She searched everywhere—under the bucket, inside the clothes, around the wall, under the stool. Nothing.
Fear spread through her immediately. In that house, missing money was never just missing money.
She went to Helen and told her.
Helen exploded before Chica could finish explaining.
“What do you mean you can’t find it? Go and find that money. If you can’t, you will replace it.”
“I don’t have any money, Ma.”
“That is not my problem.”
Then, desperate and trembling, Chica said the one thing she should not have said aloud.
“Ma… it was Bianca that took it.”
Helen’s face changed at once.
“What did you say?”
“Ma, I’m telling the truth—”
“Get out!” Helen shouted. “Get out before I lose my temper!”
Chica left the room burning with shame and anger. She went to Bianca and Linda’s room and asked if they had seen the money.
Bianca’s smile vanished.
“What money?” she asked coldly.
When Chica persisted, Linda snapped, “Don’t ever ask us that kind of useless question again.”
Bianca screamed, “Get out!”
Chica returned to Helen to say the money was still missing. Helen’s patience was gone.
“So you want me to give you more money?” she said bitterly. “You think money is growing in this compound?”
Then she said something even worse—something that felt less like help than like a trap.
“Go into the room there. There is money inside. Go and take the same amount. If I catch you…”
She didn’t finish the sentence. She didn’t have to.
Chica understood.
That same afternoon, while her heart was still shaking from the accusation, a young man appeared at the gate.
He was handsome, neatly dressed, and spoke politely. His name was Kelvin.
He had noticed Chica before and came to ask if he could get to know her.
Chica, terrified of being seen talking to a stranger, begged him to leave.
But just then Helen stepped outside, saw him, and immediately changed. The anger disappeared. Her face softened. She invited him in with warmth Chica had not seen in a long time.
Bianca and Linda appeared at once, sweet and smiling.
Kelvin looked at Chica more than once. Helen noticed.
Finally, he said it openly: “Ma, I would like your permission to take Chica out, to get to know her better.”
Bianca’s smile froze.
Helen answered without hesitation. “That will be difficult. She is engaged. Her husband’s people will soon come for the final marriage rites.”
Chica’s heart dropped. It was a lie. A smooth, instant lie.
Then Helen turned to Bianca and Linda as if she had a better option ready. “But I have two beautiful daughters. They are single.”
Kelvin was polite, but his disappointment showed.
After he left, the truth came out in whispers.
Bianca panicked. If Kelvin later discovered that Chica was never engaged, he might return for her.
So they made a decision.
“Marry her off quickly,” Bianca said. “Before he comes back.”
Linda suggested someone: “That poor man from the mall. The one who wanted to marry her.”
His name was Obina.
He came to the house not long after.
He was handsome in a quiet, unforced way. Strong, neat, respectful. Helen asked him what he did.
“I’m the chief security officer at a large mall in Lagos,” he said.
Bianca scoffed. “So, a gate man.”
Obina did not react.
Helen studied him. Poor. Handsome. Manageable. Exactly the kind of man she wanted Chica sent away to.
She introduced him to Chica and quickly granted him permission to take her out.
Obina did not take Chica anywhere fancy. He admitted immediately that he did not have money for an expensive restaurant.
“I still want us to talk,” he said. “Can we eat somewhere simple?”
His honesty surprised her.
They ate at a modest place nearby. During the conversation, Obina said something that made her go still.
“I don’t like lies,” he said. “So let me ask directly. Madam Helen—is she your biological mother?”
Chica froze, but then answered honestly.
“No.”
He nodded slowly. “Thank you. I wanted to hear the truth from you.”
Then he asked another question.
“Why would you agree to talk to someone like me? A woman like you can marry any man.”
Chica answered simply, “Poor today does not mean poor tomorrow. Hard work matters. Someone can be down now and still rise later.”
Obina went quiet.
Then, perhaps because he listened gently and without mocking her, Chica found herself saying more.
“Since Thomas died, I’ve been abused,” she confessed. “Verbally, mentally… every day. They talk to me like I’m nothing.”
Obina’s face changed. For the first time, he stopped seeing her as a girl being thrown away and started seeing the wound she carried.
When he walked her back later, he did not touch her or rush her. He kept a respectful distance and thanked her for talking to him.
That was how hope first entered her life again—carefully, like it did not want to get hurt.
After that, Obina started visiting more often. He was never loud, never forceful. Chica slowly began to relax around him.
Then one day, he told her a difficult truth.
“I am struggling,” he said, “not only because of money. My sight is failing.”
From then on, Chica noticed the signs she had missed before: the dark glasses, the careful steps, the cane. He told her there were days when everything looked like smoke, and he feared one day he might become fully blind.
Chica never mocked him. Never pitied him. She simply adjusted.
“If there is a step, I’ll tell you.”
“Hold my arm.”
That quiet acceptance softened something in him.
