Divorcing Tony…
AARON ANSAH-AGYEMAN
DIVORCING TONY
EPISODE 8
And, standing there, Tony looked like a wild animal about to unleash its wrath.
Liz looked at him with mounting horror, knowing he was inches away from turning really violent.
Tony was always calm and mildly-behaved. It took a lot to get under his skin, but sometimes when he crossed that threshold, he simply became beastly and uncontrollable. There had been instances in the past – few instances – when he had gone into what she called his ‘beast mode’ and this was fast turning out to be one of those instances.
Which was shocking to her because when Tony went into that mode, he had always been right, and always had a cause to.
But this was so unexpected because, to all intents and purposes, he was the one at fault here! He was the one who had slipped a prostitute into his matrimonial bed, and facing divorce from a woman he claimed he loved!
So, what was going on?
Why was he behaving as if he was the one affronted?
And yes, he had not even offered a simple, single apology for his actions!
What had gotten into Tony?
“Your Honour!” Hassan said as he looked at the judge with comedic chagrin. “Obviously this is not working! This man cannot behave this way!”
“I understand, Counsel,” Judge Darteh said and looked at Tony with grim eyes. “Sit down, Mr. Siaw.”
Tony was still glaring at Hassan Moshie, and he finally sat down after a while.
“Listen, Mr. Siaw,” the judge said calmly. “If this had been any other case apart from a divorce one, I would have cited you for contempt and thrown you out of here in a second. You may consider this a first and final warning. You go overboard like that again, and I’ll throw you out, grant divorce and custodial rights, and limit you to once-a-month visitation to your children in the presence of a police officer! Do not force my hand, Mr. Siaw!”
Tony looked at her furiously.
“I’m passionate about my children, Your Honour,” he said finally. “I’m sorry if I came out strong, but sometimes I blow that way. Maybe you should consider hearing this case as it should be held, without all the finesse and legal lingo and the sweet stew that comes with being in a courtroom and behaving like a refined Shakespeare! Sometimes, I guess cases ought to be heard like you would hear in a damn brothel!”
“Mr. Siaw, ohhh!” the judge shouted, besides herself with exasperation. “Can you just calm down, sir? Just calm down, please! Would you need some few minutes to calm down?”
“No, I don’t need any few minutes, madam!” he said angrily. “And stop treating me like a boy, and drop that condescending attitude, judge! I stopped going to that house not because they were sending me to do errands at Mr. Baidoo’s birthday! I’ve done errands all the time and that was nothing new to me, especially coming from that damn family!”
“I guess you want to tell us you stopped going there because you didn’t own a suit then,” Hassan chipped in angrily.
“You head like bontoa!” Tony told the lawyer angrily. “Do you know bontoa?”
And almost everybody in the courtroom laughed then, and the judge had to bow her head suddenly and cover her mouth with her hands because she could not speak.
Only Liz, Tony and a few of her family members didn’t laugh.
“Mr. Siaw,” the judge said after hammering her gavel a few times. “If I say I’m going to take you on for all your misdemeanours, I guess this case will not be heard. Now, I’m tired of warning you. I will just mark you on my sheet for every inappropriate utterance, and it will go in my judgement against you.”
“Your Honour!” Hassan said in a wounded voice. “Surely, you’re not going to let him get away with insults in this court, are you? This man is insulting me and his wife’s family! That is absolutely unacceptable! Should he get away with that attitude?”
“No, Counsel, and I do apologize for his clear anger issues,” the judge said kindly. “I do empathize with the man because this is the first time he had been away from his children for any length of time. But that does not mean I’m going to tolerate his crassness. Mr. Siaw, be mindful of what I told you. Now, can you elucidate me on what you wearing a coat had to do with deciding to stop going to the house of your in-laws?”
Tony shrugged.
“I did chores that day, yeah, and I was cool with that,” he said, his voice a bit calm. “Her parents came to me after I brought the last guests, and Mrs. Sandra Baidoo told me I could not be present at the party without a suit. I explained to her why I couldn’t wear a frigging suit in the heat of a March afternoon. Mr. Jake Baidoo suggested that he had a light material blazer I could wear because it did not retain heat. I told him no, I was okay with what I was wearing. They got angry. He told me what an embarrassment I was, and asked me not to come to his house again, and his wife agreed to it!”
There was a stunned silence in the courtroom now.
Hassan chuckled and shook his head to dispel the sudden coldness in the room.
“Surely, Mr. Siaw, you could not have taken them seriously!” he said. “Obviously, they were angry, and in the heat of their anger they came out passionately to say that. Surely, they didn’t mean you to take it literally.”
