Chameleon: The Female of the Species Book 1

By Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet

Darkness festers in aggrieved hearts.

From abused street urchin to lead mobster, Jenny Park’s story is unusual,
dark, mysterious and somewhat heart wrenching. Is she a heroine or the villain?
Even she doesn’t have the answer to this as she struggles to make her way in a new world that was thrust upon her by no will of her own.
All she knows is that she will never be hungry, raped or abused again.
And she’s willing to go to lengths – even to kill if she must – to ensure this.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet
• Release date: Sep 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9782957370801

Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet

Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet was born in Lagos, Nigeria - the daughter of a diplomat - the family travelled a few days later to New York, then Havana, Cuba, where she learnt Spanish as a first language.When the family left for England four years later she learnt English and her father – Mr Emmanuel Udenna Ezinwa - taught her to read and write there in a fun way that inclined her to fall in love with the wonderful world of story books. Her entire family were avid readers and her father was keen on the literary arts.Nneka’s first book – The Muse – an anthology of poems, prose and wise sayings - was published in 2004 and led to her successful 12 year career in the advertising industry.During her advertising life span she edited magazines and books on the side and continued to write several unpublished stories and works of poetry.In her later years she joined a team called –Read Africa (Closet Space) and contributed an informal essay about her life in Ethiopia during one of her father’s diplomatic postings.The female of the species is a book close to her heart that she has been working on, writing and rewriting for the past 14 years.

Book preview

The female of the Species

BOOK 1

CHAMELEON

Nneka EZINWA de DOUHET

Copyright © 2020 Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-2-9573708-0-1

To my Korean sister from another mother – Jenny Chun-n Parks

who showed me so much love in a foreign land.

.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nneka Ezinwa de Douhet was born in Lagos, Nigeria - the daughter of a diplomat - the family travelled a few days later to New York, then Havana, Cuba, where she learnt Spanish as a first language.

When the family left for England four years later she learnt English and her father – Mr Emmanuel Udenna Ezinwa - taught her to read and write there in a fun way that inclined her to fall in love with the wonderful world of story books. Her entire family were avid readers and her father was keen on the literary arts.

Nneka’s first book – The Muse – an anthology of prose, poetry and inspirational quotes- was published in 2004 and led to her successful 12-year career as a copywriter in the advertising industry.

During her advertising life span she yet edited books, magazines, worked as a columnist for several magazines and continued to write several unpublished stories and works of poetry.

In her later years she joined a team called –Read Africa (Closet Space) and contributed an informal essay about her life in Ethiopia during one of her father’s diplomatic postings.

The Female of the Species is a book close to her heart that she has been working on, writing and rewriting for the past 14 years.

CONTENTS

1 SO PRETTY Pg 4

2 THE JOURNEY Pg 24

3 THE HAPPENSTANCE OF JENNY Pg 61

4 A CHAMELEON BLENDS IN Pg 84

5 TIME Pg 102

6 DARK NIGHTS OF A LOST SOUL Pg 132

7 LEE AND CHAN Pg 138

8 BYUNG-WOO AND THE PRANKRATION FIGHTERS Pg 158

9 FIGHTING FIRE WITH FIRE Pg 175

10 THE LIBERATION OF MING Pg 199

11 PRINCES, SCANDAL, SEX AND SHAUN Pg 212

12 AND THEY ALL FALL DOWN Pg 261

13 AN UNEXPECTED HEIR Pg 278

14 REVENGE IS A DISH BEST SERVED COLD Pg 290

EPILOGUE Pg 317

None of these stories were inspired by actual events, names and places are fictitious.

Any resemblance to actual names and places are entirely coincidental.

How covetous, nigh’ amorous,

Creatures of vasculature clout.

Erythrocyte exoergicity,

Fiery combustibility,

Eyes misshapen like a mouth.

Mouth anfractuous like the eyes.

Hips victorious, hence notorious,

Catalysing then snuffing out life.

Moist piles of diorite clay.

Coiling crackle glaze formation

Kiln-forge an angel or devil…

Just ne’er delay.

The soul paves the way.

Your grip on life’s sway.

Scour the lamp, let the genie play

Rub her wrong and well…one cannot say.

