Ade and Ayo X: The End

TRIGGER WARNING: Blood, self harm, drug use, violence.

Thursday, April 22nd

'You can do this'

'You are strong, you are not a coward Ayo'

'You were raised by a Yoruba man who clawed his way to success. You can do anything'

'He can't destroy you anymore than he already has'

She walked into the house knowing two things: she no longer wanted to hurt, and she was exhausted . She had walked into his house many times in the past, each time hoping, praying that this time it would be different. She always hoped that this time a good time would be just that, a good time. She always hoped that he wouldn't do the thing that made her leave again.

She was surprised to see Ruth sitting on the kitchen counter, Ade shirtless and making her breakfast. He didn't flinch when she walked in, but Ruth did. She immediately jumped off the kitchen counter and looked down. Ruth was scared of her, there had been an incident: Ruth had confronted her about a bruise she had on arm. She had taunted her, "Look what we have here, a bruise on you, they said you were special, you were a unicorn. But I guess to him you're just like the rest of us." Ayo had snapped and smacked her once on both sides of her face. Since then, Ruth was scared of her.

She couldn't bring herself to feel pity for Ruth, Mixo pitied her a lot, but Ayo couldn't pity Ruth. It was the same with how she couldn't pity Lesedi. Both Lesedi and Ruth were people who thrived on Ade being horrible, and for that Ayo despised them both. She didn't feel bad for hitting Ruth, but she had known when she did it that it was a low thing to do, and completely out of character for her. She had accepted it as something Ade had left in her; his love for inflicting pain and feeling gratified by it.

She looked at Ade who still had his back turned to her. "I'm back," she said.

"What did I say Ruthie? She came back. She always comes back," he said, without bothering to look at her.

Ruth chuckled nervously, "Y-yes, she is back," Ruth looked her up and down, "You look beautiful Ayo."

Ayo scowled at her, she didn't understand what Ruth was doing there. Was this something he did often, bring his stalker into the house whenever she left him? She couldn't help but wonder how many times Ruth had come to the house, how often he would let her wear his clothes and how often he had slept with her; knowing that she was going to come back soon. "She looks disgusting. Don't lie Ruthie," said Ade. He had turned around and was wiping his hands with a handcloth.

Ayo felt her stomach sink, she had already been nervous about coming here. But when he looked at her with that disinterested look on his face, everything she had said to herself earlier washed away. Suddenly, she was eight years old again, her father frowning down at her in disapproval, asking her why she looked so muddy. "You are descendant from royalty, you must hold yourself to a higher standard Ayo". She was a child again, desperately keening for approval.

He always did that to her, Ade, he disarmed her in ways she could never really understand. She used to love that about him: that he saw into her soul, that was until he had started to use it against her. Now, as he looked at her confidence wash away, he smirked at her. He cocked an eyebrow, pulled Ruth towards him by the waist, and kissed her right in front of her.

Ayo scoffed, she couldn't believe him. He was always like this: petty, provocative. It only ever got worse: him using every method at his disposal to torment her, her lashing out. It always ended with her looking like the crazy one. He was so good at getting her to act out of character; and she despised him for it. This time though, she told herself, he wouldn't succeed. So even though she wanted nothing more than to pull Ruth away from him and scratch him in the face, she folded her arms and looked away.

"I'm here for the rest of my things Ade," she said.

Ade moaned and pushed Ruth away, "Ruthie go relax,"

Ruth slinked past Ayo, walking to the living room with her plate. Ade looked at her and smiled wide. Ade had a beautiful smile, a smile that she had fallen in love with; mostly because he rarely smiled like that. His wide smiles were reserved only for her, and sometimes Lesedi. When he smiled he looked really young, like a little boy. He looked innocent and fragile, and sad. When he smiled it was easy to see the extend to which his parents had broken his heart, and how desperate he was to be loved.

Not for the first time, she wished he would stop hurting her, wished that she could fix him; then they would be together. She looked into his eyes, she saw the man she loved, but she knew how easily that look could change. She knew how easily he could turn cold and cruel. She knew his cruelty knew no limits. She wanted nothing to do with it.

"I missed you my Ayo," he said, walking closer to her.

If she still cared, she would ask him why Ruth was there. 'If you love me so much then why is she here'. But Ayo was tired, she wanted to get upstairs, take her things and leave. Mixo thought they were there so they could get some grand expose on Ade, but really, she had asked Mixo to come because she was scared. Scared of what she would do to him, after what he had done to her. So she had told Mixo to hide somewhere Ade wouldn't see and take a video of everything that was happening: that was the only way she could guarantee she wouldn't kill him.

Still, standing so close to him, it took everything in her not to wrap her hands around his throat. She cleared her throat, "I'm just here to get my clothes. We're done, Ade."

