Nene's Choice (3)

They spent every spare moment they could together during this time and Zel soon graduated and got a job working for olan oil company whilst she continued with her studies. 

She lived for the love they shared and counted each moment until they were together again.

Even after the blissful years of dating she could hardly believe her luck that out of all the 'correct' girls on campus, he had chosen her. 

Nene, the campus loner, the shy and retiring wallflower who never hung out with anybody to be reckoned with and yet somehow she had managed to bag herself one of the hot happening club boys who had gone on to become one of the most eligible bachelors in town working as a manager at a renowned Oil and Gas Company.

 Most people wondered what he saw in her and secretly she wandered the same as their affair had since become a constant feature in most of the gossip rags around town.

 Nene took it all in stride and eventually finished her course at University and having served the mandatory youth service, with Zel’s connection she managed to get a job working in the same company.

Soon after, they got married and the future looked very promising for the young couple.


                                                                       ***

Those first few years were blissful and during that time Nene climbed steadily up the career ladder getting a double promotion at work and becoming a senior level executive at Cynergy Oil and Gas.

A few years later, she moved another level up and was appointed to the position of Head of Engineering Services at the company, becoming the first female and youngest person to ever hold such an esteemed position.

 This was to become a turning point in their lives as the troubles began on the home front.

Their once happy home after several years of marriage became a war zone.

Zel became prone to violent mood swings and would turn on Nene at the slightest of provocations. He started to complain about everything she did, from how his shirt was ironed badly to the temperature of his food or how salty it was and how his wife did not keep the house to a high standard and if she dared to explain anything, he would spew forth much more abuse.

In the office ,he was mister charm himself and everybody thought what a lovely couple they made but as soon as they got home, he switched to mister vicious haranguing her at every opportunity.

Nene kept up the front of playing happy couples to the outside world never daring to confide in anyone the emotional and sometimes physical abuse she suffered at home.

She bore her scars well and nobody would have ever guessed the lovely engineer Nene was not living such a charmed life.

She also never let on to her family members about her dilemma as she knew her mother would have a broken heart at the thought of what her only daughter was going through plus she could not trust her brothers not to beat her husband to within an inch of his life, so she kept quiet.

Nene threw herself into her work since that was her one place of escape leading her to excel so much that she won accolade after accolade both nationally and internationally for her first class work.

She quickly rose through the ranks to become a director and was now a good few levels ahead of her husband in grade.

Her progress at work became another bone of contention for her as her husband became greatly embittered about what he called foolish office politics...


  To be continued