BOOK 1

One little riddle

The female of the species is deadlier than the male,

I’m usually tagged the ‘enchanting’ femme fatale.

That tag is a farce, the oxymoron of my riddle,

I am the frisky vibes off a mad man’s new fiddle.

Always on the move, I leave tracks of sorrow,

I love you today, and leave you in the morrow.

I have multiple faces so you cannot catch me,

I have a constant itch, I want you to scratch me.

I’m brainy and witty and clever and quick,

My tongue is a charmer for any one I ‘smit’.

I’m full of ideas, the colour of life.

The bearer of hope, Harbinger of strife.

I’m the apple of your eye.

What am I?

CHAMELEON

The name Chameleon means earth lion and is derived from the Greek words chamai (on the ground, on the earth) and leon (lion). The Chameleon adapts to its environment unseen and unnoticed. There is a sense of remote viewing and auric sensitivity.

In a person, ‘hiding in the shadows’ allows one to quietly watch, listen and learn, appearing to have greater knowledge than is actually possessed, while keeping their own thoughts and intentions secret.

The changeable nature of the chameleon keeps it from standing out like a tasty morsel, thereby surviving longer. With people of this nature, survival is enhanced, but human empathy is lost.

-1-

So pretty

She was so pretty.

Born Nkechi Ononuju in 1976.

Born beautiful.

Born lucky.

But not all at once.

In the beginning, she was born into a very poor home in Agege, Lagos, Nigeria.

Agege was one of the poorest neighbourhoods in town with plenty of shacks and rundown shanty huts littering the streets, all huddled in ridiculously close proximity of one another.

Nkechi and her family lived in one of them.

Her father sold marijuana for a living and often disappeared for weeks on end whenever he got busted, leaving Nkechi and her mother no choice but to beg for money on the streets until whichever time he’d come back and start making money again. Going to bed hungry was no uncommon thing at her house, and neither were scenes of her father beating her mother up, over the slightest thing, and her mother screaming. If Nkechi cried or tried to get him to stop, he would beat her up too, so she quickly learnt not to interfere and would run out of the house most times when they were ‘at it.’

The older Nkechi got, the more she realised that her mother and father’s relationship was of a purely saprophytic nature. There was no love between these two as was the norm in most households around them.

Her mother cooked, cleaned and kept house for her dad and he provided an average amount of the income. How these two met and married in the first place Nkechi would never know since it was almost taboo to discuss emotional or personal issues in their minuscule family unit.

Her mother’s name was Christy and her father’s was John. John was handsome, huge bodied and very dark skinned. Christy was plain looking, dark, skinny and scrawny. No hips. No boobs. No ass. No face. She’d aged before her time due to hardship.

Nkechi took after her dad in the looks department except for the weight. She was as ebony black as him with smooth shiny skin. She was very skinny, but already at nine, one could tell she would soon develop a voluptuous body. She had it all. Hips, boobs, a tantalizing mouth and smile. Large captivating eyes, a taller height than her mates, and legs that went on for miles and miles. She was indeed a manifestation of God’s glory in the midst of chaos.

The Ononuju’s both hailed from Abia State and their extended ‘impoverished’ families still lived there. John was very lazy and would do nothing more tedious than to sell drugs. Nkechi loathed him since forever she could remember. All he ever did was shout, beat and fuck her… but we’ll come to the latter bit later.

Her relationship with her mother was barely cordial too. Christy was as harsh as her husband. She worked Nkechi like a slave right from when she was as little as four. By the age of nine, Nkechi did all the washing, cooking and cleaning in the house. Her mother sold groundnuts and oranges outside their compound along the streets and flirted openly with any man willing to notice. She brought men into the house when John was not around and would send Nkechi out of the house to play or to sell the groundnuts and oranges while they got ‘busy’. Some of the men were John’s friends or relatives. Mrs. Ononuju didn’t discriminate.

When you stepped into the Ononuju residence you’d come face to face with the bedroom which had a tiny adjoining bathroom, toilet and kitchen. Nkechi spent most of her spare time hanging around outside. She slept in the same bed as her parents even when they had sex, and by the age of seven, had already started experimenting on her female anatomy with the neighbourhood boys whenever the adults were not around.

