We were married for five years but if my family listened to me and supported me, the marriage would have been over a year after we moved in together. My family pushed me away and blamed me for being a bad wife because they couldn’t understand why someone would think of leaving a man like my husband.

He had money and was happy to throw it around. At functions, he was the one who promised to give the highest amount. He sent money to my parents even when they hadn’t requested it. In church, he was appointed the chairman of every function because of his money but this man didn’t give me a penny when I needed it.

I was making my own money when I was working. I was doing just fine before we got married but when we moved in together, he started talking about me leaving my job to become a housewife. I didn’t agree with him. He was gentle about it at first until he got hostile. He had a son with another woman. He said the woman was tormenting his life with money issues so one day, he went out and came back home with his son. He told me, “You’ll stop working and stay home. You have a son to take care of. Very soon, we’ll start making babies of our own. You’ll have to stay home and take care of them.”

My husband was nine years older than me so he treated me like a daughter who had to listen to him. When I said no to him, he screamed at me. When I didn’t agree with him on things he questioned my intelligence and asked, “How old are you? What do you know that you have to challenge me?”

I knew the marriage wouldn’t work when he started pushing me around, boxing me to stop my job. I ran home. I spoke to my parents about it. I needed their support but all they said was, “He’s your husband. You have to listen to him. He has the money to take care of you. Stay home and support him.”

I didn’t want to but for the sake of peace, I did. I thought that would bring peace to our marriage. I believed he would love me more when he felt listened to so I quit my job and became his housewife and then his punching bag.

I came to depend on him for everything, at some point he boasted, “I’ll pull off the plug and your air would be gone.”

He was right. He was in control of the air that I breathed so he treated me with disdain. He punched me at very little provocation. The first day I packed my things and left his house, this man came to my parents’ house to put up a show of his life. He cried. He knelt to ask me not to leave him. My mom said, “You made a man go on his knee and cried and still say no? What kind of heart do you have?”

I went home with him and that very night, he beat me for making him kneel in front of me. “Who do you think you are? If you leave today, thousands will come tomorrow but it’s because of your parents that’s why I’m respecting you.”

Everything he did was because of my parents. It was through them I found him. When he wanted to marry me, I asked him why a man his age hadn’t been married. He answered, “I was waiting for you to come along. You’re the only one who’ll make me think of settling down.”

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I thought it was sweet, for a man his age. He told me he didn’t have a child but later ambushed me with a child he said came along just at the time he met me. Everything was a lie but he made me scared—too scared to fight him. I was like a bird without its wings. Nobody listened to me because, on the outside, this man operated like an angel.

One evening, he came home with another woman he introduced to me as his relative. I served her food. I warmed her water and showed her where to bathe. I prepared her bed and made her feel comfortable. The woman spent three days with us but she was never comfortable in my presence. She only talked when my husband was around. Long story short, the woman wasn’t a relative. She was his girlfriend.

The woman got pregnant before I got to know there was something deeper going on. When I found out, I stood up to him. I fought with my voice but he ended up fighting with his fist. After two or three slaps on my face, he screamed, “You’ve been in my house for three years. What do you have to show for it? Where’s your child? What joy have you brought me?”

He was calling me barren just because of another woman’s pregnancy. I stopped fighting and thought of how to run away from the house. All that while, I was pregnant and didn’t know it. The day he slapped me, I was carrying his child but I didn’t know it. Even after discovering the pregnancy, I still wanted to run but this man cut off all my support so I didn’t know who to run to. When I had no option, I told him about the pregnancy.

For the period of the pregnancy, he treated me like an egg. Everything I needed, he provided. He became the man I thought he would be when I married him. I thought our problem was because of the absence of a child. When I gave birth, there was a huge joy in my heart, not for the child but for the fact that I would have joy in the house.

Once I delivered, he went back to being the monster I knew. Anytime I tried to fight back, he threatened to take my daughter away from me and throw me out. I stayed calm, bearing it all until that fateful day when he came from the farm and complained of a pain that felt like an insect bite.

His leg started swelling. I took him to the hospital and he stayed there for over a month. His leg swelled until it burst. He was diabetic. The wound refused to heal until he gave up the ghost in his sleep.

I got the call at dawn from the hospital. “Your husband is gone,” the voice said. “He’s tired,” I responded. “He needs this rest.” I cried for the rest of the dawn. I was sad, relieved, conflicted, free. My emotions were chaotic.

During his funeral, everyone had something good to say about him so when I went up to read the tribute from the widow, I said all the good things. I sobbed when I said, “He left a vacuum no one will ever fill.” But deep down, I was happy he was dead. His Death was my only escape.

When his family came fighting over his properties, I didn’t fight back. I told them, “You can keep everything. I’ll start all over again.”

The only thing I picked from the house was a bundle of money he left in his travelling bag. I didn’t go back home to my parents. I carried my daughter with me and travelled to where I am now to begin life again.

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It was hard but I got a new job. I made new neighbours who eventually became friends. Alice from the office became my sister. One day I asked her, “Is it strange I’m happy that my husband died? I don’t feel anything, no sadness, no vacuum I think it can’t be filled. Nothing.”

She responded, “Knowing how he treated you, however, you feel about his death is right.”

I’m happy for a new beginning. I’m happy to be in a place where I can be my own woman and happy that he’s out of my way. I’m also happy I’ve broken free from the toxic influence of my parents. I cheer when I see a new sky each morning. A sign I can always begin again.

—Ruby

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