We are just broken pieces in the hands of the greatest.
~ Broken by Lecrae (Anomaly)

Ebun strode into the house from the back door, hoping she would be as invisible as the wind. The white shirt she wore was crinkled, with a brown footprint stained across the breast pocket to aggravate matters.

She knew the implication of getting her uniform smudged all too well.

Her facial appearance was the straw that broke the camel's back. Her hair had specks of sand, disfiguring its original texture and color.

The ziplock of her school backpack had gotten damaged. It took Cassandra nine days to get the bag done. She had misplaced some of the books that were inside even. More dangerously, there was a cut on her lower lip that traveled down to her chin.

It was very sharp and red with fresh, oozing blood. Ebun was just a twelve-year-old girl, and the only thing that was supposed to give her troubles, if any at all, were her quizzes and home-works but the only thing on her mind at that moment was how she'd let her guard loose for one second to have granted that bastard the chance to damage her lips in this manner.

At least once in every fortnight, she came home with either of the three: an unkempt hair, a loose button, or a tiny scratch on her arm. But never for once did she come home with an injury, even if she lost a fight.

Ebun was never the girl to lose. Agile and Wicked she was. But she had to portray herself as a timid, fragile last-born child of the family day in, day out. Especially once she stepped foot into the house.

But habit, they say, is like smoke. And smoke can indeed not be hidden.

Why else would she come home through the back door if she had nothing to hide or if she had a good, understandable reason ready to be given to her parents?

Right now, she hoped she would never have to think of a lie to tell. The process of telling a tale that had no affiliations with her truth was exhausting. They wouldn't understand.

All they would take from her tale was the fact that she got into a fight. And fights no matter what situation prompted it was 'bad.' Parents were selective listeners, so why try at all?

Thankful that she made it past the kitchen room without being seen, she held her bag firmly, covering the open spaces with her hands. She hurriedly walked in as noiselessly as she could towards the direction of her room.

Until she felt a hand rest on her shoulder, automatically, she made no further movements. The hand was wet on her shoulder, but the grip was firm. She knew who it was. She'd been caught.

Today wasn't her lucky day.

Slowly, she turned, her head fixed on her sandals that had lost their buckles as she now noticed. The sandals were new. Double trouble.

"What did you do at school today?" her mother's voice was arduous and seemingly tired of having to ask that question regularly, believing every single time that a day that would require her to ask that question again would never come.

The anger that came from that disappointment and dashed hopes reflected in her voice.

"emm...err...I..."

"ANSWER ME!" she screamed, then placed the tip of her index finger on the end of Ebun's chin, raising her daughter's face to create eye contact.

Unfortunately, there was a power supply. Somebody had illuminated the naturally dark passageway. It was bright enough to help Ebun's mother see the deep cut on her lip down to her chin. Ebun wished she'd put out the light while sneaking into the room.

Her mother gasped.

"I fought with someone, " she confessed. The fresh wound wouldn't even grant her the opportunity of telling fake tales.

Excessive movements of her teeth and tongue made it feel like a hefty pound of her lip would fall off, and she succumbed to that illusion because it seemed possible.

"Again? Whyever would you do that?" Folake's voice cracked. Tears found their way into her vocals. "What is your problem, Ebunoluwa? Your dad and I sent you to school to read your books and do well in life, but you come back all the time like you are in school for a different reason. Do you want to implicate me this girl?"

Her mother fell on her knees, face-palming as the tears rushed down. Ebun started to wish she could state her reasons and be perfectly understood. She didn't just go around looking for trouble. She didn't like to see her mother cry because of her, but she couldn't utter a word either.

"Who did you fight with? Why is there a cut on your lip?" her mother touched her face after getting a grip of herself. She cared too much for her last-born child to give any ass whooping of the sort.

"I fought with a bad boy. A nasty boy. But I won. This injury was the most damage he could do to me, " she risked the threat that her wounded lips offered with hopes that her statement would soothe her mother a little.

