HADIZA (TRIGGER WARNING!)

The whole house is filled with the sounds of afro beats. The speakers in every room poured out echoes of the harmonious pauses and beats of Burna Boy. Without knowing you find yourself humming the lyrics and bobbing your head while washing your hands. A little lip-gloss touch-up and you are good to go.

You make sure everything is cleaned up. By wiping away the water droplets that had splashed on the bathroom counter with a wad of tissue, then you make sure the toilet is well-flushed before switching off the bathroom light. Knowing that there is a mess that you didn't clean has a habit of irritating you. Although you always mentally tell yourself that it's not OCD.

If your lip-gloss hadn't fallen out of your purse. If you had left immediately after the Ego awards. If you hadn't let Onari convince you to stay for the after-party in the first place.

Maybe, just maybe you wouldn't have witnessed it.

On all fours, you tap the ground till you feel your lip-gloss' cold cylindrical body. You begin to wonder why you didn't turn on the room lights when you first entered. If you had done that, you would have seen the lip gloss immediately. You would also have seen that the room had a balcony or noticed the boy vaping on the balcony. He was someone you knew but didn't interact with, a senior you had written off as a bad boy. But those are all 'if's' and 'would have's, they didn't happen. They aren't important.

In a blink, the sounds of the footsteps you are ignoring grow closer. You return the runaway lip gloss to your bag, as the door opens and closes. You can hear the excited voices of the boys that come in. "They are probably looking for a private place to play FIFA", you think after you hear one of them say the word "game" amongst their conversations. You remember seeing the big tv in the room, so your assumptions made sense.

You ignore them since you plan on leaving immediately after sending a "let's go home" text to Onari.

An eerie feeling envelops you. They didn't turn on the tv. Your body had prepared itself for the sudden shock of loud football commentary and FIFA songs, that didn't come.

Crouched on the bathroom floor, you begin to hear sounds you didn't expect. The ringing of belt buckles as they hit the floor. Clothes and shoes are thrown onto the floor, and then something heavy is thrown on the bed.

"I'm going first! Can you take off her top", confused you look up and see three almost naked boys at various corners of the bed. Your brain doesn't process it at first till you hear the word, "stop!" whispered loudly. A voice you know, but couldn't place comes from the body on the bed. The girl on the bed turns her face towards you, her barely open eyes meet yours and instantaneously you use your hands as a shield to interrupt her gaze.

You peel away your hands and look up to get a better view of what is going on. At that moment, another boy runs in making them four. The last boy to come in, enters the room panting, "I got your text. What did you need?" the boy freezes taking in the scene. Even after the shock wears off, he didn't look keen. He looks uncomfortable, his hands are shaking as much as yours or maybe more. But he didn't try to leave or help.

"Fuck! Didn't you put everything", says the same voice that said he wanted to go first.

"Guy, she's just sleep-talking. See, she can barely even open her eyes", says the second voice as he tries to open her eyes. You begin to silently pray for the ground to swallow you. "What are you waiting for, help me strip her", the second voice orders. His gaze is focused on the frozen boy, who immediately unfreezes and begins unfastening her shoes.

You sit there chained to the floor by Fear, silently watching as they strip her naked. "Please", she whispers loudly again snapping you back to reality. They didn't notice the soft ping sounds or the light of your phone's screen when Onari replies, "Okay I'll call an uber", "It's almost our curfew anyway", "Where are you?" and "Chill my data would soon finish I'll call you on regular call", without thinking you mute your phone and put it on flight mode.

When they hold her down as she struggles to move her body, Fear clutches your phone and mouth. Tears begin free flowing, both yours and hers. The room is bright enough to see them and dark enough to hide you. You believe Burna boy's tunes are hiding the sounds of your panicked breathing, your Fear-guided shaking. The bathroom door is ajar, and its cold tiles match your skin as he climbs on top of her.

"Guy! Your mask", says the second voice tapping the one on top of her. "I'm filming it", he continues. You couldn't understand why he is laughing as he pulls out his phone to video it.

Your 14-year-old mind knew what he is doing, you had attended the girl's health seminar in school last year. It didn't seem like something real then, it had only happened in rumours and movies. You shut your eyes the moment the "R" of the word crosses your mind.

For a while, you forget yourself staring at his black ski mask. You forget where you are and follow Flashback to meet your younger self trembling with your hands covering your mouth while you hide inside the cabinet of your father's bookshelf. Peeping through the holed cabinet door you saw the four masked gunmen, with masks similar to the masks that the second boy is handing out.

In between their moans, thrusts, and arguments you hear the door open. It forces you to separate from Flashback.

The rapists didn't notice. They are arguing about something with the last boy that had walked in.

Fear holds your breath, as you think another one of them is about to come in. You are scared you'll get caught. That they'll do what they are doing to her to you.

You finally inhale when the footsteps become distant.

"Are you fucking stupid? You left the door open?" the first voice yells causing you to reopen your eyes. The second voice had taken his place on top of her.

"So, she really won't remember a thing?" the first one asks as he closes the door.

"Guy! I've seen my uncle put this in the special juice he gives to my house girls" says the second one as he finishes. You notice that she had gone silent, no more loud whispers. "Some of them believed that they had a nightmare where my uncle slept with them, but most forgot", three of the boys nodded in acceptance.

You aren't sure how long you have been there. Your mind keeps jumbling their words while your trauma clouds their faces. You are glad you rejected Onari's offer to escort you to the bathroom. Her reckless bravery and inability to mind her business would have definitely put her in trouble.

You knew it will crush you if you scar Onari again. Though you feel bad for the girl in the bed, you tell yourself, "I am going to go home and forget about her and them". You wipe your tears and harden your heart.

After the boys finish, the third and fourth boys are asked to climb unto the bed. The frozen boy does as he is told but the third is inquisitive. The third and first boys traded several whispers before he agrees to go to the bed. You watch the two boys manoeuvre the girl on the bed into poses while the second boy takes pictures of them. Then they just leave her there and you hear the door shut.

You try to stand up but your cramped legs immediately give out. Before you could make another attempt to leave, the frozen boy runs back in. He dresses the girl up muttering, "Sorry" continuously to her and some other words you didn't care to hear before he abandons her on the bed again.

"Was it over?" you ask yourself.

Then you mentally count to a hundred. Making sure you can't hear any footsteps, you drag yourself off the bathroom floor, refusing to look at her as you stagger out of the room. It isn't your business, you tell yourself. You didn't believe your own words, so you kept repeating, "I didn't hear anything. I didn't see anything. I wasn't there."

It seems impossible but the charcoal dark skin you see in the mirror as you walk past looks pale grey. Your reflection shocks you.

By the time you find Onari, she is sitting in the uber, asking you a million and one questions from the moment you sit down. You stare out of the window looking at nothing, mentally chanting, "I didn't hear anything, I didn't see anything, I wasn't there". You are silent, scared that if you open your mouth it might escape.

You go home. "Forget about it", you tell yourself once more before you sleep. But the Fear that followed you home doesn't let you escape.

…