Nkechi was known among her peers as a bully; always fighting, lying and stealing. She was pretty, charming, and loose, so boys flocked around her, did her favours and allowed her to lead her gang of friends. She and her gang of friends shoplifted from shops and pick pocketed from unsuspecting pedestrians. In secret they bought cigarettes and alcohol to drink in quiet alleys at night when they had the chance and she often supplied them with the weed that she stole from her father’s ‘weed bag’. They also bought knives, and all kinds of sharp instruments which they used to terrorize other kids and at times even adults. All this she had explored between the ages of seven and nine.

As if the situation on the home front couldn’t get worse, a very unfortunate event occurred when Nkechi was just nine years old, going on ten. She was outside the house playing with the neighbourhood kids one evening when she heard her mother and father shouting from inside the house. Her mother’s shouts gradually turned into screams and it became painfully obvious that John had started beating her. It wasn’t an unusual thing to hear around their house, so Nkechi pretended like she didn’t hear anything and kept on playing ‘ten ten’ with the kids outside. The kids and neighbours were also used to it, so no one raised an eyebrow. But when Nkechi was suddenly deafened by an abrupt and unusual silence, she stopped dead in her tracks. Though very playful, she was a very sharp kid too and could tell that something had gone wrong. The other kids kept on playing, but Nkechi stepped aside, and slowly, with her heart in her mouth, went into her house to find out what was going on. On the floor by the bed, lying motionless was her mother. Her father was crouched beside Christy, shaking her and calling her name.

It was like a nightmare come true. Nkechi believed that her father had beaten her mother so much that she had dropped and died and her eyes popped out in horror.

When John turned around and saw her he quickly drew the terrified girl to the floor with him and said, Nkechi, stay with your mother while I go and look for help, and looking petrified himself, he quickly left the house. He came back 5 minutes later with one of the neighbours who helped him carry an unconscious Christy into his car. Nkechi went into the car with them and they sped off to the hospital. She silently wondered if her mother was dead or dying, too scared to ask her father questions. She felt numb and vaguely realized that she didn’t care if her mother lived or not. She had no feelings for this woman who had given birth to her. At least if she died, that would be one less person to terrorize her.

Christy wasn’t dead but she was paralyzed. She could no longer move. A blow that John had given her on her back with a thick piece of wood had put ‘paid’ to that. Her spinal cord was dislocated and required treatment that they could not afford. Of course, John told the doctors that she had ‘fallen hard’ over the balcony outside.

The doctors gave no positive report of Christy ever being normal again, and after spending a week at the hospital, she was sent home, this time as a permanently bed-ridden patient.

The entire burden of taking care of the house was now on Nkechi’s shoulders. She inherited the duty of selling groundnuts and oranges in front of the house, apart from her normal cooking and cleaning, plus the additional burden of cleaning up after her invalid mum.

She seethed with resentment for both her mother and father and neglected her mother purposely at times. Nkechi poked Christy and slapped her around, laughing at her and yelling when no one was looking your crippled condition serves you right for being a wicked mother!

Christy was miserable, depressed and cried often. Nkechi reigned abuses and curses on her and hit her whenever she saw her cry.

As if all that wasn’t enough torture for her Christy, Nkechi and her father John, started having sex in bed together and didn’t care that her mother Christy was right there and could watch.

He also brought prostitutes into the house and slept with them right beside Christy on the bed.

On the first night that the sexual relationship began between daughter and father, John came home late at night and drunk as usual.

He flung the door wide open and bumbled into the house. Nkechi had been up, sitting on a stool in front of their old fashioned TV, still and watching programs while her mother lay asleep in bed.

John lurched for her and gave her a hard slap on the face. Go to bed and turn that TV off, aren’t you a child? Don’t you have school to go to tomorrow? Shouldn’t you be in bed by this time?

He seemed to have forgotten that he had never paid for Nkechi to go to school before. She was one of those kids who had been poorly home schooled by her mother. She had never set foot inside of a school before.

Nkechi jumped away from John and went to the other chair which she often slept in when she didn’t feel like being on the same bed as her mother and father. She rubbed her cheek where she had been hit and eyed her father in anger as she sat down on the chair scowling.

