It was a well-known dance at this point. Archie McKean proposed to her the same year she met him. His had been tricky as he was a gentle, easygoing 57 year old Professor but it worked all the same. Ah, she abruptly laughed.
Shameless eavesdroppers, her stepdaughters argued with her when Tolani changed her will giving her clueless daughter, Chinyere her whole inheritance. She had to think her stepdaughters must be foolish into thinking she remotely cared about them.
Commemorating her 50th birthday, the launch of her apiary site and her equestrian property with stalls for ten horses in her stable, Tolani at the last minute planned a three day holiday celebrating her one year anniversary with Archie McKean. She was starting to get listless of the boredom of her marriage. The only thing keeping her going was her growing apiary business.
Two nights after Chinyere graduated from high school, Tolani watched a movie about a couple of jaded upperclass housewives with unappealing, annoyingly healthy husbands unfortunately dying from carefully planned accidents. Tolani had never had an epiphany but when watching the movie, she smiled.
It was with feigned deep sorrow, Tolani grieved at Archie McKean's funeral playing the dutiful role of a widow having her husband's will in her name. Or the lovely widow with a 19 year old daughter who for her mother's hen party, hosted a private dining party then a wild night on the town regarding her engagement to Russell Banbury. Tolani at this point of her 52 year old life was just having fun.
Her carefully cultivated life shattered. Tolani screamed. She beat the policeman on the chest, holding onto his collar yelling at his sympathetic face to bring her daughter back. It could'n't be true... It wasn't. It couldn't be Chinyere, wasn't the child trampled to instant death in a stadium by fans.
Her Chinyere, the reason she breathed wasn't just gone. Someone was trying to draw her back from successfully clawing the policeman's face with her fingernails, deaf and unbothered by the policaman's obligatory condolences.
Tolani couldn't be comforted. Her parents sympathised, her siblings comforted her to no avail. How could it when they knew nothing about the pain of losing a child. All of their children were around.
Healthy. Happy. Tolani cocked her head from Ifeanyi's cries for his sister. It should've been you. Tolani wailed in her head as she obsessively chewed her fingernails. It should've been you, wicked child!!
Tolani Onitsha couldn't be consoled. How could she plan her daughter's burial, pack her things, say goodbye? Ifeanyi tried helping but his suggestions infuriated her, boiled her blood cold.
His voice, so young and full of life. A̲l̲i̲v̲e̲. On the top of her lungs, she screamed at him to leave, pushing him out of the house cursing him with 'You should've died instead'.
There was absolutely no regret afterwards.
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