They met at the work place; my wife and her boyfriend, a married man by the way. They worked at the same office complex not necessarily in the same organization.
That is all I know; I don’t know how long the affair lasted because this is what actually happened.
My wife and I were separated; we had been separated for more than one year; she did something to me that really hurt me so I left the house for her.
I moved out and squatted with a friend for a while in the hope that those mediating between us would help her see sense but when it looked to me like she was bent on not seeing sense, I went to rent an apartment.
My renting an apartment was just because I wanted to show her that I could easily walk away for good from the marriage. But like I said, we still had people talking to both of us to reconcile. They kept talking about our children; we had two already; a boy and a girl…products of our 12 years of marriage.
What did she do?
She was always quarrelling with my mother whenever mama came to see us.The last straw was when she told my mother not to come to our house again! That is my own mother! The woman who gave birth to me! My flesh and blood!
My mother left the house and I moved out a few days after when she refused to call my mother to apologise. That’s what happened and I told her, if my own mother isn’t welcome, then I will leave the house as well.
Family friends, church people, relations kept trying to mediate between the two of us at that time but I was still a bit adamant about returning and that was because I didn’t think my wife was remorseful at all. A woman who’s husband walked out of their home should be sober but she was always attending parties, always going out every weekend. Does that sort of woman wish to keep her husband?
I kept telling those who came begging on her behalf, ‘…see the person you are begging for, see her, blue gele party today, avocado coloured aso ebi tomorrow…is that one remorseful? You are fasting for a glutton.’
She didn’t care, she was always at one party or another, she was always posting photos on Facebook and Instagram. Is that one the woman you are asking me to take back?
So I said, no. I would not go back; then after a while nobody came to disturb me again about taking her back. So, I thought, ok, o, finally we have gone our separate ways. But I missed my children; I used to go and visit them at school and many times they would just be crying and begging me to come home. This was very demanding on me emotionally. That’s how I began to send messages to my wife, asking after them, sending money for their upkeep, you know all that stuff?
Sometimes she would respond, other times she wouldn’t. I have always known her to be a stubborn woman and I also realised that it was one of those things I truly liked about her. If she made up her mind, you just couldn’t shift it.
So, we were like that for some time; until one day, I sighted her. She was looking funny. I mean, my wife was slim, but she looked fat; she had also stopped posting photos on social media. I later learned that she was pregnant for one married man!
My own wife!
So, I went to confront her.
‘When did I leave the house that you’ve already jumped into bed with another man? Who owns this pregnancy?’
She began to cry and beg for forgiveness; she told me the man was married but that he was looking for a child and that it was a mistake because she didn’t plan to sleep with the man that it just happened in a moment of weakness! And you know the worst part? The man’s wife was threatening my wife with all kinds of juju such that my wife told me she would wake up screaming from her sleep.
See me see wahala! So, a married man, who had no issue before, saw you, jumped on you and fiam, you are pregnant with twins!
This was like an insult to me, I knew we couldn’t remove the pregnancy because by the time I found out, she was almost six months gone and with twins…
Meanwhile, the so called man was begging my wife not to remove it of course because he and his wife didn’t have children after more than 8years of marriage…you know, this was a very untidy mess!
At this point, I saw my wife was under a lot of pressure and I feared for her life; I could easily have walked away but I feared for my children. The married man did not want to leave his wife, maybe she also tied him with juju, I don’t know but my own wife was also suffering. So I moved back to the house and claimed the pregnancy as mine!
Why?
She was still married to me, we hadn’t done any form of divorce at that time, so technically, we were still married and the pregnancy became mine.
I will not allow that man have the babies, they will bear my name, I will raise them…next time, he will look far to find who will carry babies for him, that’s my own!
(Series written and edited by Peju Akande)
photo credit