You are in love with your bruises. But your brother is not. And that is why you both are currently in the living room, having a shouting match. His voice starts to rise with each word he speaks until he suddenly stops. His fists are clenched at his sides. He looks like he is ready to strike and you can see the rage in his eyes. You brace yourself for it; his punch. But it never comes. Instead, he slumps into a sofa, massaging his temple. He is stewing in his anger; you can see it in the way he keeps bouncing his left knee and grinding his teeth repeatedly. You readjust your stance incase he has changed his mind and still wants to punch you. So you would not be caught unawares.

He sighs, rubs his eyes a few times with his index finger and thumb and asks

"But how did you even get here? How did you allow him get this far?"

"Brother Olayinka", you begin. He straightens up in his seat because you rarely call him by his full name. He is aware that this is serious. 

"Can you remember the first apartment we lived in? In Ikorodu, close to Liberation Bible Church?"

He nods.

"Can you remember Tajudeen and his father?"

"With the multiple girlfriends and loud Fela music. Yes, I do".

You clear your throat and begin to tell your story. From the very beginning, where it all started.

You are seven years old and trying to sweep away the mess you and your brother made before your parents arrive. It would not have been this stressful to sweep if you and your brother had considered your rug-covered floor and  hadn't catapult yourselves with plastic spoons of garri. In the midst of the huffing and puffing, you see Tajudeen's toy car lying forgotten on the floor. He had claimed his uncle from Sierra Leone bought it for him but you know it is a lie. You know,deep down, that he does not have any uncle abroad and the toy is from Surprise Package. But you had indulged him and said nothing. You drop the broom and bound up the stairs to return the toy to him. You knock and it takes a while before Tajudeen's father answers the door. 

"Good evening, sir", you greet.

"And who might you be?"

"I'm Tolani, sir. Tajudeen's friend. We live downstairs".

"He's not home".

"I just came to return his toy, sir", you say, stretching the blue thing outward to him.

Tajudeen's father's eyes rake over you. Once. Twice. And he licks his lips in a way that makes you shudder. 

"Sir!" , you impatiently say, snapping him out of his trance. He takes the toy from your hand and you hurriedly leave. Your frenzied steps do not stop until you reach the safety of your apartment walls and deadbolt the door.

"Daddy Tajudeen looks funny", you say to your brother who is eating his third helping of garri since you returned from school.

"What do you mean?"

"He looked at me one kind".

"I don't know what you're talking about. He doesn't have crossed eyes".

You shrug. Maybe it's just you. You don't talk about it anymore.

The next Friday, you plead with your brother to let you follow him to his friend's house but he insists you stay and watch over the house. He says he will return early. He leaves. The digital clock reads two-sixteen. Daddy Tajudeen must have seen him leave because he comes to your door right after that.

"Open this door! Don't you know it's rude to keep elders waiting?!", he bellows.

You are scared but you open it all the same. He sits on the sofa and puts his legs up on a stool. Daddy Tajudeen never comes into your apartment. You wonder why he does today. You don't go through the hospitality routine your mother has taught you; serving visitors fried chin-chin and cold orange juice. Instead, you slink back into your room. Just as you are about to lock the door, Daddy Tajudeen appears.

"Were you about to leave a visitor all alone and lock yourself up in your room?", he begins.

"I'm sorry, sir".

"That's very rude. You're a bad girl". He is walking towards you now. "You're a bad girl and I will show you what happens to bad girls".

"I'm sorry sir", you are shivering with fear now. You can see the wicked gleam in his eyes. He is fumbling with his belt and the only thing you hear is "I'll show you what happens to bad girls" before everything becomes a blur. There's a lot of slapping and scratching and kicking. He bites you on your right shoulder because you attempt to claw his eyes out. He slaps you a lot too. And you finally give up trying to resist him. You don't watch him as he keeps on spitting into his palm and rubbing himself. You don't watch him as he breaks your hymen. Despite the tears trickling down your cheek and pooling at the hollow of your neck, despite the searing pain in your lower region, you don't say a word. You tune out the obscenities he keeps muttering. Instead, you watch the clock.

It is four fifty-four when he leaves you alone.

It is five twelve when your brother finally comes home.

You are eleven years old and struggling to spread the clothes your mother and brother have washed when you see Tajudeen in a corner leering at you. You feel queasy because you don't like it at all. To make matters worse, you are in your green bumshorts and black see-through singlet that your mother has warned you to stop wearing outside your room because you are no longer a child. Before you can protest, he leaves.

Two days later, you are curled up on the three-seater trying to solve the crossword puzzles in the cartoon section of yesterday's Punch Newspaper when Tajudeen walks in. At that moment, you regret leaving the door open to allow fresh air in. He has a large bottle of coke clutched in his right hand and his mini speaker in his left. He has interrupted the afternoon silence with his senseless Fela music.

