Short Story: Songs Of My Past

When I was 14 I stupidly started dating a 19 year old boy called Osei who wasn’t a nice person and was into criminal activities. I had involved myself with the ‘popular’ girls at school who were all dating older boys. Some from Osei's group of friends.

It was a bit of escapism for me. My grandfather had just died and my family had collapsed. I wasn’t allowed to talk to my grandmother who was like my second mum. My mother and father would argue continuously and were going through a long drawn out, hateful divorce. My mother had become a full blown alcoholic and our relationship had crumbled.

Osei was my distraction. An older guy who gave me some little attention. Osei was very charismatic and confident which made him attractive. He called me ‘dimples’ which made me feel special. We used to enjoy each other’s company. At the beginning there was lots of laughing, play fighting and having fun around. I used to skip school to spend the day with him.

Then I started to lie to my parents that I was staying at my friends place but then will stay at his. I used to sneak out in the middle of the night and he would pick me up in his father’s car and drop me off before first light. Looking back I must have been crazy. My father was super strict and what I was doing was unthinkable.

Osei and I were together for about 7 months. Sometimes he was really mean but I was in awe of him and just wanted to please him. He would mock me, laugh at me and call me funny names if I didn’t know something. He would always mention how skinny I was and how it was unattractive. But I was 14! For girls of that age that isn’t unusual.

One time I was looking out of his window in his bedroom. He came up behind me and held a gun to my head and pulled the trigger. It wasn’t loaded but it still terrified me. I felt the cold metal against my temple. I had never seen a gun before. I live in Kumasi and over here in Ghana they are illegal. So it shows what he was involved in.

Another time as my curfew was 7:30 and it was 7:00 so I needed to leave his place. He was angry that I hadn’t given him sex. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ he asked as he jumped up and stood in front of the door. Pleading with him and trying to pull him away from the door I panicked ‘please I’m going to get into so much trouble’. But he wouldn’t let me leave until I had given him oral sex which he knew I hated’. The longer you stand here talking the longer you will be here’ he said unbuttoning his jeans.

Another time he pulled my knickers off and made out like he was going to push a knife inside me. I was pulling his hand away, screaming and begging in complete terror. He found this absolutely hilarious and was laughing uncontrollably.

What a stupid naive girl I was? How many red flags did he need to give me? But I was clueless about relationships and was very young.

Osei moved in with his 22 year old cousin and asked me to come and stay the night. His cousin seemed nice and friendly. Nicer than Osei who was very cold and unemotional. His cousin made me feel welcome asking me lots of questions. I remember thinking ‘this is nice’ as we chatted away.

We watched TV for ages. American pie and then Sex and the city came on and I remember feeling really embarrassed to be watching something with sexual content. I pretended to be on my phone.

Osei poured me a vodka and coke. I was 14 so I didn’t drink and didn’t like the taste of alcohol. ‘You not having one?’ I asked. ‘No its for you’ he said ‘I don’t want it’ I replied. ‘Stop complaining and just fucking drink it!’ Osei snapped. His cousin stepped in to curb the awkwardness and said ‘I will have one too’ and poured himself a glass which made me feel better.

Osei wanted sex so we went into his bedroom. He left the room as he usually did to go to the bathroom and I was left on the bed naked.

But when the door reopened it wasn’t Osei it was his 22 year old cousin. ‘Oh my god, what are you doing?’ I yelled as I jumped up in shock to get my cardigan from the back of the door to hide my naked body. But he pulled the cardigan away from me and threw me down on the bed.

I started crying uncontrollably I begged him to stop as he held me down, forced my legs open and raped me. ‘Shhh baby don’t cry daddy’s here’ he kept saying. I was so confused and was sure Osei would come and save me. But he didn’t.

During the rape I was in shock it was that type of shock which disassociates you from reality. There is certainly the ‘this can’t be real, this isn’t happening’ feeling. You also feel completely powerless for obvious reasons. I also felt horror and repulsion that a person I didn’t want to touch me was doing the most intimate thing to me.

After the cousin had finished he just left the room. I ran around trying to find my clothes and got dressed. I was still crying uncontrollably. Osei came back in the room and I lost my shit. Why did he come in here? Why did he do that to me? What’s going on?’ I screamed.

My next response was anger but this may be unique to this particular incident because I was betrayed by my boyfriend.