He jumped into the only bed in the room and began to remove his clothes in order to have sex with Christy. He began to remove her wrapper and that was when she woke up and realised what he was doing. She didn’t say a word as she was used to this rough, callous and violent type of sex with him.

By the time he climbed on top of her he had a sudden rethink and his penis suddenly drooped.

You know, ever since you became paralysed, sex with you isn’t fun anymore.

He turned on his side looking frustrated and up at the ceiling and then he caught his daughter peeping at him from the corner of the room on her chair and another idea came to him.

He began to stare at Nkechi intently and his hard on began to grow big once again. He started to rub his member.

Nkechi stared at him and never took her eyes away. She was mesmerized. She found the act of sex quite mesmerising.

Come here Nkechi. John finally said gruffly.

Nkechi didn’t move and Christy’s eyes popped wider as she wondered what John might have in mind.

Come and sit beside me. He patted to the side of the bed where he lay.

All this while he was naked and still rubbing his now rock hard penis.

As Nkechi watched her father masturbate himself she couldn’t help noticing how large his member was. It looked gigantic and intimidating but also somewhat pretty.

The little boys she often had sex with were just that. Little. She had never seen a penis so large and throbbing and alive before, and instead of feeling fear, she felt quite intrigued.

Nkechi still didn’t move but just stared as if under a spell.

Come here now!!!! John suddenly yelled furiously and the spell was broken.

Nkechi quickly jumped up from the chair and was at her father’s side in a flash before she could give him the chance to start beating her again.

Rub my dick. He ordered.

John! What are you… Christy cried but was silenced by a hard rock blow to her face that was John’s hand that came crashing down on her hard.

You be quiet unless you want me to murder you this night!!! He screamed into her face and she began to whimper.

Tears defied Christy’s eyelids that she forced firmly shut as they pushed their way out like a stream and made their way down her face, cheeks and then huddled in a puddle at the base of her neck.

She could feel the squiggle and creaking of the bed as John commenced on his sexual experimentation with their only daughter and she prayed for death. A prayer that was not for her alone.

John roughly grabbed Nkechi’s hair and forced her mouth on his dick. Suck it! Suck it hard! Suck it the way you suck oranges.

Nkechi opened her mouth wide and began to suck her father’s oversized penis.

She almost gagged on it at first but John didn’t care, he pushed her head up and down and made her suck him hard as he wanted.

‘Now take your tongue out and lick it. Lick it the way you would lick a lollipop and make sure you enjoy it. Ahhhhhhh yes, that’s it ahhh.’ He spread his legs more in pleasure as Nkechi obeyed and sucked.

After a while he realised that this wasn’t enough for him. He wanted more.

Lie down on the bed beside your mother. Take all your clothes off first. he told her standing up.

Nkechi quickly took all her clothes off and lay down on the bed.

He lay on top of her and spread her legs apart forcefully.

Just as he was about to thrust his penis into Nkechi he paused to check out the look on his crippled wife’s face and wasn’t too happy that her eyes were shut.

They fluttered open when he gave her a hot slap as he ordered, ‘Keep your eyes open and watch. If you close your eyes again or even blink I will beat you up.’

Christy’s eyes stayed wide open in fear and she pushed her heart that pounded in her throat down by swallowing her saliva harder and quicker as she proceeded to watch her husband fuck her child.

The veins of her neck were tense and strained.

John looked at his nine year old daughter’s body intently as if seeing it for the first time and then he grabbed her little tits and began to rub them.

After a while he put his hand between her vagina and began to rub it just for a few seconds. He was too tense and need quick relief.

He repositioned himself well on top of her and quickly pushed his rock hard penis up her vagina forcefully.

Nkechi was not a virgin but the pain she felt was so excruciating that it rushed to her head and she let out a sharp scream undermining the fact that she might get beat by the monster who birthed her and now thoughtlessly defiled her.

John didn’t beat her. Instead he clamped a large hand over her mouth and continued to drive his manhood into her.

John began to fuck his daughter hard.

She screamed yet through his hands and tears that had a mind of their own coursed down her face as her body quivered in shock. She stared at the man who had fed her as a baby and provided food and shelter for her while he pumped her moaning and groaning, panting and sweating as if he was running a marathon.

