Apparently, I was the problem

“You act as if your parents are here to monitor you. Loosen up, beaurifuu girl. You're no longer a teenager, besides, Your mom is 10 hours away and your dad is 6 hours away. Not like we're planning to go see a bad movie or do we plan to do anything wayward afterwards.”

Loretta rolled her eyes and said it in that friendly-scolding manner she had mastered.

I stared at her.

The annoying thing was that she had a point.

Loretta and I have been friends since our 300 level in Uni. We were, as we liked to call ourselves, the two brazen ladies who chose Dr. Nwabueze's elective course. He was notorious for being intentionally stingy with marks.

Well, being the only two people taking the course, we both got an ‘A’. It's either the man was getting old, he wanted to prove people wrong, or our hard work actually paid off.

Ever since, we've been inseparable. At some point, I started wondering if God had personally taken an interest in our friendship. Fortunately, NYSC posted us to the same state, and our primary places of assignment were in the same community too.

I don't want to believe it's a coincidence. That's God at work.

That afternoon, Loretta, two other ladies from the firm, Ifeoma and Ochuole, and I were finalising plans we'd made earlier that week for an all-girls' night out. It was Friday, after all, and, in Ifeoma's tiny voice, the “weekend ought to be fun.”

Ifeoma and Ochuole were permanent employees at the firm, while Loretta and I were serving there for NYSC. Somehow, we'd all become close enough to plan an evening together outside work.

The plan wasn't even anything serious. We were going to see a movie.

Simple. Harmless.

When Loretta said those words, marvelling was an understatement. I was genuinely shocked.

To be honest, I hadn't realised how bad my reluctance to attend any fun gathering that didn't happen in my home had become. I'd missed close friends' birthdays, weddings, and all sorts of gatherings that might make me come home at night—even when I wasn't going alone.

I had always blamed it on my parents.

But was it really my parents?

Was I hiding behind something else to justify being an introvert, or was I simply afraid of something I couldn't name?

Come to think of it, if I'm being honest, my mother, whom I'd spent the better part of my 20 years with, wasn't even that strict. She was strict enough to bring me back to my senses whenever I wanted to misbehave, which was normal for young children. At the same time, she was a very funny and easy-going woman.

In fact, I've had to lend my mom to some of my acquaintances.

In case you need to hire a mom, I'm here for you. My mom would be glad to mother you for as many days as you choose.

Kai... See lines naa 😂

It was me bailing out that had Loretta calling me out in the first place.

I don't even know why I bailed out. She has never really understood why I never show up for people when they have events or join her on her numerous adventures.

That evening, we were just going to see a movie. Nothing wild. Basically, it was a popcorn, candy and soda night, with maybe some suya, kilishi, massa and those spicy things you find on a typical North-Central semi-urban street at night.

So, no. It couldn't have been my parents.

It had to be me.

Or perhaps something inside me was restraining me from having harmless fun.

Aha.

The Holy Spirit inside me.

I turned to Loretta, who was already carried away chatting with Ifeoma and Ochuole about where they'd meet.

“It's not my parents. It's the Holy Spirit,” I whispered to her.

She scoffed.

She's a Christian too, but tonight, her patience with me was thin. I knew because that was what she did whenever she didn't want to discuss a particular topic any longer.

I watched them plan absentmindedly and packed my bag when they all rose to pick up theirs.

Normally, Ochuole—one of the permanent staff who strikes me as a Nepo baby—would drop Loretta and me at our bus stop in her Mercedes, where we'd get a bike home. But today, she was going shopping for an outfit for the night out, while Ifeoma lived at the other end of the street.

This meant Loretta and I would have to take a keks home.

Loretta had gone for the night out in a yellow spaghetti-strap, free-flowing gown with black flats to match her tiny crossbody purse.

I watched her apply mascara and eyeliner, then do a lip combo to highlight her face. A little selfie here and there, and she was soon bursting out of the house, kissing my cheeks and saying a rushed goodbye.

It was 6:35 p.m.

The room felt dangerously quiet, far more boring than it usually did whenever I was alone.

I looked at Loretta's corner. Her Bible lay open on her desk.

We had done our quiet time before she left, so I went over to see what she had last read.

It was John chapter 2.

At the bottom of the page, she'd written a footnote:

“Even Jesus attended a party. Jewish weddings stretch into the night, and Jesus, who had already been baptised and moved out from home, was there by invitation—and He actually stayed into the night, Awesome right?”

I went back to the Scripture and read through the page again.

Then I turned the page.

Behold, my cinema ticket.

I picked it up, returned to my corner and fell into deep thoughts yet again.

Maybe it wasn't the Holy Spirit asking me not to have fun.

Maybe it was just… me.

I'd always been scared.

But of what exactly?

Then it hit me.

I was raped at age eleven. It happened on a dark alley at night.

Although I'd healed in many ways—I no longer saw the monster's face lurking in front of me most nights in a nightmare—the trauma hadn't completely healed.

More like, I hadn't given it all to Jesus.

I wept.

I didn't know that childhood experience had become a trauma that was quietly influencing my reluctance to go out, enjoy myself and simply live, all while I kept attributing it to the Holy Spirit.

I checked the time again.

6:45 p.m.

The ticket said the movie, The Sound of Music, would be showing by 7 p.m., and the cinema was just on the other side of the road, after the bus stop.

I picked up the flowery chiffon gown Loretta had suggested two days earlier, back when my enthusiasm hadn't waned. I wore it, strapped on my sandals, carried my crossbody bag and picked up a jacket for Loretta, remembering that she was wearing a spaghetti-strap gown.

After applying my mascara and doing my lip combo, unlike Loretta, I didn't stop to take a selfie.

I simply flew into the night, brightly lit by the stars and the full moon, taking in the cool night air and feeling the soft wind against my face.

It felt like I had been released from a cage.

Fear came, but I reminded myself of the Scriptures, quickened my pace and marvelled at how sweet freedom could feel.

We live once, and I'm not letting my childhood trauma strip me of healthy, harmless experiences—like seeing a movie in a cinema for the first time in my life.