He started laughing. "You're not leaving me Ayo, you love me. Even if you leave now, you're going to come back," he closed the distance between them and kissed her forehead, "I love you too, and I'm sorry about what happened last time. So I'll humour you, you can go take your things upstairs. But don't pack too much, it will be too much to unpack when you come back."

She should have been angered by that. She normally would be. She would normally scream at him, yell that she was never coming back and that she hated him. However, she was tired. Her body was still recovering from losing that much blood, her womb ached, and she just wanted to rest. She was too tired to argue that day, too tired to fight him, so she dragged herself to the room she had shared with him. Ade watched her go up the stairs, apprehension in his eyes. She was different, he just couldn't tell how. He knew she would be fine, she had ways of healing herself, fixing all the things inside her that he broke. So he took a seat next to Ruth and watched Ayo walk into the bedroom.

Walking into the room her eyes flitted over to the bathroom door, the door was closed. Her breath caught, and she couldn't help but wonder if Ade had cleaned up her blood. It had been six days, so she hoped that he had. She hoped that he would do her that curtesy. When she had left last time, she hadn't been able to clean up the blood. She'd only taken a few clothes and toiletries, her smallest suitcase and taken an uber to the hospital. Ade hadn't noticed her leaving because he'd been passed out from drugs. If he had been awake, she knew that he would have made her clean up. Afterwards, she'd taken a cab to Mixo's.

She walked over to the bathroom, took a few deep breaths and turned the doorknob. Seeing the sight in front of her, she gasped, "He forbade me from cleaning it, said he wanted you to learn your lesson. He said you weren't allowed to leave without saying goodbye," Lesedi said. He had come from his bedroom. Seeing Ayo standing there in a white dress, he couldn't help but feel sorry for her. The blood was disgusting enough for him, he couldn't imagine what it was like for her. "He's been using my bathroom for the past few days. I had convinced him that he should let me clean it tomorrow. But, well, here you are."

The bathroom was as she'd left it. There were the white towels that had been stained with her blood, the stale water that was mixed with her blood in the bath, claw marks on the bathroom door from when she had been begging him to let her out. Everything was exactly how she left it, the blinds and windows were closed, so the place smelled absolutely terrible. The stench of blood was so strong that she felt like no time had passed at all.

Ayo felt the walls closing in on her, she couldn't breathe anymore. She felt herself collapse onto her knees, but she couldn't see past her own tears. She started scratching her thighs through her skirt. Her entire body was shaking, as she heaved through deep, guttural sobs. She started beating her chest, she couldn't breathe, and she felt she would do anything for air. Her cries were so loud they were heard throughout the entire house. Lesedi had never seen her like this; for the first time, he knew that Ade had broken her. She was a mess, muttering and moaning in a language he couldn't quite comprehend. She kept calling out for her mother. Soon, she started banging her head against the floor.

Lesedi crouched near her and took her body into his hands. This was the closest to empathy he had ever felt for any of Ade's girlfriends, and he felt bad for Ayo. She had been innocent, hadn't she? She had been naïve and young and better than Ade in every way, and he had destroyed her for it. "Shhh Ayo, don't cry. You know he hates loud crying," he said. "Be quiet, it's going to be okay," he kept saying to her. The last thing he wanted was for Ayo to bleed out on the floor again, Ade would make her clean that up as well. He was hell-bent on punishing her, and Lesedi couldn't figure out why.

Although, part of him suspected that it had something to do with the used pregnancy test he had taken out of the trash for Ade to find. He knew that pregnancy was a no-go for Ade, in fact, everyone knew that. Ayo had taken great care to hide that pregnancy test, she'd wrapped it in tissue and put it at the bottom of the trash, but Lesedi had fished it out and put it somewhere Ade would see. He had hoped that when Ade saw the test, he would do to Ayo what he had done to Mixo and Angel. Still, he hadn't expected the bathroom fiasco. He wouldn't say that to Ayo though, no, he would just hold her and comfort her as she shook and cried. He could only hope that Ade wouldn't come up the stairs.

Ayo wailed in despair, she couldn't believe that he hadn't cleaned the bathroom. She couldn't believe that he had slept peacefully while knowing the evidence of her pain was in the next room, she couldn't believe that he had slept with Ruth with the evidence of her pain right there. For the first time, it struck her that she loved an animal. What a lonely thought that was: the man that she loved was a monster. She couldn't help but feel disgusted with herself, she had kept the company of a monster, loved a monster, nurtured a monster, for months. She kept scratching herself all over, hoping that if she scrubbed hard enough she could rub him off of her. She couldn't hear Lesedi, who was still trying to coo her into keeping quiet.

