THE JAILBIRD (Episode 80)

THE JAILBIRD EPISODE 80
© Aaron A. A

Elaine is facing the camera now.

She makes no attempt to wipe the tears on her cheeks.

She has passed that now, and as Wach¡pa watches her he is filled with grudging admiration for her.

However, her face looks tired and resigned. The angle of her shoulders has lost that proud thr-st. She is a broken woman.
Elaine does not smile; her sadness is too deep.

ELAINE
(shattered)
I took it upon myself to destroy Chris Bawa. Dearest Chris, handsome, sensual, rebel, charismatic …a man loved by women, hated by men, an enigma. I’ve accused him every step of the way. Chris, innocent criminal. My heart is broken today. I have a confession to make, ladies and gentlemen. There are two videos which were not shown to you today because they doc-ment my part in this painful story. You see, a very long time ago, when we were in school, I dated Chris Bawa.

Wach¡pa Sey smiles, chuckles, and then he laughs slowly, shaking his head.

WACh¡pA SEY
(softly to himself)
Crazy brave girl!
There is a hushed gasp from the studio audience. People are looking at her with absolute shock.

Elaine changes position as the camera follows her, and this time she brushes tears from her face.

ELAINE
I love Chris. I’ll love him forever. Today he is in hospital, in a coma, fighting for his life. His son is also fighting for his life. It seems to me that trouble has located Chris, and decided to stay. But that ends tonight. Chris Bawa deserves better.

She is quiet for a long time, obviously overtaken by the depths of her emotions.
She had kept the festering sore in her heart for too long, and it has become corrosive. This is the time to scratch the sore open and allow the gaping wound to heal.
Effe sits beside a weeping Adwoa Timtim.
She takes a shuddering breath.

ELAINE
 When he left me and I realized he was going to marry my best friend, and I simply I couldn’t forgive him. I hated him, because my heart was broken. He begged me, telling me that he loved Effe, and there was nothing he could do about it. Well, on that fateful night he was arrested, something happened in the morning. He had a fight with his wife and left home and Effe called me to find him and bring him home. That fight started because I gave Effe photo-shopped pictures of Chris making love to teenaged Chinese girls.

There are cries of shock from the stunned audience, and someone even shouted ‘witch’.
Her l-ips are trembling, and she takes a deep breath again to calm her nerves.

ELAINE
You see, Effe didn’t know then that Chris and I dated once. I called Chris and told him if he didn’t tell me where he was, I would tell Effe about us, and so he told me he was lodging in a hotel. I went to him and I lied. Yes, I lied. I told him that he should make love to me for the last time, otherwise I would inform Effe about our relationsh¡p. I think he had watched the video Roland made for him just before I entered the hotel, and he was very agitated and lost. He was afraid to lose Effe too, and so he began to make love to me. I told him to wait. I went to the bathroom and tore up my clothes and p-nties. I left them in the sitting-room area of the hotel suite. I called Effe and asked her to come to the hotel because Chris was drunk and trying to rape me. I unlocked the door, and I then told Chris to make love to me like he used to when we dated… violently! He was already hurting about Roland, and he was drunk, and so he did make love to me, and Effe came and found me scre-ming and hitting and scratching Chris! He pulled him off me. He was drunk and confused. Effe left with me and told him she didn’t ever want to see him again for raping me, her best friend. He tried to explain, but I was weeping a feigning pain, and Effe was so stunned and hurt that she just couldn’t control her emotions.

Elaine bows her head, and her shoulders shake as she cries silently.
The studio audience is stunned into silence, and she cuts such a pitiful sight that many suddenly feel sorry for her.
After a while, with her head still bowed, she cleans her face with a hankie and takes a sip of water from a glass.
She sits straight and smiles painfully at the camera,

ELAINE
 We see from the videos that later Chris went home and heard Effe and her Mom talking about her divorcing him, and he went crazy. Yes, that is how terribly I behaved. That is how I contributed to the downfall of an innocent man. Today, I stand here condemned! Forgive me, Chris. Forgive me, Effe! I’m so sorry! Please, Effe, I’ve learnt a bitter lesson. Please, please…forgive me. I’m ashamed, I’m humiliated, and I don’t deserve your forgiveness. But please, forgive me, Effe!
And then Elaine begins to weep bitterly on live television.

It touches many hearts across the nation for her to bare her soul this way!
Some women in the audience, also weeping, stand up and go to her, and they hold her, and they console her.
The Director and Producer of the programme is overwhelmed when he fleetingly checks the programme ratings over the Internet on his phone.
The ratings have soared… GIRL VIBZ has just become the number one show in the country.

PRODUCER
You clever girl, Elaine, sweetie! You turned a bad situation in your favour!
A DARK LONELY ROAD in,side MADINA
Wach¡pa Sey had offered to drop Elaine off because she is too uptight to drive.
She is sad, and stressed, and cannot simply breathe. It seems the world is crashing down on her shoulders.

Oh, Chris! What have I done to you?
She turns in her seat and looks at him.
His car is huge and luxurious.
He is handsome, and she has seen the way his eyes keep on devouring her.

ELAINE
You could’ve destroyed me. Why did you bring the tapes to me? You could’ve taken it to another TV station.

WACh¡pA SEY
(chuckling)
I always believed in making people pay. You were always cutting Mr. Bawa down, and when I saw the tapes I wondered how you would look like when you find out your own husband was behind the wheel… plus, I wanted a chance to get close to you.

ELAINE
I see. And why did you want to get close to me?
Wach¡pa, over-speeding, suddenly stops the car.