"Good afternoon, brother Taju", you say and unfold your legs from beneath you.

"Tola-scholar!", he hails you." Is your mummy at home?"

You shake your head from side to side.

"What of Yinka?"

You repeat the gesture.

"So you're all alone?"

You bob your head up and down in the affirmative way.

"Can't you talk? Or have you suddenly gone dumb?", he asks irritatedly in Yoruba.

You mutter a quick "sorry" and wait for him to state the purpose of his visit. He settles into the three-seater with you and you freeze.

"Get me two cups", he says.

You come back with them and he starts talking.

"Tola-scholar! I heard you passed your Common Entrance examinations. I brought this Coke to congratulate you and for us to celebrate. Just me and you. The both of us".

Your eyes travel from his face to the sweating cups and back to his face. You don't know what to say. 

"Do you have bread? Or anything I can eat with this?", he asks

"Yes". You come back with the bread and tentatively watch him tear the almost finished loaf and mould one half with his palm.

"Better drink your Coke and don't waste my money".

You blink and lift the cup to your lips. The cold soda hits your throat and you sigh contentedly. "Thank you, brother Taju" you say in your head and take another long gulp. Minutes later, you start to feel weak and can no longer sit up straight. Tajudeen carries you in bridal style to your bedroom. He starts to pull down his trousers and you see his loose pink boxers before it registers in your head. You are about to be raped! The Coke must have been drugged! Maybe he is not as wicked as his father. Maybe if I beg very very well he will listen to me, you say to yourself. And so, you start. Even though you are slurring your words.

"Brother Taju! Brother Taju, please! Please, look at me like I'm your younger sister! I'm your younger sister!"

"Which foolish sister?! Better shut your mouth!", he kneels between your thighs, forcefully parting them.

"Brother Taju, please, I beg you in the name of God!", you continue.

"I will slap you now if you don't shut up!"

"Brother Taju, please don't do this to…"

His slap cuts you off. You give up pleading and begin to recite State and Capital in your head. At that instant, you hate Fela, the weed-smoking, semi-naked musician, more than anybody in this life because he just keeps on singing and singing as you're being raped, not being able to do anything. You stare at the bruises for a long time afterwards and just…cry.

You are sixteen years old when you have your first boyfriend. You have all moved from Ikorodu to Ebute-Meta. It is not much but it is significant to you; you are finally able to leave the hurt and trauma behind. Your boyfriend is caring and respects your decision to stay off sex unlike other boys his age. He is twenty and already schooling in Lagos State University. You plan to have all As in your WAEC and join him in studying Civil Engineering there after a year and a half.

It is Saturday and your mother has given you permission to visit friends. You go to your boyfriend's house instead. You are shocked at the amount of boys in the living room. Truly, your boyfriend told you he was having friends over but you didn't expect them to be this many. You count them. They are seven in all. Your boyfriend does the introductions and ushers you into his room, past the cluster of boys. You and your boyfriend are randomly gisting and he says to stretch out your arms in front of you and close your eyes. You do so without hesitation. You feel cold, heavy metal encircle your wrists. Maybe the bangles are just heavy like that. You hear the clasping of the metal and ask to open your eyes. He gives the go ahead. He is off the bed and now squatting in front of you.

"Tolani, I'm sorry, I can't hold on any longer. Guys in my school keep talking about sex and how beautiful it is. You see all the guys out there, all of them have had sex. All of them except me. I want to experience this beautiful thing with you, Tola. Please, don't say no".

"So that is why you handcuffed me?"

"I'm sorry, Tola. It's part of the fun. Don't worry, I'll be gentle with you". But he isn't. He is rough, sucking and biting your exposed flesh; your arms, your stomach, your neck. You feel a kind of pleasure later on when you stand naked in front of your full-length mirror and count the lovebites. Ten in all. You feel a kind of pleasure when you see the dark purple bruises left by the handcuffs on either wrists. You feel a kind of pleasure when you see the thin scratches from his long fingernails and the bite marks on your inner thighs. You feel a kind of pleasure knowing you've been marked by him.

You are twenty years old and have just finished the first semester exams for your second year in the university. You and three other girls have decided to book an Uber to the Faculty's after party at The Dungeon, Lagos' biggest Gen Z club. The music is loud and a glass of alcohol is shoved into your hands the second you get there. But you don't mind. You are here to unwind. And you do just that. It is several hours from when you came. You are spent from twerking and twisting and whining and showcasing all the baddie moves you have learnt over the years. You head over to the general toilet to wipe your makeup off altogether. Everybody is drunk and they are in much worse state. Nobody will notice it. So you are in the process of cleaning your makeup with wipes when a boy stumbles in. He stares at you for a while before coming to stand behind you. He wraps his arms around your waist despite your protests. His weed breath is hot on your skin and you begin to shout as he bites your neck.

