BN Prose: Am I a Bad Man? by Feyisayo Anjorin

“Am I a bad man?”

“I think you are.”

“That was quick. You’ve not even heard what I have to say.”

“Yes. But I’ve seen what you did.”

“Don’t be like that. We’ve been neighbours for how long now? For years? Have you ever heard the sound of chaos from my house?”

“So this time you just got the perfect excuse.”

“Look, Ebuka, just listen, okay? You can say whatever you want after you hear my side of the story.”

“OK storyteller. Go ahead.”

“See, things have been hard for our family for about six months now. In fact, we struggled to pay Bayo’s school fees. We struggled to pay the rent when it was due in January. I sold one of my cars in March.”

“Oh, I wanted to say I’ve not been seeing the red Toyota for a while now.”

“We sold it.”

“Well, I’ve always felt four cars seems like too much for a small family like yours. That was a wise choice, even though it was enforced my circumstances.”

“And we’ve sold another one last week.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Well, everybody goes through that sort of time when unnecessary expenses would have to be shaved off. Hope you invested the money wisely?”

“That money was the reason for all that noise and drama you saw last night.”

“How come?”

“My foolish wife gave all to the pastor.”

“To her pastor or to the church as a sort of offering?”

“What difference does it make? That man is always talking about sowing your Isaac, sowing a seed to connect with the grace of the man of God, sowing a seed that will touch the heart of God, all that jazz for a special blessing. I’ve been hearing that candy gospel for years and I’ve never tossed 1.5 million in compliance.”

“1.5 million?”

“Yes. 1.5 million. She didn’t even tell me before she took it there.”

“Wow.”

“I see you find it shocking hearing it too. Now imagine if it was your money.”

“It’s…it’s..look, I don’t know. This is serious.”

“So, yeah, that’s how we got here.”

“Look, this does not in any way justify you beating your wife. So don’t get excited.”

“Excited? You think your support for my act will make me feel better?”

“Was it her money or yours?”

“Ebuka, there is nothing like ‘my money or your money’ in marriage. We keep our accounts together. This cash just happened to be in her care for a few hours. And boom! It became a seed.”

“But, Stanley, you knew that your pastor is crafty and manipulative, and you kept going there with your wife to listen to crap.”

“I thought my wife would have been wise enough to know how to sieve off spiritual-sounding nonsense from the real thing.”

“Believe me there is nothing real in that church of yours’”

“Don’t be so extreme. You don’t know anything about it.”

“Stanley, you know what I find strange? The fact that she could do that without even consulting you.”

“She said she thought I agreed with the message since I was nodding eagerly and saying all the amens and hallelujahs.”

“You were expressing your approval for the star.”

“Isn’t it dumb to say someone agrees to something on a holistic level just because they’ve been nodding when such things are spoken of? The nods could just mean one is listening. And listening is not tantamount to approval.”

“Well, if your wife can not read that simple non-verbal gesture of yours; then I wonder.”

“It’s like you’ve made up your mind about me already.”

“Let me tell you this. You beat your wife because you failed as a man. Simple.”

“So it’s all my fault, because we keep going to church? There is no perfect church, just as there are no perfect human beings.”

“But your church’s teachings bear no resemblance to the teaching of Jesus, or his disciples, or the apostles. You are the one who failed to protect your wife from seductive words. You took her to a sweet-tongued devil. I hope you know the devil can quote the bible very well, and out of context.”

“Pastor is not a devil.”

“Have you read Acts 16:16 to 17?”

“I don’t know what’s there. I will have to check.”

“Go and read it. Once the source and the motivation is wrong as far as faith is concerned, the message, no matter how peppered with bible passages, will be wrong.”

“Ebuka, I didn’t know you are the bible-quoting type.”

“Because I don’t have stickers of big man of God and his wife on my car? Or on my door? Look, if a lot of people just sit down carefully with an open mind to read the bible, and to ask questions, a lot of these pseudo-churches will close down. A lot of these practices they use to rip-off you guys were not practices of Jesus, his disciples, the apostles or the early church. No mention of tithe in the entire NT, no one sows seed to have more money; no one gives first fruits to connect to any blessing.”

“I’ve heard you. So we’ve been hearing the wrong things. You understand me now?”

“No sir. I don’t understand you. You beat your wife because you were irresponsible and you want me to bear with your foolishness and give you a pat in the back…”

“Why are you so judgemental? Dude, take it easy.”

“I was. I was taking it easy before you came in here to know if you are a bad man. I just want you to know that if I had a daughter who is ready for marriage I wouldn’t want her to marry a man like you. We are done. Shut the door behind you.”

Photo Credit: © Igor Golubov | Dreamstime