The Child Who Lost Her Voice.PART 1

This is a true life of an 8 year old child who lost her happiness due to her step mother's maltreatment.

this is my first story ever, please pardon me if I made any mistake or if you find my story not good enough.

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It all started when I turned 8 months, my parents started having a misunderstanding, they fought every day, I had no I dea why as I was still a baby. Then my mum had to pack out of the house and went to her mother's house. After a few days, my dad came to collect me from my mother saying he won't allow his child to be separated from him, unknown to him, my mother was already pregnant with their second child.

Fast forward to when I became aware of my surroundings and everything going on around me;

I grew up knowing my aunt [my father's elder sister] as my mother, as she was the one who has been taking care of me since the separation of my parents 6 years ago. My life has been smooth sailing, filled with all the love and care from my aunt who also had at that time was pregnant. Ops... Did i forgot to mention that I now also live together with my younger brother who was also collected from my biological mother and brought to live with us a year after he was given birth to,and we've been living happily together,my dad wasn't with us but he always came to visit and always called to check on us. But all of a sudden we had to move to another city with my dad.

My aunt got a call one calm afternoon that my grandmother had just kicked the bucket at a prayer function she was at. The next day my dad had who was living in another city extremely far from us had to come pick I and my younger brother and took us a long with him to the city he was living, since we couldn't be with my aunt anymore as she had to move to the village for take care of my grandfather.

It was a very long journey from our city to the city my dad lived, we finally got there at night and we were welcome calmly by a strange woman who treated us sweetly. It was after we finally settled down that my dad finally introduced her to us as our new mom,our STEP-MOTHER.

We adapted and got used to the new situation and environment faster than we could've imagined.we got into a new school and our step mom was one of the teachers in the school. She protected, cared and showered us with lots of love. I used to think step mothers were wicked but this woman prove me wrong. She doesn't joke with us, any one who tries to mess with us always ends up seeing her dark side.

Life was sweet and joyous for us. Then one day my aunt called my dad and requested that I come stay with her at the village , she had given birth to a bouncing baby boy months after we separated and now the baby has started crawling. One of my big cousin was staying with her but I guess she still needed an extra hand. I was so overjoyed and excited when my dad told me about the news,I told my dad I was more than happy to go back to her and he smile and said we'll be taking the first bus back the next day.

The next day we took off as early as 5;23am,it was a long and hectic journey but we got to our destination safely at 11;54pm. I settled in, took a shower, had dinner and went to bed. The next day by the time I was awake, my dad has gone back, I was told he had a meeting to attend close by. I went about my day filled with joy, I was happy to be with my aunt and finally meet my little cousin.i got enrolled into a new school and resumed the next day.

My first day of school, i was excited , I had a stomach filled breakfast,my lunch box was packed with food,varieties of snacks and sweet that will fill my stomach up for the rest of the day. I got to school , got assigned to a class and started my classes. The day went by fast and boom, it was already closing hour, I quickly ran out of my class to the school bus and was set to home. I got home finally after the bus driver took turns in dropping everyone at their houses. I took a cold shower,did my assignments,had dinner with my little cousin, watched Barbie Fairytopia together till it was time to go to bed. And that was my routine everyday for over a year.

Then one night,my aunt had an heart attack very late in the night,1;33am. She was rushed to the general hospital,but no doctors were on seat. She was then carried to different private hospital, but the process to take before seeing a doctor was too long. She was then rushed to a federal hospital at the outskirt of the village,that was the only hospital with emergency ward but she unfortunately gave up the ghost the moment they arrived the hospital. And that was how I lost my beloved aunt. And all these happened just after I clocked 8.

Her funeral was held on the evening of that day as we're muslims. My dad had to take me back to the city he lives in,it was painful parting with my beloved aunt this way.

On getting to our destination the next day,we boarded an Uber home,on getting home,I met my step mother and I was so glad to see her,what made me even happier was the fact that she was now heavily pregnant for my dad. I ran to her, greeted her and hugged her from behind, but she pushed me away and didn't respond to my greetings.i found it strange. So I tried again and she pushed me away even harder. My heart sank, what was going on? Wasn't she happy to see me?,alot of thoughts started going through my head. I silently walked towards my dad and told him what happened but he only said, I guess shes just tired,just hold her hands and try greeting her again , so I walked towards her and held her hands but before I could say anything, she pushed me so hard that my but hit the floor and she said something in her native language which I didn't know what It meant. It was then I looked her in the eyes with teary eyes only to realize that this woman was giving me a death stare and had a disgusting look on her face that says I disgust her, My feet went cold instantly. What happened to the warm and lovely step mother I knew? Who was this woman possessing her body? What changed?, alot of questions were going through my head all at a time. But that was just the begining.