John was so turned on that within two minutes he came. Hard. Inside of her.

To Nkechi it felt like he had ridden her for an hour.

The fact that Christy lay beside them and could see and hear what was happening had been an additional turn on for John.

He quivered and panted over Nkechi’s body for a while, then he rolled off her and spat. ‘Get off the bed now. Go and sleep on the chair or lie on the floor. Give me space.’

Nkechi got up and out of the bed still crying. She felt as if her vagina was on fire. She could still feel a lot of pain. She was bruised and wounded. Blood trickled down her legs that now wobbled as she trembled in shock while making her way to the toilet to try to clean herself up before retiring to the chair or to the hard floor that were at times her bed options for the night.

‘You can sleep now.’ John said to Christy. ‘I hope you enjoyed the show.’ He laughed to himself a bit.

Then he raised his voice and spoke threateningly to his two girls, ‘from now on nobody sleeps until I sleep and no one eats or gets satisfied until I’m satisfied. This is my house and these are my rules. Anyone who doesn’t like it should pack their bags and get the fuck out! After all that will be one less mouth to feed.’

Over the next few months John became even more aggressive, violent and he had his wicked way with Nkechi every other night, or whenever he pleased.

Christy turned into a miserable nervous wreck.

One afternoon after coming home from selling some oranges, Nkechi walked into the house and found her mother in bed with one of the neighbourhood kids at her side. The 12 year old kid was sitting beside Christy on the bed and writing on a piece of paper. He was the son of one of Christy’s friends and his mother must have asked him to drop by to find out how she was doing.

Even though the boy was much older and bigger than Nkechi, he looked up when she walked in and you could see the fear in his eyes. All the neighbourhood kids either feared or respected Nkechi.

Nkechi now dropped the orange basket on the side of the floor and shrieked, What do you think you’re doing here? What’s going on? Nkechi menacingly brought out a knife that she usually kept in her pocket. She held the knife to the boy’s throat with one hand and snatched the paper he was holding with another.

She read a few lines from the paper and then motioned for the boy to leave. Move. Get out. Get lost and don’t let me catch you in here again unless you want blood.

The boy ran out of the house for his life.

Nkechi then inched closer to her mother and sneered at her with hatred as she read what she had seen on the paper out loud.

"Please ask Mama Chiamaka to call my parents quickly. They are killing me in this house please. Ask them to come and pick me."

Christy looked terrified as her only daughter spat out those words to her.

Really? Mama? After all we do for you? Nkechi asked her. After how I clean and cook for you? After how you lie there and watch your husband fuck me instead of you!

She spat on her mother’s face and then angrily tore the paper into bits and let the bits fall all over her face. ‘You are not going anywhere.’

As Nkechi spoke with venom her face contorted into a scary look that seemed crazed. Her eyes were intense, red and mean. Her lips were tight in a scowl.

The anger in her heart could no longer be contained as she huffed and puffed and her chest heaved up and down.

Christy broke down and began to cry.

Please Nkechi, I am your mother. Don’t do this. Why are you doing this to me?

Nkechi looked even more furious at her mother’s question and clenching her hands in anger she knocked her mother on the head.

Christy began to sob even louder.

"Stupid cry baby! Do you remember? That’s what you used to call me. Stupid useless mother.

You’re not a mother! You deserve to die. No. I don’t want you to die. I want you to live and suffer! You and your useless husband, making me work from morning till night everyday while other children go to school. I want to watch you suffer."

Nkechi went outside and plucked a branch off a tree. She came back to the room and faced her mother with it.

Do you remember how you would pretend you’re not seeing my daddy when he canes me with a stick? I want you to know what it felt like.

No, please, Nkechi…

Nkechi brought the branch crashing down on her mother’s body.

Nkechi please, she screamed I’m your mother! Your mother!

Nkechi kept on lashing her vehemently with all the bodily strength she could muster with the cane.

Shut up! Shut up! Stop screaming.

Somebody help me please!

Shut up or I’ll flog your mouth for you.

Nkechi brought the thick branch crashing down on her mother’s mouth again, and again and again. Nkechi stopped only when she saw that her mother had