I got married at twenty-seven. At twenty-nine and without a child, my marriage collapsed. It was silent. I didn’t share my struggles with anyone including my best friends. They knew I was married and it ended there. The very day I packed my things into my new apartment, Jane called me, “Araba, I’m getting married. You’re the first to know this because I want you by my side.”

Her happiness rushed through the phone into my ears like a bug accidentally entering my ears. I’d just returned from a place she was going. I was happy for her of course but I felt guilty that I would be the first to know about her marriage but she didn’t know about my divorce. I congratulated her. I listened when she talked about her plans and where I fit. She said, “Tell your husband I’m going to rent you for a month.”

I had no intention of mentioning my divorce but she mentioned my husband so I told her the truth. She screamed. I could imagine her mouth left open in awe. “Tell me it’s a joke,” she said. “Why are you not laughing if it’s a joke?” I answered.

I told her everything from the beginning to the end. We had a naming ceremony at a funeral, it seemed. She gave a huge sigh of relief when my story ended. I told her not to worry about me because we had happiness reserved ahead of us.

At her wedding, I noticed this guy trying so hard to get my attention. He introduced himself as Jones. I nodded without mentioning my name. At the reception, he took a seat not too far from me. When I got my food, he asked to help. I shook my head and said thank you. He told me he was the elder brother of the groom. “Oh OK, I’m also a sister of the bride. Nice meeting you. Again.”

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After the wedding, he took my number. Jane was there smiling at us in her new beaming ring. She made me feel old. Divorce makes the heart grow older. When I was young, I thought it was for older couples. They decide to part ways after they have fought for over ten years. Ten years because if you’re fighting for ten years then you don’t need any other proof that the marriage cannot work.

After my divorce, marriage felt like something I’d done all my life. It was like I was born married and had to struggle to break free from it.

When Jones called the first time I wanted to cut off the chase so I told him I just came from a divorce and needed some space to reassess and realign my life. He didn’t get it well. He thought I broke up with a boyfriend so he responded, “You don’t have to worry. Repairing broken things is my specialty.” Then he laughed before asking, “Wait, what did you say? Divorce?”

On our first date, we discussed my divorce and the place I was at that moment. On our second date, he explained why his junior brother had to marry before him. He was closer to marriage until an older man with money married the woman he was about to marry. They were only five months away from their wedding. He healed from the brokenness and was sure he could help me heal too. “I’m good at that, trust me. I can repair a heart but after that, I will have to keep it.”

On our third date, a date that happened at his place, I accepted his proposal. The first question he asked was, “Where should I start from? The repairs.”

I wasn’t broken but when you go through a divorce like mine, you don’t come out whole again. Your confidence in yourself will chip away piece by piece. You develop self-doubt. You carry the ghost of your failed marriage with you and see a piece of your husband in every man, even tiny pieces others will need a magnifier to see, you see them with your naked eyes. Starting again is hard, not for you but for the other person who’s trying to make you fall in love again.

When I showed signs of insecurity, Jones asked me, “What can I do to help?” When I judged him or a situation wrongly, he told me, “I know. The familiar ghost is around. Let’s pray him away.” Anytime I started a fight, he asked if the fight was about him or about the past. Because of him, I saw myself in a mirror and saw how ugly I’d become. I asked him, “How did you come out better after the collapse of your relationship but I’m here still seeing glimpses of my failed marriage in everything?”

He became my therapist, sort of. He repaired me emotionally and fixed what was broken gradually. I came to trust his fixing powers so much when my car broke down, which it happened often, I called to ask, “My car is doing this and that. What do you think is broken? Can you fix that?”

When I told my mom I wanted to marry again, she told me, “It’s not even up to a year. Why are you in a hurry? If you don’t slow down you’ll break down again.”

My dad wanted to know who the man was, something he didn’t do with my ex-husband. He asked if Jones knew about my divorce and what happened. After meeting Jones, Dad told me to feel free to try again. “This might work or might not work. At least you tried. But I pray it happens for you.”

A year and a half after my divorce, I called Jane. When I called, she started ranting about all the ways pregnancy was dealing with her. While laughing, I told her, “I’m getting married.”

She screamed. I could imagine her mouth left open in awe. “Tell me it’s a joke,” she said. “Why are you not laughing if it’s a joke?” I answered. We both burst out laughing. Finally, we found laughter in what was not supposed to be a joke.

“Does my husband know this?” She asked me. I answered, “I warned his brother not to tell him because I wanted you to be the first to know.”

She Cried That Day On The Altar

This time, I married my repairer. He doesn’t only repair me, when the kids get their toys broken, they run to him. When the sink gets choked, when the lock messes up, when my car refuses to start, when our lives develop doubts, he comes through to fix them. In his eyes, I’m a perfect object that’s prone to breaking down and because he’s there for me, for us, there will always be a fix.

— Araba

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