A reasonable Doubt
My friend had been staying with his girlfriend and his girlfriend’s best friend in one room for a period of one year when he got accused of rape and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment. This has really affected me and the fact that after serving for 5 years the accuser came out and said it was a plot to get him since she had a crush on him!
It was in a small town in the outskirts of the main city. Housing was expensive and as we were trying to achieve a few dreams of our lives, we didn’t consider renting a big house a priority since our income was not so much. I had grown up together with Ian and we knew each other so well. We shared most of our dreams.
When Ian met Julie the love of his heart, he was so sure that she was the woman for her. They had dated for sometime and all along the dating period Julie was sharing a room with some other two friends of hers. One of which was her best friend while the other was a girl they had been together with in the university.
They knew that all along they would become financially stable and each would go their way as soon as their income could allow them to afford rent each one on her own.
When Julie and Ian decided to come and live together, it was at first not difficult since the two girls shared the rent between themselves. Julie and Ian had stayed together for 3 months when a need arouse for Karen to move out of the town. (Karen is the other girl from the university who was now left living with Tina) Tina is Julie’s best friend.
When the news reached Julie that Karen was planning to leave the town she was a bit worried about her best friend since she knew that Tina would not afford to live in there alone.
However it was a tough thing to think about since the only left option was to ask Ian if he could allow Tina to come and stay with them even if for some days before she get someone to share a room with or perhaps until she could afford to stay alone.
She knew that she had to prepare on the best approach to present this request to Ian. She was worried that may be it might turn out that Ian would refuse that kind of a thing.
But she needed to ask him the soonest possible. A thought came into her that it would be necessary to first speak to Tina maybe she might have a different idea.
She made her short journey and visited her best friend whom she found in tears. They talked after comforting her and Tina was more than happy to have realized that her friend thought about her in such ways. She knew that her problem was half solved since the only remaining part was now to approach Ian. They agreed that as soon as Ian gave a feedback Julie would let Tina know soonest possible.
When Tina returned home that evening she was so restless yet she found it hard to start it to Ian. It was until Ian noticed that her concentration was divided and that she seemed a little bit disturbed. Ian walked to where Julie had sat and sat on the arm of the chair that she had occupied. He looked at her with concern and asked her ‘sweetheart is everything okay? How was your day?’
Julie knew right inside her that this was the perfect moment; she knew that a chance had come and she was not going to waste any time about it. She replied to him ‘everything has been fine but I only worried about my best friend Tina, she is being left by Karen in that room we used to live the three of us. Karen needs to move out of this town as she has got a job elsewhere so she is only around here for a month.
The problem here is that we had opted to stay the three of us since none could afford living alone. Just three months after I left Tina to stay with Karen now Karen is about to leave. Tina can not afford it alone’. As she spoke all these Ian just listened without interruption but when she posed Ian asked ‘so what is the problem?
Are you suggesting that you want to go back there?’ she knew that this would worry Ian, he would do anything to have in his room and so she said to him ‘you see that is the only other option since it might not be ideal to you to have her here staying with us’ do you think Tina agree to come and stay with us? This was Ian asking. Julie told him that she was not sure about it but if Ian would not have a problem with it then she would ask Tina when they met next about it.
Then Ian said; ‘ that is not something to worry about to the point of losing concentration, all is going to be okay for her, we can stay with her if she agrees if she refuses then it means she has a better option and therefore the problem will be solved.