Ade walked into the room and found the two of them on the floor, Ayo in Lesedi's arms. He had heard her wailing from the living room, and wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Ayo knew better than to cry so loud, they had neighbours, nosy ones who liked calling the police. He took her from Lesedi's arms and laid her down on their bed.

"Ayo, baby, shhh, don't cry so hard hmm, you'll wear yourself out." he said, Ayo was starting to come out of her stupor, and she could hear him clearly. Ade grabbed both of her arms and pinned them above her head, making sure that she couldn't keep hurting herself.

"We had a rule the two of us: 'don't give me a reason to punish you and I won't hurt you'." He was right, it was something they had come up with after he had beat her with a belt. Ade had a way of making her feel like his beatings were her fault. So they had set a few rules; as long as she didn't break them he wouldn't have to hit her. "It was a condition of us being together; you follow my rules, and I followed yours. I played my part; I loved you and took care of you. You failed at yours, you fell pregnant, and then you tried to hide it. Worse, you lied about cutting ties with Mixo. So I have to punish you, now you want to cry like I'm was being unfair to you. Come, my Ayo, that's not fair."

Ayo hiccupped and looked into his eyes through glassy eyes, "I don't want to be with you anymore. I'm tired Ade. Let me go," She knew he wouldn't let her go, but she hoped that Lesedi would. Lesedi would make Ade let her leave, she knew that much. So she looked at Lesedi and pleaded, "Let me go,"

Ade noticed that she was looking at Lesedi and he squeezed her wrists even harder, pinching the skin there painfully. He put his full body weight on her and occluded her view of Lesedi. "Lesedi, give us privacy," he said. Lesedi stayed where he was, unsure of who he should listen to between the two of them. Ayo was begging him to help her, and Ade was clearly thinking about himself.

Ayo wasn't shocked by Lesedi's lack of action, he had always been a coward. When he wasn't a coward, he was helping Ade get away with murder. Ade was suffocating her and she didn't have the strength to fight him off, so she tried something she was sure would bother him, "Mixo is watching us right now you know? She's taking a video of this whole thing. Do you want your fans to know that you're a rapist Ade?"

He stared at her, hesitant. The curtains were open and the door to the balcony was open. No one could see them in here, there was a tree-line that had been planted outside that hid the bedroom balcony from the street, but the trees were tall and thick enough that a person could climb onto them and peer into the bedroom. Lesedi looked out into the treeline, he couldn't see anyone. He was sure she was bluffing, but her bluff was enough to get Ade to release her.

Ade opened the bedside drawer and took out his drug kit. Ayo sat up on the bed, hugged her arms around her knees and rested her head there. Lesedi sighed; drugs were one way Ade always got his way with her. He was sure it had been a while since she'd gotten high, and this would be her first fix in nearly a week. Ade took out a bag of cocaine, a razor and a straw. He sat outside, on the balcony, where Mixo would have a clearer view if she was indeed watching like Ayo had said. He set everything up on the coffee table. He started putting out a few lines, watching Ayo as he did. She was watching him intently, waiting for his permission. You see, they had rules for drugs too.

Lesedi knew what Ade was trying to do, so he protested, "Ade, don't."

Ayo was tired and in pain. She hated Ade, she was angry and sad. She knew that getting high would make the pain go away. Getting high would numb her pain so she could breathe again. She just wanted to breathe. So she decided that she would play along with Ade, just for a fix.

"No Lesedi, stay out of this. She wants this, needs it. She came back for this, that's why she was so angry earlier, and crying like that." He looked at Ayo, "I'm sorry baby, I should have known. Ayo baby, come," With a simple command, Ayo crawled to the coffee table. Lesedi couldn't believe it. She was trained. Ade gave her the straw, "Here. Two lines," Ayo sniffed two lines of the cocaine. Lesedi could tell she wanted more, but she would wait because Ade would tell her what to do.

"Take my shoes off," he said. She didn't want to, but she would do anything for another line. Lesedi knew he was just doing this to bait Mixo. He hated her, and Lesedi had never understood why. Ayo of course, had forgotten about Mixo, her only thought was that this high would be her last, so she wanted to enjoy it. She took off Ade's shoes, and removed his socks as well for good measure. He liked it when the fresh air hit his toes.

Ade smiled down at her, kneeling in front of him. "Do you think we should give Mixo a show? Do you think your friend wants to watch you fuck me in exchange for a few grams of cocaine?" Ayo looked up at him then, her ears ringing. Ade had a way of saying things that filled her with pure rage. She hated him for it. Oh, she hated him so much, how could he say that to her, and treat her this way then claim that he loved her? Still, she knew her body, and she would do anything to get mind-numbingly high. She was already starting to feel the effects of the cocaine, and she wanted more. So if he asked her to, she would let him fuck her on the balcony for that cocaine. In front of Lesedi, in front of Mixo, in a place where the entire neighborhood could see.

