Read Story: SEASON 1 EPISODE 4
The Breadwinner Episode Four
John is a troubled man. For the third week running, his landlord has been on his neck for him to renew the rent of their apartment but he had failed to do so. Each afternoon, the landlord would come to threaten that he would kick John and his family out of the apartment. John had pleaded for more time, informing the landlord that he had been jobless for months. The landlord turned deaf ears to his passionate pleas. He gave John 24 hours to pay up or be kicked out of the apartment.
John has been thinking about the problem
without knowing how to inform his wife so she
could bring money for them to settle the rent. He
is already aware that if his wife was going to
bring the money, it would be accompanied with
a lot of insults and debasing comments. He had
avoided telling her for many weeks but he had
no option anymore. So when his wife returned
from work that evening, he opened up to her.
"My dear, our rent is overdue and the landlord has been on my neck to pay up but I have not been able to do that because my pocket is as dry as the desert. I have been meaning to discuss with you to see if you can raise some money for us to us and pay our rent. The landlord has given us 24 hours to pay up or be kicked out. Is there anything you can do to help?" John asked his wife who was busy eating on the dinning table. John had cooked the food and served her when she returned from work.
"Do you know you are so shameless? You have no atom of shame inside of you. You have the guts to ask your wife to pay the rent of the apartment you and your children live in. What kind of man are you? What kind of man confronts his wife asking her to pay rent?" Miriam asked John in-between mouthfuls.
"It is not confrontation my dear. While I acknowledge that it is my responsibility to pay up the rent as the man of the house, currently I'm not financially boyant. Since I'm jobless and penniless, there's nothing wrong if my wife pays up our rent. After all, the Bible calls you a help meet for me. This means you are to help me if I'm not capable." John responded.
"At this point, it baffles me why you still call yourself the man of the house. Can we really say that you are still a man? Don't you think you have lost that title? The only thing that still gives the title of a man is the long John Thomas in-between your legs. Apart from that, no one in their right senses would call you a man." Miriam was talking to her husband with painful words.
"But I'm still a man. It's only job that I don't have but I'm going to get a job soon and all these insults would stop. But like I said, we need to pay up the rent to avoid being thrown out into the streets by the landlord. So if you have money, please bring it let is use." John pleaded with his wife.
"My dear, stop decieving yourself that you are still a man. A man that cannot feed his family or pay house rent. A man that cannot pay children's school fees or buy fuel for his car, is that one still a man? Anyway, how much is the house rent?" Miriam asked when she finally decided to discuss the real issue tabled by John.
"The rent is N500,000 as usual." John responded.
"Look at how you are calling the money as if it is just N5,000. I can't afford N500,000 even if I saved my salary for five years. We would have to relax and wait for the landlord to kick us out." Miriam said.
"No now, how can you say that? There must be something we can do to avoid the overwhelming embarrassment. Even if it is half of the money, you can bring it let me use it and beg the landlord." Said John.
"I said I don't have any money in my account. My salary is not enough to cover house rent." John's wife said in anger
John knew she was telling lies because he had secretly checked her bank account and found out that his wife had N900k in it. When John was working, his wife never spent her own money because John was paying for everything in the house. Miriam saved all her salary back then. But she has refused to bring it out to solve the lingering rent problem.
As silence fell in the room, Miriam picked up her phone and dialed a number. Someone picked and it was a man's voice that John was hearing over the phone.
"Please darling, can you help me with something? I'm in a deep financial mess right now. Our rent is due and there's no money to pay up. Can you raise some money for me?" Miriam asked the man on the phone.
"I can do anything for you my dear, because you are such a sweet beautiful woman. Please send your account number immediately. I'm sending you N1 million." The man said with a jovia voice.
Immediately after Miriam sent the account number, an alert came into her phone. John peeped and saw that it was N1 million.
"I have transfered N500,000 to your account. Use it and pay the house rent when the landlord comes tomorrow. If you like, use the money for another thing, that's your business. Don't ask me for any money again if you misuse it." Miriam said as she stood up from the dinning table.
"Who is that person that sent you money?" John asked.
"He is a man. A real man. Not someone like you who can't pay rent. You see what that man did? That is what real men do. You see he just sent me N500,000 without asking questions. That's a man, not a weakling like you who is jobless and poor." Miriam said as she leaves the room.
John made up his mind that he was not going to use the money sent by the unknown man to pay the house rent.
"How can I be alive and another man will be sending my wife money and calling her 'sweet' in my presence? No, I can't take this. I will return the money to her. It is better for the landlord to kick us out than for me to pay the rent with this money. I will find another way to pay the rent." John said with pride and ego.
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