But it did the exact opposite, and it only made her realize just how audacious she was to wear a smile on her face even as she uttered those words with the scene replaying in her head.

While she felt like a champion once more, her mother's eyes went wide as dinner plates.

"Oh my! Is that something to be proud of?!" her mother panicked and squeezed her shoulders the way she wished she could press the obnoxiousness out of her heart. Ebun winced. "Why are you so stubborn? Why would you fight with a bad boy? He could have done worse things to you! Why? Why are you doing this?"

"SHE FOUGHT AGAIN?!" her dad's voice was heard, then his presence afterward. "Ebunoluwa, you fought AGAIN?!" he yelled.

Ebun began fidgeting, wishing her parents wouldn't get to catch her all the time. She might possess the tenacity and the agility of a grown woman, but she was just twelve, above those qualities, and she was just like a child who was terrible at hiding things.

She couldn't fight smoothly without leaving so many obvious signs. She wished she wouldn't get scolded every time. It was draining. Now she couldn't even dare to tell her dad that the boy she had fought with had deserved it. Not like she ever planned on doing so, but at least, the kind of explanation she gave her mother would have sufficed.

She feared her dad even if he was a sickle cell patient and could not make many movements without his walking stick.

"The next time you make your mother cry by doing something this dangerous when you should be focusing on your studies, forget about going to school. Now go to your room and don't come out till it's time for dinner!"

"Kelvin, you should allow me to treat her wound before she goes to her room, " her mother advocated for her nevertheless.

"There's a first aid box in her room. She should treat herself since she's good at throwing fists."

***

Ebun hoped her Dad's threat would be genuine so she would never go to school again. For sure, she knew this wasn't the last fight she was going to indulge in, even if she had gotten a lot of scolding.

However, as long as she went to school and kept on witnessing that bad boy harm people, she would never let it slide. If her parents wanted to make drastic and effective decisions, they had better do the needful.

The more she thought about the outturn of the day's events, the lesser the chances she had of feeling any regrets concerning her actions. She had caught the bastard harassing a particular senior at the corridor many times.

Ordinarily, Ebun had no business meddling in the business of older people. Still, each time she passed by that specific corridor, she studied the girl's countenance closely each time the guy reached for the hem of her skirt, roaming his hands to her butt cheeks.

She observed how the girl would gently remove his hands from touching parts of her body that could be sexualized. She heard the slight whimpers and groans even.

She noticed that they were always in the corridor when it was past closing time with no one around the school premises. So she stayed by the narrow passageway, with the passage afar giving a view of them both.

She tried to imagine the oppression the girl must have been subjected to and was so trapped that she didn't scream out loud for help. She never did. Maybe she used to but succumbed to her captivity eventually.

The guy never stopped when the girl begged him. Ebun noticed that too. It showed in her actions, reactions, and whispers that she didn't want any of it. Instead, he always smiled and went further. It infuriated Ebun so much, but she always refrained from fighting every time.

She opted for interrupting the action from going further instead. Whenever she spied during the closing hours and spotted the predator, and the girl who she was hoping wouldn't become a prey, that was the moment Ebun would walk briskly towards the water dispenser just by the lane leading to the corridor to fetch some water into her bottle.

Her intrusion always worked because the guy would leave in frustration. Although the girl never thanked her for her subtle rescue plans, Ebun took no offense because she could understand the aftermath of sexual harassment and how heavily it weighs on any girl.

The senior was most likely flustered, in shock, or sad from how demeaning the experience was.

Ebun became that innocent, little round-eyed junior with oversized clothes who just always happened to be thirsty during that hour that struck sexual exploitation.

It was apparent that the predator didn't know who she was, so he was clueless about her schemes. He could not yell at her or bully her out of fetching water from the dispenser. After all, a human being should have the simple right to drink water.

But today was the day Ebun had enough. Enough of it all. She deemed it appropriate to chose violence when she overheard that same sound of pain. The senior was crying softly this time, in lower tones, begging the same guy to stop.

