard his voice in the background so I decided to stay and hear what they were talking about. It got messy. The husband was trying to snatch the phone from her…she screamed insults at me. She called me a rat. A cockroach. A worm in a wormhole. Anything despicable was me that night. I dropped the line and blocked their numbers. 

The next day I went to the hospital and got it done. I called my boyfriend; “I’m no longer pregnant. I guess it’s over now, right?” He rushed to my house. He came to cry and ask why. I had no option but to tell him the truth. “I didn’t know who it was for. I was seeing someone else. A married man. It could as well be for him. I don’t want you to raise another man’s child and I can’t have a child I do not know the father. The best way is to let everything go and have a fresh beginning.” My confession brought the monster in him. If I wasn’t already weak, he might have kicked and slapped the spirit of deceit out of my heart. He called me names too. A cockroach. A worm in a wormhole. The daughter of Jezebel. He called me “Borla goods.”

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Life is very funny. You’ll wake up one morning having everything but you will go to bed eventide with nothing in your hands. I lost the two guys rocking my world and lost a baby whose future I couldn’t tell. But that day was a day for reflection. I thought deeply about things and asked myself, “What do you really want in life?” The answer was, “I don’t want to do fashion. I will want to go to tertiary and study a professional course. I will like to be known for something. A teacher. A nurse. Midwife. An accountant. Anything but not fashion.”

I checked my bank balance. I had so much I could use to go back to school, kind curtsy my madam’s husband. I packed from the room my boyfriend helped me to rent and went back home to my mother. I told her, “I’ve made some money. I want to go back to school.” I thought she would be angry with me for leaving the fashion school but she didn’t. She asked, “Enough money to see you through?” I answered, “I hope so.”

I’m now a midwife. My madam and her husband patched their differences and are still living together. I knew they wouldn’t divorce. As her husband told me, they’ve built so much together to go their separate ways. My only hope is that that episode of their lives brought the right awakening to their marriage and caused them to work on what was not working and they are together again because it’s the only thing that would bring them happiness. I’ve had my own awakening….an awakening that brought me this far to a dream I once lost.

—Boakyewaah

#SilentBeads

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