living off campus 7

I was really disturbed and sad, Tunji had driven out of the house still angry, wole and his friends left after he banged on our door to serve as a reminder I guess. Even after the girls were gone and everyone was gone I knew there was no sleeping or reading for me that night. Whoever says a bad roommate couldn’t affect one’s academics should have a re-think. My ordeal with Ife had proven so many things.
Bukky later knocked on our door late in the night, after her visitors where gone I guess. I knew what she was coming for,of what benefit was re-telling a bad story so I pretended I was asleep, hoping that ife wouldn’t be stupid as to open up. Luckily she didn’t.
The following day, I made sure I left the house early, I needed to read for my test as well as avoid further questioning from housemates. They didn’t know that, they even knew more about Ife than I did. I was grateful that Uche and Ugo as well as Timothy were not at home to witness the show of shame the previous night. They had probably gone to read in school, they would have been more disappointed than I was.
In the afternoon around 2pm I had just finished my test and was still in school when I received an urgent call from Laura telling me that she and Bukky were on their way to the health center with Ife. I was still about to ask what was going on when the phone went dead. When I got to the health center, I discovered that Ife had gone for an abortion and complications had risen. She was to be transferred to a specialist hospital.

The nurses who kept on calling us all sorts of names suggested that we informed her parents. Everybody agreed that I was the best person to call.
Now here was the real problem, this was something I should have done before things got to that stage. Ife often told me of how wicked and impatient her mother was, she had a hypertensive father. How was I to call and inform her parents that their daughter who was supposed to be in school had not only had a failed abortion, but was still pregnant and had been avoiding lectures and tests?

Weighing out all of the possible options, I summoned up courage, encouraged ife and we called her parents. I felt more sorry for her father who was the best father anyone could wish for , who was sadly hypertensive. How was he to take this heartbreak which he didn’t deserve from his beloved daughter? As for her mother well , from all I had seen and was told, I would largely blame Ife’s rebellion and predicament on her for being such a failure of a mother.
Days and weeks passed and i got tired of answering questions from individuals concerning Ife’s predicament. To crown it all in a bid to salvage what was left of her pride and education, she was advised to defer the whole academic year. Surprisingly her mother blamed me for her daughter’s waywardness, she said we were all thieves and only those who were caught at dawn are exposed.

If I felt bad earlier, this remark made me worse. Ife and her mother packed her things and left to an unknown destination. Exams came and I managed to read and sit for all my papers with a heavy heart. During and after exams, all efforts to reach Ife at her home, phone and social networks proved abortive during the session break. I was tempted to move out of the apartment and get another, just to clear up memories but all efforts to find another apartment of my taste during the break, proved abortive. So I decided I was going to live alone.

Time passed, still no word from Ife, the new session resumed. Surprisingly but rather expectedly, the session resumed with lots of surprises, such as Ronald moving into the apartment with Doyin. Both began to co-habit as couples. Not that it was new or odd so to say but because of the frequent fights and quarrels they engaged in, one would have thought they will both decide to let each other off the hook. Alas the reverse was the case.

More surprises rolled in as Uche and Ugo had to go on industrial training and their room which we thought would be vacant was let out to another guy, Kunle. Kunle was a corper, whose place of assignment was close to our house. He was lucky to meet with Ugo and Uche who needed someone to use the room while they were away. The appearance of Kunle into the house brought about new but surprising developments….