He gets down and slams the door.
He walks round to her side of the car, wrenches open the door, and then he holds her and k-sses her…passionately, hungrily, violently.
Suddenly Elaine feels the need to be held, to be wanted, to be desired.
She responds to him, putting her arms around his neck and k-ssing him back fiercely.

One of his hands works at his buckle and zipper, and a moment later he drags himself out of the confines of his boxers.
She feels him on her th-gh, hot and hungry.
She reaches down and hikes her dress up over her wa-ist. She pulls her p-nties to one side and moves her h¡ps forward, taking hold of him and guiding him.
He impales her with a grunt, unifying their bodies.

She responds with fervour, grinding against him, willing, urging him on.
She is too crushed.
She is so vulnerable. She is in so much pain.
There is a void in her heart.
She needs love, she needs attention.
She cries her heart out as Wach¡pa pounds into her, but her mind and heart are separated from the act.
She only sees that handsome face, those dimples, those long eyelashes, those sensuous l-ips, those tender hands, that s€×y body….oh Chris, Chris, Chris!
They make love with the fury of animals, and they both scre-m in the throes of mutual orgasm.

He continues to hold her, p-nting.
She can feel him growing smaller in,side her.
Finally, she sits back and watches as he tucks himself in, zips up and buckles up.
She suddenly feels used and sickened.
She had just met a man and within two days she has had s€× with him.
Crushing despair and bitterness assails her.

WACh¡pA SEY
(coldly)
Your husband is going to prison, you know. Everybody is going to forsake you. You’re going to have a very lonely life, Elaine
Elaine puts her head back and speaks in a hurt voice.

ELAINE
You’re a crazy man, Wach¡pa Sey, whoever the f-ck you are.

WACh¡pA SEY
And you’re equally crazy, Elaine f-cking Boateng! Crazy and sick. Get the f-ck outta my car, bitch!
Elaine bolts up in her seat and stare at him with horror.
He has just make love to her!
She can see the sudden hatred in his eyes.
He has changed from the kind man who has been looking at her with desire the past two days she has known him.
There is only disgust on his face now.
She shakes her head humbly.

ELAINE
(bitterly)
What?
Wach¡pa looks at her with absolute disgust.

WACh¡pA SEY
Seven years ago I almost died. I was on admission at the hospital in need of money for a life-saving operation on my heart. No one wanted to help because it was expensive. I resigned myself to death. And then, out of the blue, Mr. Chris Bawa donated all his title defence money from one of his fights to my mother who, out of desperation, went to see him. He didn’t know me, but he saved my life! To me Chris Bawa is a damn hero, a semi god! I sat back and watched you and your evil husband and his stupid friend destroying my hero Chris! I wanted to kill y’all, but I was helpless! And then, Lord of mercies, I came across those videos, in my f-cking archives and I said, hallelujah, isn’t Karma a real ass f-cker!

Wach¡pa suddenly holds Elaine’s shoulders and pulls her out of the car, making her fall heavily.
His eyes are crazed now, and she whimpers with fear as he suddenly brandishes a knife.

He kneels down and presses the tip of the knife under her right eye,nipping the skin and causing a little blood to flow.
Elaine trembles with fear and panic.
Tears now fall heavily down her face.

ELAINE
(in agonized panic)
Please, please….don’t hurt me please!!
She is trembling with acute fear at the murderous look in on his face.

WACh¡pA SEY
(snarling)
I wanna cut you up, you bitch! You piece of cow dung! That Chris is my hero, He saved my life! And you wanted him in prison! But you don’t deserve my knife. I f-cked you. Go and tell them I raped you! I hope you get pregnant, and I hope you f-cking die trying to abort the child! Stupid little f-ck!
He gets up and enters his car.
He picks up her bag and throws it at her head, and then he guns the engine and leaves her.

Elaine wraps her arms around her knees.
She weeps like a baby!

EFFE’S RESIDENCE
Effe runs to her room and shuts the door.
She takes faltering steps forward and collapses on the floor in front of her bed.
No, no, no!

This can’t be happening!
Elaine had lied! Chris hadn’t raped her!
Everything she believed about Chris that had made her hate him so has now come tumbling around her feet.
The basic ingredients of trust and belief have never found a way into her heart in her relationsh¡p with him.

She had always believed others over him, always expected the worst of him…to the extent that she had almost led the prosecution against him, and if it hadn’t been Junior he would’ve been in prison for now, to serve twenty-five years.
Her pain knows no bounds; her heart is being torn out of her chest.
And now!

Elaine had caused her to throw Chris out of her life, at the particular moment he had received a video from a dead brother he adored, a most terrible video that had torn him apart!
And Chris had gone amok, beating up his sadistic and wicked uncle, and taking up the blame for Afful’s accident so that he could go to prison and get away from his pains!
The time he needed her most, she had cast him to the wolves!
Not once, not twice, but throughout her life with him!

EFFE
(heart-wrenchingly)
Oh, Chris-Love! Forgive me! I’m so sorry, my love!
Tears drench her.
Effe weeps as memories come flooding back.

Chris…her Chris-Love!
Life had dealt him a cruel hand, but he had stood against the storms, and loved her through all her doubts and mistrust.

EFFE
(sadly)
I never believed you, Chris. I was so mean to you. But not anymore! May God heal you and Junior and bring you back to me. Oh, I’m going to spend the rest of my life making you happy, Chris-Love. Nothing is ever going to separate me from you ever again. I promise you. I love you, Chris, always have, always will… till eternity!

To Be Continued

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