The cold atmosphere was on for two more days until my dad had to go on a 3 months business trip. That was when my hell started. I got to find out that the reason why she changed was because she hated the fact that I was my dad's first child and not her unborn child, she hated how he always prioritized me.[I found out when I overheard her while she was on a phone call with her mum], but she wasn't treating my younger brother who was with her all these while I was away the same way, she treated him like her flesh and blood,so why me?

The first thing that changed was the feeding,she changed the wide dish she usually use in serving me food when my dad was around to a small bowl,that little bowl you find inside a food flask,yes that was my new dish,and it always had to be with me because she said anything of mine was a stain to other things. And I was only fed once a day.

Secondly, I was no longer given lunch to take to school,but my younger brother was given everything her needed and was asked not to share with me. Overtime i started getting malnourished,after school i started going from classes to class to check if anyone forgot to eat their lunch,if there was none,I pick fallen food crumbs or pieces of snacks from the floor and start eating it.i didn't care if these has sand in them,no matter how small the snack piece is, I also ate the ones that has been stepped too, I just didn't care. I go round the school doing this and then drink lots of water before going home because I knew I wasn't going to have anything for dinner or lunch when I get home,when things weren't turning out well I began going from class to class during assembly to steal students lunch or money just so I could feed myself. This was what I had to do everyday till whenever my dad came back,and whenever he's back, my step mom never allows me have alone time with him, those alone time would have been the perfect opportunity to spill the tea. She also suddenly starts feeding me well loading my plate with food and giving me lunch to school whenever my dad was around,but all these don't last because my dad only spends few days with us before traveling again for months.

Thirdly she resorted to beating me over trivial things,and since she was pregnant,her younger brother who's a military man was the one doing the job. Whenever she was having mood swings or was angry about something, she always took it out on me. This happened everyday except on the days her brother was not around. Whenever I go to school I always prayed for the day to be longer,because I was always scared of going back home knowing what was always awaiting me.

I who was always happy and has always known happiness turned into an abandoned sad child overnight. All i ever did was cry whenever I noticed no one was watching,all the tears I couldn't shed when I lost my aunt, I began shedding them,growing up as a child before these incidents, I never had a reason to cry, but everyday in that house was now enough reason to cry, that fact that I was birthed to experience this was enough reason to cry , I had absolutely no one to talk to and I was just 8 years old,my younger brother was just a kid and doesn't even know anything going on. I only had one person who still made me smile and that was our landlady's grandson, a 17 years old boy. I knew he approach me out of pity because he was always seeing me crying, but still I appreciated his very existence in my life. All we did was play games, joke and chase each other round the compound but all these only happens whenever my step mom was sleeping,because she never leaves the house.

On the day her brother came from camp,he came around to visit, but she went antenatal that day so he decided to wait for her, my younger brother was asleep and I was reading my books,this man started acting weird, he started praising me calling me pretty name which I found weird because all he has ever done is beat me till I forgot how to feel pain, so what was all this praises for?. Then he asked to see the book I was reading,I stood up and walked towards him to give him the book,only for him to start rubbing the back of my waist and touching me weirdly,the he asked me to sit on his lap,that was when I backed off,immediately he noticed I was moving backwards he pushed me against the chair and tried to force his was with me,but God so kind we heard my step mom opening the main gate to the house and that was when he stopped. The moment my step mom came in he started asking about all the things I've done while he was away and began beating the hell out of me. He did this for over one week, everyday he had one irrelevant reason or the other to beat me. It got to a point where he now took beating me as a way of relieving stress,but who was I to complain.

Despite all these, I was happy I still had someone who could temporarily make me forget what I was going through, through games and silly kids jokes,until that too was taken away from me by our next compound neighbour,an 18 years old girl who was a family friend of ours whom I had no idea had a crush on my friend, our landlady's grandson. This lady told a drastic lie again I and this innocent boy that we were more than just friends and were always hiding to have seggs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~to be continued

Full details of how the whole seggs story came about and the disaster this terrible lie caused in the poor 8 year old childs life coming up I pt 2.

Thank you every one for engaging this far. thanks for your support,I would have been able to write this story without you all. I love you guys.