"Calm down, baby girl" he says "nobody will rescue you. Not here". You ignore him and keep on shouting for help as he tackles you down. He wraps his fingers around your throat as he eases into you. Your air supply is cut off and you can barely speak. You are just there, whimpering, your eyes fixated on the wet tissue paper by the sink. He is done within a matter of minutes and as the last of his orgasmic shudder wears off, he looks at you in uttermost disgust. He slaps you. It isn't hard but it hurts just the same. And as the tears sting your eyes, he says to you

"Stupid girl. No be say you even sweet like that wey you dey try implicate pesin". He leaves. You spring to your feet and go to check yourself in the mirror. It gives you satisfaction to see that his choking had left red finger marks on your throat. The beginning of a bruise.

You are twenty-three years old when you come across Dunsin on Twitter. His repost of a tweet supporting impact play is what catches your eye. You then proceed to go through his account. His pinned tweet reads "inflicting injuries is the only love language that I speak". You reply the tweet with "Oh yeah?". And you keep on scrolling.

It takes him three days to reply. You are nervous as you click on the notification. Your eyes frantically skim through the tweet and when you're done, you calmly read the whole thing

"Hey @MotolaniTheFirst, are you from Badagry? Cause you're bad, I agree. I have gone through your profile and I must say, you are one finished work of art. Infact, I think I may have fallen in love with you. And yes, I mean it when I say inflicting injuries is the only love language that I speak. So come, let me show you how much I love you. You can't say no."

You stare so hard at the reply that the words begin to swim into each other. You take almost an hour to come up with the perfect reply. Soon enough, you both are exchanging stories of how you came to be sadist and masochist. He tells you stories of how his father always beat his mother and how it became exciting to him. How sometimes he even pleasured himself while watching them. How seeing the cut on her lip, the dark purple bruise around her eye, the marks on her corn pap-colored skin turned him on. How when he tried biting a girl for the first time, she slapped him and yelled curse words for thirty minutes straight. How he finally matured and would rather allow the pain-loving girls to come to him, willingly. You recount each of the rape experiences and how after a while, you began to feel happiness at the sight of those bruises.

"Oh my God! That's BDSM!", your brother interrupts you for the first time since you started speaking.

"Impact play, brother Yinka. But yes, also known as BDSM", you reply.

"Wow".

"Incase you have to tell Mummy, just say I have a kink for bruises and marks."

"But Tola, I've heard of BDSM cases that got too extreme. Some even leading to death".

You laugh. "He broke my arm once. The pain was so excruciating that it hurt badly to even move. But it was my fault, I asked for marks, I didn't care how". 

"Do you think it was as a result of Daddy's disappearance from our lives?", your brother asks tentatively.

You think back to that sunny afternoon when you couldn't stop standing by the window, singing nursery rhymes you had learnt from school while waiting for Daddy to return. Mummy kept shouting to come back and finish your homework but she got tired with time because she too was waiting for him to return. He didn't come home that night. He never came back. In the following weeks when you complained to your brother and had nightmares that left you cold despite the sheen of sweat you always awoke in, you didn't see him. And when you finally asked Mummy for Daddy's whereabouts, she answered with this sombre look in her eyes, "He's never coming back".

You shake your head.

"No. It has nothing to do with Daddy's disappearance. I don't have daddy issues. It might have helped if an adult was more at home though."

Your brother sighs.

"You know I can get him arrested. I know top people in the army that can render him useless for the rest of his life when…"

"Brother Yinka", you interrupt him. " We are two consenting adults and I  have never ever come to you, my tail between my legs, crying to be rescued. Besides, he traveled to Spain at the beginning of the week; that's why we broke up".

"Oh, that's why you broke up?", He mimicked "Tola, can't you see what you're doing to yourself? Can't you see what you've been reduced to? Someone's fantasy plaything…"

"Stop!", you cut him off mid-sentence, "Just stop! I am in love with my bruises and I don't care whether you or Mummy or anyone accepts that for me. You hear me? I don't care! But what I won't have you do is come to my home and speak to me like I'm still a child. If you can't stand me, then leave me alone. After all, that's what you did all these years; leave me alone".

Your brother shakily exhales.

"Tola, you know I won't ever leave you alone. You're my sister. We are siblings. And who else will I have left when Mummy finally passes away if not you? But I have heard you and won't say any more negative thing about your desires".

You look into his eyes and see a mixture of tears and hurt and resignation. But you don't care.

"Good. Now let us dance. Alexa, Play me Bruises by Lewis Capaldi".

THE END