Short Story: Bogeyman Law.

 By Chioma Benedicta Okwuelum

My name is Valerie. A citizen of the Republic of Vague. Today happens to be a fateful day for me. My freedom for long has been debated on the national table, but today would birth the judgment. Walking into the courtroom wearing a glassy look, I could see my partner in crime subdued by his fate. Fate not yet decided but obvious enough. I didn't pity him neither did I pity myself. If penitence was my gateway to freedom, I would still not be free. Experiences build the heart. A heart that has known survival and has become a survivor dies while surviving but never regrets it. Survival is a risk. A risk I had taken all my life. 

He had it all mapped out. He was an expert, so he said. Hahahaha, an expert in debauchery. He was unequivocally the most inept in coition but he would never admit. Such display of cocksure. I had met many enough to tell those with the knack from a chicken. He was a chicken to me. A pitiable one, but I had no pity in my emotional library. He had won me over by his manly risque but I never knew  he was no man. 

The first and bravest man I had ever met was Kanda. I was fifteen then. Living with a drunk father, an ever depressed mother and a moribund brother. Schooling was a reserve for the rich and the middle class not for those of us down the ladder. I just lived not knowing how, but I survived. My family's existence sank into oblivion to me. I didn't care and they didn't care too. The only thing we shared was the roof over our heads.

Kanda was a neighbor who called me his wife until 2040 when sex outside marriage and every licentious act was declared a criminal act against the law.  A crime with 12 years imprisonment,  as punishment. The government had told the citizens it was for our own good. To curb the spread of a deadly STD which the government in its clairvoyance had foreseen even before it's outbreak. Of course sexual intercourse had become a norm that it could even be engaged in on the street without calling any attention. It had grown past being  an eyesore. Every year recorded a high birth rate  of love children, high motality from abortion and child delivery. Unkempt children roamed the street. So we knew better. We knew the government wanted to depopulate the nation. We knew the labour market was becoming too crowded. We knew it was a war against fecundity. It was an economic war. 

A year after the war began, on my fifteen years birthday. Kanda never knew though. My precocious growth made me look like an adult while a teenager. I loved my looks. I acted my looks not my age. I was matured in mind and body but not age. So on my fifteenth birthday, Kanda approached me, dropping all the poetic lines that wakened the caressing wind. I admired him. I didn't know why but I just did. I wanted so much to let him have me but the government decree constrained me.

 "Kanda, we have to get married first," I whispered to his ears even though I never thought of marriage. I just wanted to live in the moment.

"But we are already married," he said giving me a smirk. He didn't wait for my next question before presenting me with the certificate. We were indeed married. That night, I let him have me. We became friends with benefits. I cared little about his welfare and he never pried into my privacy. The urge to experiment with other men grew but the government decree tormented me. I loathed it. One day I spoke to Kanda about my sexual curiosity and he divulged his secret to me. The secret of the marriage certificate. His friend who worked as a cleaner in the registry had stolen a certificate. He took it to another of his friend who was a computer nerd who began to replicate it. It was a discreet business with huge profit.

As a nubile, everyone wanted me. I easily gave signals and any one with certificate approached me. Not long I had my own certificate. With different men having same name on my certificate and I, a plethora of names on men's certificate.

The government came to the knowledge of our discreet business just when I met my partner in crime. They became austere and draconian  in their fight. Then I was 18 and my partner much older. Perhaps 22. I was with him when government agents barged in on us. I told them we were married. I showed them the certificate, his certificate. In a flash one of them brought out a register which I assumed contained the list of the legally married. They scanned the register, the man with it and the two others giraffing. After their brief search,  they shifted their furious gaze to us.I knew they detected it was fake but I hid my fear. My partner peed. His fear was visible. He was guilty and so was I.

Here, we are in court waiting for the Judge's verdict. The Judge began to read out our case. I closed my eyes. The word " wakie wakie" kept ringing in my heard. I struggled to keep my eyes shut but I couldn't. When at last I opened my eyes, I saw my elder sister on my bed. " It's your wedding morning, you don't want to be late, do you?"

                                                                                  

Chioma Benedicta Okwuelum is a graduate of English and Literary studies in Delta State University, Abraka. She has written some unpublished creative works encompassing poems, short-stories and plays. Nnamdi, a short-story she recently concluded is weaved around the African belief and preconception appertaining to reincarnation. Currently, she is writing a short-story entitled, Human Library which mirrors the emotional struggles different individuals in the society encounter in the course of their existence.