Mother-in-law – Final Episode

The sky above gleamed with lightning and light showers began to cascade down to the earth. Emmanuel did not move, he remained on his knees making his request known to God. A few nurses had tears in their eyes watching him pray in the rain.Back in the theater, the female doctor who happened to be a devout Christian had rallied a few people to pray for Janet. Standing around the operating table on which Janet lay, they began to pray for her. While they prayed, their number swelled. All who had seen Emmanuel distraught and praying desperately in the rain made their way to the theater to join the prayers. Those who could not, bent their heads and offered up prayers to God.

On the operating table on which Janet lay, she seemed lifeless with a pool of blood oozing from between her legs.
Mrs. Asibong’s HouseMrs. Asibong had managed to talk down Musa and struck a deal with him to help her. Of course Musa haggled hard until he got her to part with lots of money before he agreed to offer his help. “Your froblem (problem) is much. Many doors are ofen (open) in your life. Your fellowship knows this and they are using it very well to keep you busy while they launch attacks to kill your daughter in-law whose life and that of her unborn child you offered to stop them.

I know you killed your husband and three of your children. This will be very difficult. Your fellowship has turned their spirits against you. You must be prepared for anything,” Musa said to Mrs. Asibong, holding nothing back. Jumbo signaled to his colleagues and they quietly let themselves out of Mrs. Asibong’s compound. They had heard too much for one night. Jumbo knew Mrs. Asibong was a bad woman but did not know her wickedness went as high as what Musa revealed about her.Working frenziedly, Musa offered Mrs. Asibong some mixtures to drink and gave her some to spread around her house.

With his voodoo, he conjured smoke around the house. From afar, one would have thought that the house was on fire. For the first time in years, Mrs. Asibong saw her husband and three children whose lives she offered to her fellowship. They stood in the smoke Musa conjured, looking mean and menacing. Musa displayed his mastery at what he was doing that night by placing chains on Mrs. Asibong’s husband and her three children. With that done, Musa announced, “We have kept your husband and three children quiet, at least till morning. Now what do you want me to do with your daughter in-law? Should I put hern out of her pains by killing her or should I save her?” “No, how can you kill her? I want her alive! If her being alive is a problem to my fellowship, then I want her alive by all means!” Mrs. Asibong yelled.

“Okay, I will need her ficture (picture) and that of Emmanuel too,” Musa said. Mrs. Asibong beckoned to Ibinabo to accompany her into her house. She was clearly rattled with fear. Though her husband and children had been chained, she was still afraid of them. On the other hand, she could not tell what her fellowship might send against her.Mrs. Asibong and Ibinabo had hardly stepped away from the litany of charms Musa spread out on the ground, when a mighty thunder struck Musa and his charms and left nothing behind. Mrs. Asibong and her friend stood petrified. They could not lift a limb. Her last hope of defense had been obliterated by a single strike of thunder.

As the reality of what had happened dawned on her, she and her friend began to back away into her house slowly. Just like he and his voodoo trappings vanished, Musa reappeared with all the charms he had on the ground. There was a bloody gash on his head. “There is no time left! Go and get me thefictures (pictures) I asked for!” Musa barked. Mrs. Asibong bolted off and in a jiffy reappeared with the pictures of Janet and Emmanuel. When they returned, there was already an aluminum basin filled with water on the ground. “Throw the fictures (pictures) into the basin!” Musa instructed.Mrs. Asibong threw the pictures into the basin and in that instance, a resplendent wave of light belched from the basin and almost left all of them blind.

“Eeh! Fower (power)! Sufer (super)fower!” Musa screamed and made a dash toward the gate. That was the last Mrs. Asibong saw of him. Seeing their last hope was gone, Ibinabo bolted away. Mrs. Asibong made to follow her but slumped to the ground. While she lay alone on the floor. Crying for help, her husband and three children whose lives she offered to her fellowship circled around her with the chains on their hands gone.