"No Ade, stop it. That's enough, don't go too far," Lesedi said, he was worried about where this would go. He was well aware that Mixo ran a very popular instagram page dedicated to ruining Ade's life, if a sex tape was released on that page it would put a lot of things in ruin. He couldn't risk it, and also, he wanted Ayo to leave. Ade had done too much to her, and he could tell that she had reached dangerous levels of self-destruction.

Ade persisted with his monologue. He started ranting about Mixo, how she'd thought she was better than him, how he'd destroyed her, how her obsession with him was pathetic. Ayo listened, intently, but on her mind she was only thinking of what she could say, what she could do to get him to allow her another line.

Still, Ade ranted, "and you, if you hadn't fallen pregnant me and you could have been a lifetime. I thought you loved me, my Ayo, why would you get pregnant? Why would you do that to me?" He asked her, staring down at her with a mixture of hurt and disgust in his eyes, "I thought that maybe it was a mistake. That's why I did what I did, I was trying to correct you mistake. I was trying to make things right for both of us. Then you just left,"

Ade hadn't noticed it, but Ayo had grabbed the razor. She was shaking again. It had only taken him mentioning the abortion for her to snap. Lesedi noticed her grabbing the razor and blinked, "Ayo..." he warned. He was too late, Ayo took the razor and cut Ade across the face. She lunged at him, aiming for his neck, "I'm going to kill you, you bastard!" she sobbed. Everything had come down to this: he had killed her baby. A baby she'd wanted desperately, and she would make him pay for it. She cut his neck, however the razor couldn't cut deep enough to kill.

Lesedi grabbed her from behind and tried to pull the razor from her hands, only managing to leave minor cuts on both their hands. Ayo tried her best to kick out of Lesedi's hold, managing to kick at Ade and the coffee table instead. The coffee table tipped over, resulting in the cocaine flying all over.

Ade brought his hand to his face and was stunned when it came back with blood. He wiped the blood away with the sleeve of his shirt and looked at Ayo, who was still trying to fight her way out of Lesedi's arms. Finally, she flew out of his arms and fell into the balcony glass. Ade took the coffee table and threw it in her direction, it crashed into the balcony glass, causing it to break, glass flying everywhere. Some of it pierced Ayo's skin. However, she couldn't feel it, the high had truly kicked in now.

She was thrilled, happy even. She felt better than she had in days. She crawled over to where the cocaine was on the floor and started sniffing it. She was probably going to overdose, but she didn't care. She just knew she needed more. Enough that she could forget what it was to feel pain. Ade, on the other hand was furious. They had another rule: they could fight, bruise and hurt one another, they belonged to one another, but never the face. Ayo had broken their cardinal rule.

"You bitch! Come here," he picked Ayo up by her neck and smashed her head against the wall. It happened so fast, she stumbled first, until she felt and rolled to the balcony edge. She finally fell off, but her dress caught on a glass shard that was still attached to the floor. She hung there for a long time, the wind swaying her body sideways.

The room was deathly silent, Ruth had ran upstairs upon hearing the commotion. She stood in the doorway stunned. Lesedi was terrified, he had just seen his best friend commit murder. He was covered in her blood, from earlier when she had been scratching at herself, and Ade's blood, from the cut on his face. His heart was beating so fast that he couldn't bring himself to think. Ayo was dead, he couldn't believe it. Ade walked to the edge of the balcony and looked at Ayo's lifeless body.

He hadn't meant to kill her. He loved her, staring at her then, he loved her. He would do anything to take the past few minutes back, reverse what he had done. He looked at his hands, the ones that had crushed her skull, and he felt a deep shame overcome him. How could he have done that to her? To Ayo, the only girl he had ever loved? He started crying, going down on his knees, his head in his hands. He realized that he had done something terrible.

"Call your father Ade, I'll call mine." said Lesedi, he grabbed Ruth by the hand and asked her to gather all her things. "Take everything that's yours Ruth, and go. If anyone asks, you were never here. And if you have to, you lie. You lie for him, you protect him."

Ruth nodded her head mindlessly. She couldn't believe that Ayo was dead. Part of her was relieved, with Ayo gone that meant she could find space in Ade's life. Still, she couldn't help but feel sorry for Ayo.

And so it was that Ayo Abiola had died. An accident, a disaster, a tragedy. Samuel Orifa paid the police to make it look like a suicide, his only son was not going to be labeled a murderer.

You see friends, this was never a love story. It is the story of obsession, lust, and everything in between. It's the story of how one woman had to die, and how a system built for the rich failed her.

The End