JENNIFER

She always carried a shadow in her eyes, a quiet disturbance I couldn’t ignore, yet I dismissed it as family troubles. I’d interviewed her myself a married woman with a young son.  

Brilliant. Hardworking. Fiercely dedicated. Yet every day, she seemed to wilt a little more, like a plant starved of sun and water. Her spirit felt brittle. I wasn’t one to pry, valuing privacy above all, so I kept my distance, a silent witness to her slow fading.

Then, one afternoon, I passed her duty. Her shoulders trembled, silent tears tracking paths through the day’s exhaustion. My resolve crumbled. "Please," I said, my voice thick, come to my office.

Gently, persistently, I asked what weighed her down. The floodgates opened. Her mother, gone beyond. A father who’d disowned her. Raised by a grandmother’s weary love. Then, a teenage pregnancy after secondary school. She’d followed the boyfriend to Abuja, building a life on shifting sand.  

The truth was a punch to the gut. The man she called her partner offered nothing no sustenance, no care. Their home was a warzone, seven days of screaming condensed into six. My own words failed me for advice, lost in the enormity of her pain. "Let’s talk tomorrow," I managed, my voice unsteady. I need… I need to think.

Slowly, I became her confidante. I met her bright-eyed son. She shared secrets heavy as stones family wounds, whispered fears. I offered advice, sometimes professional, sometimes the clumsy comfort of an older person. I saw the evidence of her battles eyes raw and puffy, the hollow look of hunger. Sometimes, I slipped her money for groceries, shame burning my cheeks at the inadequacy.

Every day after her shift, she’d appear at my office door, a hurricane of need. While I cherished her trust, a quiet panic stirred within me. I guarded my mental space fiercely, and she… she was a wounded bird seeking shelter, desperate for warmth. Our closeness felt dangerous, a precarious dance. I was married; she was achingly vulnerable. What did this look like to the world?

Our conversations spilled into endless messages. Then, the bombshell, her husband(boyfriend) wanted to come to the work place. Relief washed over me finally, I could confront this phantom tormentor. But she stood firm, terrified, only telling me to stop him. After reasoning with her, she relented.

Meeting him shattered my illusions. He was barely more than a boy himself, simmering with a toxic brew of insecurity, bitterness, and shocking immaturity. Their dynamic was a car crash in slow motion two children playing at marriage, fueled by resentment. I enlisted wise colleague pastors even to intervened. But untangling their misery felt like trying to mend shattered glass with bare hands. The air crackled with unspoken danger the chilling possibility of violence, of a life snuffed out. He had no job, yet pride radiated off him like heat; she carried the crushing weight of providing, her spirit curdling with bitterness.

It was too much. The family ties were knots of conflict uncles supporting the union, her grandmother and the women in the family vehemently against it. The complexity suffocated me. With a heavy heart, I called her. I can't continue to play brotherhood on this path with you anymore, I confessed. I need also to protect myself. 

She never forgave me for standing out. Not when she left the job. My desperate note, I’ve already adopted you as my sister. My family and I will hold you in our prayers, always.

Then, few years later, the phone my rang. Her voice, once strained, now shimmered like sunlight on water. "He’s off my life," she breathed, joy trembling in every syllable. "My uncle's intervened. I have a new job… and a good man. We’re planning our wedding.  

I stumbled to my shelf, pulled out my worn Bible. Tucked inside were folded some pages desperate pleas scrawled in moments of helplessness "God, protect her." Give her strength. Show her a way out. My fingers traced the faded ink. I sank to my knees, the weight lifting, leaving only a profound, trembling gratitude. Thank you, I whispered to the silence. Oh, thank you for the testimony God. 

Until the moment when will shall dance in white Greater Grace.

Oyugbo Osagie Jonah 

Oyugbo JONAH Osagie