Her aunt burned her face with boiling water and called her worthless. For years, Rejoice lived in torment, treated as less than human. But life’s tables turned: the orphan girl who once starved in the kitchen corner became the only one left to feed her abuser.

A painful beginning

Rejoice was just eight years old when her world fell apart. Her mother died giving birth to her baby brother, and her father, a struggling construction worker, could not care for both a newborn and a grieving little girl. With a heavy heart, he left Rejoice in the care of his late wife’s older sister, Monica.

“It will only be for a while,” he promised. “Your aunt will treat you like her own child.”

But nothing could have been further from the truth.

A house of cruelty

From the first day, Aunt Monica made her bitterness known. Abandoned by her husband, she carried resentment like a whip. Her sons, Justin and Terry, lived in privilege—fresh clothes, private schools, warm meals. Rejoice was given scraps, rags, and a mat beside the kitchen floor.

“Do you think you’re a princess?” Monica sneered whenever Rejoice paused from chores. “You’re lucky I even let you breathe under my roof.”

Her days became endless cycles of fetching water, scrubbing floors, and enduring insults. Childhood, for Rejoice, ended the moment she entered that house.

The boiling water

The cruelty escalated. One evening, while Rejoice was too slow washing plates, Monica snapped. She grabbed a pot of boiling water and hurled it at the child.

The searing pain tore through Rejoice’s face and arm. She screamed, collapsing on the wet floor. Her cousins stared, silent, as if nothing unusual had happened.

“Let that scar remind you never to disobey me,” Monica hissed.

The wound healed, but the scars remained—a permanent brand of her aunt’s rage.

Survival through silence

For years, Rejoice endured. She grew into adolescence marked by burns, bruises, and silent resilience. She rarely cried—tears only earned her more ridicule. She learned to eat quickly, sleep lightly, and obey without question.

But beneath the silence, her spirit simmered. She whispered prayers at night, asking God for strength, for a day when she would no longer bow to cruelty.

Life turns

Years later, fate began to change. Monica’s bitterness deepened into illness. Diabetes crept in, stealing her energy. Her sons, spoiled and entitled, grew restless under her demands.

Justin left for the city, never calling back. Terry followed months later, vanishing into Lagos traffic and leaving no word.

Suddenly, the woman who once commanded everyone was left alone—weak, frail, and abandoned.

The unexpected caretaker

By then, Rejoice was a grown woman. Scarred but resilient, she had learned tailoring and earned small money from neighbors. She could have walked away forever.

Instead, she returned—not as a child servant, but as the only one willing to help.

Neighbors were stunned. “Why would you feed the woman who burned your face?” they asked.

Rejoice’s answer was simple: “Because bitterness ends with me. If I repay evil with evil, the chain never breaks.”

Tables turned

Now, the roles had reversed. Monica, once sharp-tongued, sat in silence, waiting for food spooned by the same hands she had once beaten raw. Rejoice washed her clothes, cooked her meals, and treated her wounds.

The scar on her face remained, a daily reminder of past cruelty. But now, when Monica looked at that scar, she saw not defiance—but mercy.

The apology

One evening, Monica broke down in tears. Her voice, once a whip, was barely a whisper.

“Rejoice,” she said, “I destroyed your childhood. I called you worthless. I hurt you. Yet here you are, feeding me when my own sons abandoned me. I don’t deserve your kindness.”

Rejoice looked at her quietly. “You’re right. You don’t. But I won’t let hate live in my heart anymore.”

Reflection

Rejoice’s story became one whispered through the streets of Aba. The orphan girl who slept on a mat, who wore rags and bore burns, had become a living example of grace.

People said her scar no longer marked her shame, but her strength.

She had endured cruelty, survived abandonment, and in the end, became the one who fed the hand that burned her.

Closing

Today, Rejoice continues her tailoring, her sewing machine humming late into the night. Monica, frail and repentant, lives under her care, dependent on the girl she once despised.

It is not a fairy tale, but something deeper: proof that true strength is not in revenge, but in choosing mercy where none was ever shown.

Rejoice, scarred yet unbroken, carries herself with dignity. She once whispered prayers for deliverance. Today, she is the answer to those prayers—not just for herself, but for the very woman who tried to destroy her.