Instead, the bastard kept growling like an animal as he forced kisses full of his saliva all over the sides of her neck. His hands were beneath her flared skirt, squeezing her derriere shamelessly.

Ebun cracked her knuckles and observed the scene before her for a few more seconds. She wanted to ascertain that most accurate time to step in. During her observation, she noticed that the guy was of average height. Just a little taller than her but with muscles for a deception.

It was beyond advantageous for her when she sneaked in, just right when he was still infesting the girl's neck with his saliva and hit his cheek with a loud slap. That indeed did separate the guy from the victim. He jerked his head towards Ebun in a millisecond like a wolf that perceived blood from miles away.

He held the affected cheek; his eyes were wide with inhuman rage. He moved his jaw at an excessive speed. How dare a little girl slap him well enough to make him lose his prey? The girl ran away immediately. His hands were free from its hold on her neck and buttocks.

Ebun saw the question burning in his gaze, and she stared right back, beyond ready to answer his questions, or better still, show him how much of a skanky pig he was by her actions.

Quickly, he walked right up to her and wrapped an arm around her neck, callously pressing down her thyroid glands with the pressure applied on her Adam's apple.

This move made her gurgle several times, trying hard to force any words out at all. The pressure intensified. Ebun felt her feet leave the ground, hanging in the air as her eyes slowly started to see black. The air was gradually becoming a scarce commodity.

Just as he was about to place his other hand to strengthen the force of the premeditated murder, Ebun was quick enough to yank the hand away, but that caused his long fingernail to scratch deeply across her lips. The pain was sudden, and she screamed sharply, but she didn't expect much to come out of that incident.

Fortunately, her five-second gasp seemed to distract the guy for a moment because she started to feel able to breathe. The pressure of his hand on her neck had decreased. She was able to see below the ceiling for a bit.

That was how intense the choking was.

She could barely even see the hands that were choking her, so it was a miracle that she was able to yank off the second hand that tried to rest on her neck. All she could see was the ceiling above her.

When she brought down her head for a bit, she saw the outline of his groin. Her eyesight at that moment was as sharp as an eagle's. So she straightened her leg with every force in her and pushed on the bulging organ beneath his trousers

It was a procedure that was sure to work every time. Once his head plopped to the ground with a thud, Ebun fell to the ground, grateful that she could feel the tiles again.

She didn't spare herself the moment to cough it all out and gasp in enough air as possible. Instead, she descended on the guy, her legs hounding his body to the ground. She even made sure to press her knees directly on his biceps to prevent him from moving an inch, and she started to throw punches on every part of his face that she could. His head hitting the ground harshly already took a good amount of his consciousness away.

She continued the process till she saw blood pour out of his nostrils. The blood wasn't enough, and she wanted it to flow from his face like water from an ungalvanized tap. So she punched and punched till she was satisfied with the view before her.

When blood started to drop from his ears, she stopped and rose. His face was a decoration of swollen purple sores and broken cheekbones even because his face had gone past the stage of bleeding.

When it looked like he would die, she wanted to speed up the process by reaching for his jugular with any sharp object close by, but when she couldn't find one, she let him be.

"Now you be the one to gaze at the heavens till your soul goes there. Or perhaps you should look down because heaven is not your place. Bastard."

"You will pay for this with your life. I promise you nosy witch. You think you can go all about saving the world, " blood dripped down his neck as he threatened.

His attempt to laugh came out as a wheeze of pain instead. "Let's see if you will be able to fight as you have now."

One thing Ebun loved the most was dares because she has always been one to prove people wrong. The memory was like a breath of fresh air to her nostrils in a small, stuffy room like hers.

As she applied the sterilizer on the open wound on her lip, she grinned internally, hoping that whatever the guy had in store for her had to be worth every ounce of her strength. The idiot had better do his worse because she was anticipating with all eagerness.