I Am A Monster

I Am A Monster
I hit her. Yes, I did, she provoked me and I could take it no longer.
“You’re a weakling!”
My father shouted over the phone. He threatened to hit me the same way I did my wife of five months. He loves her like a daughter, that I know; it pained him he was out of town at a time like this.
My wife and I still lived with my parents. I was jobless, and didn’t have much to stand independent of them. I was too forward and strong willed to survive on my own as an independent business man, that I left a well-paying job without properly structuring my finance to bare the brunt of a start-up. Here I was two months later.
“How could you beat a pregnant woman?”
My mother asked me. Her voice was as concerning as ever; her teary ears bore worry, and they pierced my soul.
Everyone was against me. Obviously, my mother-in-law naturally supported her daughter, same way my mom would support my sister and rain hell on any foolish man that’d dare lay a finger on her daughter.
My mother-in-law threatened me over the phone, as though she was already at my doorstep. I understood the ploy to make me fear and shake at the thought of her descending her reserved anger and resentment on me, but I wasn’t moved, I don’t scare easy, not even when she referred to me as a monster.
I got married to the love of my life. Sabina was all I ever hoped for in a woman, and I still bless the day we met in a series of sweet turns and twists. I never knew I’d the chance to date her let alone put a ring on her pretty finger: She scored poorly on first impression and came across to me as a bit rude and pompous (But that’s a story for another day).
Her family says I’m a monster, did they not see the monster in me the day I came to seek their daughter’s hand in marriage? I remember that day clearly, her mother’s joy was was obvious – Sabina had finally brought a responsible man home. Her father was too elated, busy org-nizing the outrageous list for the bride price.
I am still the same man that arrived their door seven months ago; if I am a monster now, I was a monster then, and they failed in their duties as parents to notice, they married their daughter off to a mad man.
I blame myself. I ignored my intuition even though they tingled. Yes, they did, but I paid no attention and now I’m wallowing in confusion and regrets. I went ahead to marry her because I was blinded by dumb love – Love for a woman who allowed me believe she was a V-rgin all the while we dated – she strung me along to put a ring on her finger before I could touch her. My friend warned me: he advised I taste the fruit irrespective of what she claimed to be, but I didn’t listen, I loved the challenge she put up for me – Miss V-rginity 2016. Indeed!
We finally did it three weeks to our wedding day, off her own volition. Apparently she was too h—y to keep up the pretense – I discovered first hand how beaten she was, but I didn’t let that deter me, I loved her that much.
“If she loses this pregnancy, I won’t forgive you,”
My mom’s pointed finger stared at my nose. I wondered if she thought me a Pinocchio.
This wasn’t the first noise of pregnancy she was making. As a matter of fact, she made one two weeks after our first s€×. Probably she thought I would dump her after the big discovery, for food reasons, the pregnancy was a coy to compel me to marry her irrespective of my emotional state at that time.
She claimed to have had a miscarriage one month into our marriage when she realized I had my eyes fixated on her bump-less belly.
Mother insisted I drive them to the hospital, but I held my ground constantly repeating “I won’t” for her to know I meant business, Sabina already understood my stand – This is the real me, the one tired of being played; the one tired of her constantly thinking me a fool for loving her too much.
“What did she do, that’s so unforgivable?” Mother asked in tears.
“She slept with my best friend!”
I lashed out. I couldn’t bottle my pain any longer. I had to speak up. I also had the right to cry. She shattered my heart, she stole my heart and fed it to me through my exit-h0le, she made me a laughing stock before my friends. She slept with the same friend who advised me not to marry her without checking her authenticity.
Of recent, Sabina made a habit of nagging unnecessarily. She complained I didn’t have money, but, she was the one who urged me to resign and invest my life’s savings in a business idea her friend brought. I was defrauded in the process. I still suspect the thief to be one of her many lovers scattered all around town, as I got to understand from my Private Investigator that she had many.
“My own wife a pr-stitute!”
I confronted her about the allegations before her. I showed her pictures speaking against her on many grounds, I gave her a chance to explain herself – I loved her up to that level – even as she rained insults on me, I endured. She called me a jobless man, I swallowed. A weakling, I nodded. I loved her like that. She called my mother a pr-stitute, and I lost it.
I hit my dear wife for the first time.
I wonder what my mom would say now if I tell her that a pr-stitute called her a pr-stitute.
I ask you reading this, “Am I a monster?”
“Was I wrong to defend my mother’s honor?”
I need an answer now, because my mom hasn’t been able to give me one, she’s being too absorbed by her own tears while I’m trapped by thoughts of my own about committing suicide to end this pain.
The End