AFTER THE SHADOWS: A Thin Escape

Chapter 5

On his way home, James could not understand why life had proven to be so tough on him. To some extent, he thought something he did that God was not happy about and suffering was the punishment. On the other side, being a Christian, he properly understood that God could never do such a thing to him. He is a forgiving God. In conclusion, James thought of it as the suffering he had to go through to salvation.

Mr. Peterson had been a principal for such a long time to know that students can be cunning sometimes. He sent James on the suspension because he needed to release the tension in school and so that he could have a good time to know the truth about the matter.

He knew that once Julia saw James go, she could show her reaction and from this, he could tell what happened. After all, he was sure that Julia would eventually want to show herself to the others and tell them the whole story.

 One thing there is for a fact is that a teenager was, is and will always be a teenager. One can never conceal their emotions at this stage. At least not for long before, they explode. A teenager is a ticking time bomb. This was the case for Julia. She felt such a winner and she had to prove it to the rest of the students.

Julia went ahead to share her story with her friend telling them that she had found the best way to be immune to the teacher's wrath and to be feared. She told them of what she had done to James for refusing to honor her request for seduction. She could not mask her feelings and ego to keep these stories untold.

Lucky enough for James, the students hated their teacher’s absence. They shared this information with the principal and volunteered to testify against Julia in the next hearing of the case. Julia was not aware of this.

Everybody in school had learned of who Julia really was. Before the episode, Julia was still a hard nut to crack. She was the kind that did not care about anything including her studies.

She was in school just because her parents had paid the fees and because it was normality for all to go through schooling. The other teachers including the principal knew about this but they could not rush to the conclusion that she was lying.

On the other end, James' life was proving to be tough. He had no job currently and all he had was to sit in his room for days thinking about the outcome of the case and many prayers asking God to deliver him from Delilah.

He never imagined that his life of being a teacher was to be ended by a student like that. The worst part of this story for him was that his parents had learned about his suspension and the case. He never thought of them that much against him but he was surprised that even they thought that he wanted to rape the girl.

The reason they had to prove this is that James was a dictator and one who could not listen to anybody. This was why he had to run away from home. Above this, they said that he went to rent his own house away so that he could be soiling these young schoolgirls without anybody knowing about it.

These accusations made James' brains to boil as he was in search of a solution. The worst for him was how to explain the story to his girlfriend to prove his innocence. Lucky enough for him, she was not the type to jump on things anyhow and she listened to him.

In the whole saga, she happened to be the only person in support of James though he thought she could be the first to bail out.

One morning, he was woken by the tunes from his phone. It was a message from one of his high school buddies. It was on Valentine’s Day and James had no clue whatsoever. This text message got him up to speed.

Without any more waste of time, he had to make the best out of the day and get the pressure off his head concerning Julia’s case for a while. It was time for him to be with his love. Time to offload!

He called his Girlfriend Maxine to invite her over to his place so that they could celebrate together. Maxine on the other side was very excited by this call from her lover James. Without waste of time, she prepared herself to go meet her love and spend the day together.

Before she could leave, she was supposed to notify her parents of her ware bouts. In the African community, it is a taboo for a girl to visit a man privately before marriage. Be that as it may, Maxine did not care about that.

Those ethics were meant for their parents and not them. To her, they had already been passed by time. She could not tell her parents that she was going to visit James though. She knew that if they found out about it, her day could be ruined with the rumors that were ongoing about James. 

She made up an excuse in order to get permission to leave her home. Their parents were not aware of this relationship yet. It had not come time for them to know about it. Away Maxine went on to meet her love.

On the other end, James went out to prepare in wait for his love and to get her gifts. From Maxine’s home to James' place, it was not a long distance. It was just a short walking distance and then a ten-minute travel distance.

Thirty minutes later, Maxine was at James' place. James was so happy to see her. It had been quite some time without James having shown a smile on his face. This day was different. He had to make it up for those others that he had been sad and deep in thoughts.

Just like the rest of the population of lovers, these two lovebirds made the best out of their day and shared many promises about not leaving each other, as it is always normality during this day.

As the day was ending, James and Maxine had the best of it. Maxine encouraged James not to give up and to strive and stand by the truth. Birds of a feather flock together. Maxine was a Christian just like James. Just to let you know, James and Maxine were from the same church.

Apart from them being from the same neighborhood, they went to the same church. She was deep in faith just like James. With all the comforts from her, James got his strength back and was ready to face Julia in the next hearing.

Finally, it was evening and they parted after spending the day together and visiting a few places for fun. Though James had been comforted by his girlfriend, he could not get the whole fear out of him.

He still could not help thinking about what could happen if things did not go to his favor and his losing the job afterwards. On the other hand, he was afraid of the people’s rebukes even in the church where he was a leader and of what he was to say and do if, everything turned sour.

It was time to let go and meditate on the beautiful moments he had with Maxine during the day. It was time for him to let bygones be just bygones.