But Osei's response surprised me. ‘Shut your fucking mouth!’ He screamed back at me as he lifted his fist to hit me. I cowered on the bed afraid. ’Stop Fucking crying. You do what I fucking tell you to do. If I want my cousin to fuck you, my brother to fuck you they’re Gona fuck you’

‘I don’t care if it’s your fucking dad...!’. I screamed back. But before I could finish the sentence he grabbed me by the neck ‘how dare you mention my dad?’ lifted me off the bed by my throat and held me up against the wall. I couldn’t breathe and thought he was going to kill me. ‘If you talk back to me once more I will rip all your clothes off again and rape you up against that’. He threatened. This pacified me and he let go of me. I didn’t argue with him again.

I asked him if I could go to the bathroom and he let me go. I locked the door and stayed in there for about half an hour. He and his cousin were knocking on the door. His cousin even asked if I was okay. I was still crying uncontrollably but was afraid Osei would hear and hit me so I was trying to muffle the sound of my tears.

The first feeling after being raped is dirty. Your body isn’t yours anymore. Not only has it been contaminated and taken from you. You can’t clean it and return it back to the way it was before. For me this feeling of being dirty hasn’t completely gone away!

Once I thought I wouldn’t cry anymore. I came out of the bathroom. Osei was on the bed watching TV like noting had happened. ‘Go and get me food from the little place I showed you on the way here’ he ordered without even looking at me. It was 10 at night and I didn’t know the area so I said I didn’t want to. ‘Are you answering me back again?’ He asked as he turned to look at me. ‘No’ I replied. So I did what he said and went out in search of food.

There were very few cars running on the streets and I had no money, just my transport fare. I thought about stopping someone on the street and asking them to help me but it was 10:30 on a Friday night and there were only drunks on the street. So I bought his food and went back to that house 😢

When I got back I had bought the wrong food so he threw it at me and it went everywhere. ‘I knew you’d come back with this shit, You’re fucking useless, you can’t follow basic instructions’ he shouted as I picked it off the floor fighting back the tears and hoping he didn’t hit me.

Then his bedroom door opened again and it was his cousin. My stomach flipped. I tried to look busy picking up the food while they tormented me. ‘You wanna fuck her again?’ Osei mocked. I couldn’t breathe ‘Please God don’t let it happen again I prayed’.

‘Naah I think she has had enough for tonight but ask me again in the morning’ his cousin laughed. I knew then I had to leave the minute it got light before either of them were awake. Before Osei went to sleep he told me I had to have sex with him again. I was afraid so I didn’t argue and just lay there numb as he fucked me. I didn’t sleep all night and crept out early morning to escape.

Osei didn’t stop ringing me for the next two weeks. I ignored every call. I was afraid he would come to my house as he knew where I lived. After a while he left a WhatsApp voice message ‘Dimples it’s me? Been trying to call you. Miss your little face. Ring me back, you know who it is!’

He even asked the girls that he knew at my school to tell me I had to ring him. In the end I came clean with Adwoa the girl who introduced him to me in the first place. She kept telling me that I had to ring him. So I broke down and told her that he let his cousin rape me.

She later revealed to me that our mutual friend Diana had been raped by Osei's brother Dan at a party she had taken her to! “I had noticed she was quiet on the way home but thought she was just tired. It’s worse because she died just after her 19th birthday and I’ve always felt guilty over this”.

A few years ago I met up with Adwoa randomly on a night out and we started talking about the horrors of our teen years. She showed me Osei’s Facebook profile. He’s a father now and looks like he may be a single parent.

His daughter was nearly the same age as I was when he and his cousin raped me. He must have had her within a year of that night. He looks like a devoted father. His wall picture was a collage of smaller pictures of his daughter.

His profile picture was of him and his daughter on her first day of secondary school. His arm was around her and their heads were leant in together, he was smiling proudly and she looked excited. The caption read: ‘Time flies she’s already in secondary school😰’

Underneath this was a comment from a well-wisher ‘you are going to have problems with your pretty daughters. Well let’s hope they don’t come across people like you I thought. It’s like two different people! It made coming to terms with what he did even more difficult as it contradicted my memory of him as a callous monster.

As an adult with a normal life. Wonderful fiancé and good career. This is the shame of my life. You wouldn’t guess these things had happened to me if you meet me. I feel sick and ashamed thinking of the way Osei and his cousin used and treated me.

The after effects are long-lasting this happened to me a decade and a half ago. You go through denial phase this can last for years. You blame yourself. You run over it in your head.’ If I did this differently it wouldn’t have happened’.

You go through a stage where you feel your body isn’t yours. You feel like a fraud around other people like ‘if only they knew what happened to me’. One of the most overwhelming feelings is shame.

Elijah Adjei Boakye, © 2023
Elijah Adjei Boakye is a trained Journalist and a motivational speaker. Elijah is a columnist for several media houses in ghana including modernghana and ghanaweb. His blog: www.2plustv.com

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