A man I met after work came to drop me off at my junction. Unbeknownst to me, my fiancé was also at the junction, and he saw me getting out of the man’s car. He watched as I waved the man goodbye and the man drove away before he attacked. He held me by the hand like a child and dragged me to my room. He picked his words slowly, but each word was laced with violence. He said, “Be honest with me and tell me who that man is, or else one of us won’t walk out of this door alive.”

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It was my birthday that day. I had closed from work very late and struggled to get a car home. After being there for almost an hour, this car stopped next to me and asked where I was going. I told him, and he said he could help me get home. I’ve always been scared of hopping into a stranger’s car, but I was very tired and didn’t see any car coming anytime soon, so I jumped into the car.

On my way, I received a call from my fiancé. He asked where I was, and I told him I was on my way. I also told him how I’d struggled to get a car home and how tired I was. Another call came through—a friend I hadn’t talked to for a very long time. He called to wish me a happy birthday.

This good Samaritan, whom I didn’t even know by name, asked if it was my birthday, and I said yes. He sang a happy birthday song for me, and when it got to “How old are you now?” we both burst out laughing. He asked if I was going to celebrate it, and I told him I was too tired to do anything, so I would just go home and sleep.

He stopped at a shop and told me he was getting something. After a few minutes, he came back with a package and dropped it on my lap. He said, “Happy birthday. This is the little I can contribute.” I was shocked. This was a man I had met only a few minutes ago. I thanked him and told him he had made my day. I still didn’t know his name until we got to my junction and he gave me his number and told me the name I should save it under.

I told my fiancé this story and he screamed, “You’re such a liar! Where did you go that he got this gift for you? What did you do for him? How long have you been dating him besides me? Confess before I strike.”

At that moment, I was shaking. I hadn’t seen him like that ever since we started dating two years ago. He left me, went to the kitchen, and came back with a knife. “You see this? Don’t let me use it. Confess. Who is he?”

I was scrambling for words. I could see my life flash right before my eyes. “Babe, believe me. I met him a few minutes ago. I don’t know his name. Take my phone. His number is the last number. Call and ask if he even knows my name.”

He called the number and the response was, “The number you’ve called does not exist…” He smiled mischievously. He said, “So I’m the one you’re trying to fool? Do you know how much I’ve spent on you? I’m responsible for who you are today. Even the job you have, I made it possible.”

“It’s true, babe, it’s true. You did it. Without you I’m a nobody. It’s true. Please don’t hurt me.”

I was shaking, begging, trembling, and dead on the inside. “Why did you give me a fake number?” he screamed.

I responded, “I’m sorry. Maybe I got the number wrong. That’s what he gave me, I swear!”

He used the knife to cut my skirt open, cut my underwear into pieces, and used the tip of the knife to cut my panties into two. He did the same thing to my dress and my bra. He threw them into a paper bag, went outside, and set them ablaze. I wanted to call someone, but my phone was with him. When he came back, he led me to the bathroom, put me on the floor, and poured water on me. He scrubbed my skin with a sponge as if I were a dead goat.

“You need to be washed clean from the filth you just came out of,” he said.

Soap entered my eyes. Water went into my nose and mouth, but I couldn’t say anything. I was shivering with fear. He threw me onto my bed with my wet body and said he was not going to marry a filthy woman like me who went around sleeping with strangers.

While I was in bed, he opened the package the man had given me. It contained chocolates, candies, and two little bottles that I didn’t know the contents of. He said, “After all the ride he gave you, see what he gave you as a birthday gift. Are you a baby?”

And then he burst out laughing.

He stormed out of my room with my phone. I couldn’t sleep. I wore something and quickly ran out of the house. I was scared he would come back again and torture me. I spent the night with a friend, and the next morning I went to his parents to tell them everything he had done to me. They couldn’t believe it. His dad asked, “Does he smoke weed?”

I responded, “Maybe he did yesterday because his behavior was off.”

His dad asked me to leave everything to him, but deep in my heart, I knew I was done with him. There was no way I was going to forget the horror he put me through. We had done the knocking rite and had only four months left before our wedding, but I told myself, “God didn’t let me go through this for nothing. It’s a sign.”

I told my parents too what had happened. My dad was so angry he wanted to face him man to man and do the same thing to him. My mom calmed him down. I didn’t see him for three days. He had my phone, so he couldn’t reach out to me. He went to my parents’ house to return the phone, and my dad nearly had him arrested.

When we met, he was very apologetic. He said he didn’t know what had come over him. “You know me, and you know I wouldn’t do this. It wasn’t normal. Please forgive me.”

I told him, “There’s no way on earth I can forget what happened, but I can forgive you because of old times’ sake and the good things you’ve done in my life. But we can’t have a relationship. It’s over.”

I Called My Girlfriend And Another Man Answered The Phone

He kept coming back, asking for another chance to turn things around. He tried to use our past to get to me, but what my eyes saw that evening, no amount of goodness could erase. I stopped picking up his calls. My dad called to threaten him to stay away from me or he would call the police.

He stopped coming, and that’s the reason I have my peace today. Because of him, I’m scared to try again. Because of him, I lock away my knives and every piece of cutlery I have and hide the keys. I’m no longer the girl he met. When he treated me that way that evening, he killed something in me—maybe a flower that may never grow again, no matter how long I water it.

—Yayra

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