I found him when he said his marriage was breaking down. He came to me crying anytime there was trouble in the house. From his own account, the wife was physically abusive, and he needed to run from the house often. My place became his place, and my bed became where he found his peace.

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One day, he visited with his first child, a daughter who was eleven years old. I was shocked, but he told me it wasn’t anything and that he wanted his daughter to know that it’s possible to live with a woman who doesn’t fight with you.

The girl was graceful and beautiful. While her dad was asleep in my room, I sat in the hall with her, eating and watching TV.

A year later, he came to tell me his wife was refusing to give him a divorce, and he didn’t want to force it because of the properties they had together. “If anything,” he said, “I want it to be peaceful so the kids can have a peaceful home.”

Today, he would talk about divorce as if it was happening the next day. Another day, he would tell me there was peace. I loved him and wanted him to be happy. If one day he told me he was no longer fighting with his wife and was happy again, I wouldn’t be bitter. He deserved happiness because he had gone through a lot for a long time.

We had dated for three years, and I had known his daughter so well that the girl could call me whenever there was trouble in the house. One late evening, I had a call from his phone. When I picked up, it was his wife shouting and cursing me, telling me I wouldn’t live to see another day. I heard his voice in the background asking her to stop attacking the wrong person.

She didn’t cut the call but turned to her husband and hurled abusive words and the same curses at him, telling him he would suffer double of what he had taken her through.

I didn’t call him again, and he also didn’t call for three days. He didn’t answer my texts, so I called him. There was happiness in his voice. He said he was fine and was going to visit me the next day. We had that conversation around 4 p.m. on a Thursday. On Friday at 8 a.m., I got the news that he was dead.

How? How can a smiling and happy man yesterday die today? How does that make sense? I tried all I could to reach his daughter to ask what happened, but I couldn’t. The cause of his death was said to be a heart attack, but deep within me, I knew something was wrong. I suspected foul play, but I couldn’t prove it. Even if I had facts, who would I talk to?

A day before he was buried, I had a dream about him. We were arguing about his death. He said he was alive. I said he was dead. I asked him to take me home to ask his daughter if he was alive. We got to the compound of his house and met many mourners screaming his name and asking why he died so soon. He put his head in his hands and mentioned his wife’s name. I woke up.

What Nobody Tells You About Divorce

The dream felt so real that I woke up shouting in my sleep. He was telling me something, but who would accept dreams as evidence in court?

He was buried not long ago, and I haven’t had a dream about him again. I’m convinced his wife had a hand in his death. No one can tell me otherwise, but I have no proof, so I wish him farewell and also ask him to avenge his death.

—Florence

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