The HospitalEmmanuel was still on his knees, praying in the rain when he thought he saw someone like an angelic being. He seemed to tell him, “Rise to your feet, it is over!” His very words seemed to lift him to his feet. Emmanuel ran into the hospital with an unexplainable ring of joy in his heart. When he drew closer to the door of the theater, he heard joyous shout coming from inside the theater. He ran inside and saw Janet sitting up on the operating table, fine and okay. All the people around her, who had been praying for her were in an ecstatic mood. Emmanuel ran to Janet and hugged her. “Our God is awesome! He sent his angel and delivered you from the jaws of death!” Emmanuel shouted as they embraced each other. “Oh! Did you see the angel too?” Janet asked. “Yes, I did, he spoke to me. He told me it is all over,” replied Emmanuel.

“He woke me from death and gave me back all the organs those demons took,” Janet said. She jumped off the operating table, prostrated on the floor and began to confess her sins.Emmanuel joined her, praying, “God, an unserious man like me cried out to you in my trouble and you heard me! I will serve you till I die!” All those present joined them on the floor and began to give God thanks.The Next Day, Mrs. Asibong’s HouseEmmanuel and Janet had been summoned to his mother’s house by one of her neighbours. Emmanuel and Janet were still in a celebration mood about 9:00 am the next morning when he got a call to come over to his mother’s house urgently. The caller had refused to tell him why it was very urgent for him to come immediately. He and Janet had to dress up and left as quickly as they could.

When they arrived at his mother’s house there was quite a crowd present. Emmanuel was struck dumb when he saw his mother, Mrs. Asibong, on the ground, mired with blood and reeking with a pungent stench of decay. Next to her were four putrefied human skulls. Shocked and confused, Emmanuel asked, “What is going on here? What happened to my mother?” Just then Arit, Emmanuel’s sister arrived with her husband and children. “We think it will be best to ask your mother what happened to her,” said one of the neighbours present. “Mommy! Mommy!! What happened to my mother?!” Arit cried. She ran toward her mother, but she raised her hand and shooed her off.

“We heard your mother crying out for help this morning and we came in and saw this. Please ask her to tell you what she already has told us,” said the neighbour who had called Emmanuel and Arit.“I am not the mother you have thought me to be all this while. Emmanuel, I am the one who took your male strength. I offered it to my fellowship. Of course, my so called fellowship is a secret cult,” Mrs. Asibong began. Emmanuel looked from Janet to his sister Arit. He was speechless. “I did much more evil than that. I am the one who killed your father, two brothers and sister. These are their heads.

I have been cursed to dwell with their decaying body parts till I die.” Janet opened her mouth to ask her a question, but she raised her hand and stopped her. “You are wondering about the ribbon, right?” she asked Janet. “Yes, I just thought about it now!” Janet shouted. “I made sure your thoughts never went in that direction. It was the ribbon. I used it to take away Emmanuel’s male strength. I fooled you with the story I told you about men in our family. It was all a lie… You are one tough lady. You should not be alive now… I offered you and one of your unborn children to another cult to keep my fellowship from destroying me. Sadly, things went wrong for me after that. It was my fellowship who took your womb and some organs to nullify the sacrifice I offered against them…” she paused.

Emmanuel could not take what he had heard. He sat on the bare ground and held his chin in his hands while tears flowed freely from his eyes. All the dreams he had in the past and those his brothers had, began to make sense to him. Arit dropped two hands on her head and stood frozen. Janet was numb, she could feel nothing. To her, all she had heard seemed like a dream.“I do not ask any of you to forgive me. I committed much evil. I don’t deserve forgiveness. However, this one thing I will ask of you. Please don’t ever leave that God who delivered you from my hands and from the hands of the evil cults I brought into this family.” With that said, Mrs. Asibong laid her head back on the ground. Till the day she died, she never spoke another word to any person.

Arit and Emmanuel abandoned her on the very spot they met her and never came back a single day to check on her. The stench from her decaying body became so much that her neighbours had to arrange and moved her to a forest at the outskirts of the city. It was there that she took her last breath.

THE END

WHAT A MOTHER-IN-LAW INDEED!

Now, we have come to the end of this story.

How did you find the story? Any lesson learnt?…..
Thank you very much for your patience, endurance and the undiluted love you’ve always shown me by reading, commenting, liking and your prayers which I can never underestimate. I’m grateful. God bless you real good. 

Another Super and scintillating story drops on Monday, God’s willing…

If you’re in Nigeria, don’t hesitate to vote wisely tomorrow……

God bless you immensely!

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