“You’re right,” Tony said coldly. “I’m a reasonable man, and I understood that their words might have been because they were still disappointed that their daughter wanted to marry me. So, a month later Mrs. Sandra Baidoo also had a party for her mother. It was in the evening, so this time I wore a tuxedo. I arrived at the residence, and Madam Cecilia was at the entrance with Liz’s parents.”
“And who is Madam Cecilia?” Judge Darteh asked.
“Liz’s grandmother,” Tony answered.
“Alright, go on, what happened?”
“Madam Cecilia embraced Liz and walked her inside to check on something. I wanted to follow, but her parents blocked me, and Mr. Baidoo asked me why I was there after they made it clear they didn’t want me anywhere near their house. Mrs. Baidoo told me they were quite serious about it, and that for as long as I was with their daughter, I shouldn’t come near their house. So, I sent a message to Liz that something came up at the office and I had to go check it up. And then I left, and never went back there again.”
“No!” Liz cried with sudden anguish as she shook her head. “No, Tony, stop lying, stop lying! They would never do that! They wouldn’t stoop that low, not my parents!”
“Your parents are shitworms!” Tony screamed suddenly; his anger once more rekindled.
“Mr. Siaw, watch your tongue!” Hassan shouted.
And Tony picked the book lying near his elbow and threw it hard at Hassan, who ducked desperately and the book went sailing over his head.
“Oh!” he shouted, his mouth dropping open again. “Were you stoning me, Mr. Siaw, or perhaps booking me? What was that for? What at all is the matter with you, Mr. Tony Siaw?”
Liz was weeping and shaking her head.
“Tony, if you have something against my parents, say it!” she whispered. “I know you’ve never liked them but please stop lying about them!”
“Liz, your parents are not in Azerbaijan!” Tony hissed furiously. “They’re sitting right there, over there, damn it! Go on and ask them! Don’t accuse me of lying about your parents, damn you! You have always, always, always defended them, chosen their words over mine, taken their advice over mine, been their daughter where you should have been a damn wife to me! Ask them, go on, ask them!”
Liz turned her head and looked at her parents.
Her mother was stony-faced, staring right back at her with compressed lips, but her father was rubbing his forehead with his fingers, and then she knew!
She turned stunned eyes to Tony and fixed him with tears in her eyes.
“Tony!” she whispered with horror. “Why didn’t you ever tell me this?”
“Hold on, hold on, Liz!” Hassan said desperately, horrified by her admission of her parents’ fault. “You can’t assume he’s telling the truth, please.”
“Would Mr. and Mrs. Baidoo please approach the Bench?” Judge Darteh said softly.
Liz saw her parents conferring briefly, and saw how tight her mother’s lips were, and her heart sank! She knew her mother would never admit to anything like that, even if it was true, and she had just given her father a warning.
When her parents started to approach the judge, Liz stuck her lips between her teeth and looked at Tony through a wall of tears.
“Mrs. Sandra Baidoo, please sit down,” the judge said abruptly.
Sandra stopped and touched her hair.
“But, Your Honour, you said…”
“I know exactly what I said, please,” the judge said with a tight smile. “But I noticed your quick discourse with your husband, and believe me, I know when a decision is made that I wouldn’t like. So, sit down. Mr. Jake Baidoo, approach, please.”
The couple looked at each other, and again Liz saw her mother sending a desperate message to her father with her eyes, and she shook her head numbly with shock.
Her father approached the bench, and the judge covered the microphone with her hand and spoke in whispers to Jake Baidoo, whose face looked guiltier by the second as he spoke – uncertainly, obviously – to the judge.
Finally, he nodded, turned and went back to his seat.
The courtroom was dead quiet now.
The judge looked at Liz and then she leaned back and began writing in her book.
“What did he say?” Liz asked numbly. “Madam, please, what did my father say?”
“None of your business, please, Liz,” the Judge replied. “Mr. Hassan, please continue.”
But Liz knew that Tony was right…
Her parents had really banned him from their house!
She looked at her furious husband… and she was horrified that she had blamed him all these years, and he had kept quiet about that terrible encounter because, obviously, he had not wanted to burden her.
“Tony?” she cried, shaking her head. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Were you listening?” Tony growled furiously. “You have always been a frigging daughter to them, not a damn wife to me!”
“That’s enough, both of you!” the Judge said sharply. “Continue, please, Mr. Hassan.”
Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony, Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony, Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony, Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony, Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony, Aaron Ansah-Agyeman, Divorcing Tony
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