Chapter 12 SECRETS

Pastor Melvin devoted so much time to her spiritual growth, he was always with her. He taught her the word on daily basis. What he was doing was generally called "mentorship" by the members of the fellowship. It was regarded as a very important relationship between two people in the fellowship.

He also taught her how to live like a responsible woman, he taught her how to be truthful by being extremely truthful himself. He advised her on hairstyle, dressing, speech, general physical appearance. He gave her little pocket money from time to time, and taught her how to reverence him in speech and attitude.

He insisted she stopped living off campus and get a room in the hostel on campus, he explained that ladies of the fellowship were not allowed to live off-campus.

It wasn't easy for Sobrina to decide to leave her one room apartment where she had privacy and freedom, to a place where she would have to live with other ladies. And so she delayed, when it was time to pay for a room in the hostel, hoping she would miss the chance and force him to have a change of mind. But he insisted she squatted with a lady member of the fellowship, whom he had convinced to share her bunk space with Sobrina.

Sobrina packed up and reluctantly obeyed.

Her new bed-mate was extremely unaccommodating, but Sobrina found a way to manage. Sometimes when she wouldn't let her sleep on the tiny bunk they shared, she would take a heavy duvet, go to the hostel's toilet corridor, where she wouldn't be suddenly spotted by the Porter, wrap herself like sausage and sleep. It was illegal to squat someone in the hostel, and discovery meant ejection.

Pastor Melvin refused to listen whenever she complained about how she was being treated by her bed-mate, and so she learned to keep it all to herself.

She decided to get her own bed space in a different hostel the following semester, when some students would be leaving for Industrial Training. She bought a space for ten thousand from one of such students, but only after inquiring in clear languages, as to if a member of the fellowship lived in the room, and got a "no". The fellowship was the largest and most popular in the University of Science, it wasn't unusual to find at least one member in each room in all the hostels. The members of the fellowship were also easily identified by their attitudes and mannerisms. Howbeit, the girl had lied out of desperation.

When Sobrina resumed for second semester and moved into her new room, it turned out one of the girls in the room was a member of the fellowship, Sobrina fell out of the frying pan and into the fire. The new room mate was not just an ordinary member, she had held a post in the fellowship, and therefore demanded respect and worship from other lowly members. When Sobrina refused to treat her like nothing but an ordinary roommate, she became a thorn on her flesh. Discovering Sobrina had a relationship of some sort with Pastor Melvin - an envied brother in the fellowship, made it worse. She was always mean to Sobrina, they fought almost every night after lectures.

Sobrina would have left the fellowship because of the cruelty of it's members towards her, or at least fallen out of faith, but Pastor Melvin's attitude wouldn't allow it. She endured their cruelty without complaints.

Pastor Melvin monitored her every movement using fellow members in the hostel, they reported to him if she didn't attend their morning devotions, or didn't return to her room at night. He was extremely domineering and controlling. He wouldn't even let her travel home to her parents or do anything without consulting him. He began to fondly call her "Rina" and used the pet name freely in public.

One of the male members of the fellowship heard him one day, and made fun of it. He relentlessly changed it to "Soby", to keep the name holy.

Sobrina had every reason to believe he loved her, because of the way he was behaving towards her. But it was hard for her to reciprocate, not just because he was ugly, but also because he had an incurable COPD which caused him intermittent coughing at random times.

It turned out he had also had his share of notorious past, filled with womanizing, drug addiction, chain smoking and God knows what else.

The cough announced his presence anywhere he was present. She had once thought it was an ordinary cough and had bought him some medication which led him to explain. But he wasn't entirely truthful, he said it was just an incurable throat infection.

Pastor Melvin who had assumed total control over the relationship, had made it that it was only Sobrina who talked about her shameful past, while he was very reluctant with revealing his own.

In the form of counseling, he milked every detail of Sobrina's past from her lips.