Ekene’s Losses 1

It’s been exactly one year today since I lost my husband. Sometimes, I still cannot believe I am saying those words.
Eben was my comfort. My peace in a troubled world. My calm after life had dealt me one hard blow after another.

We were married for fifteen beautiful years and for most of those years, I thought I had finally been rewarded for everything I had survived.

Eben was my biggest support system and my loudest cheerleader. He helped me complete my university education and later obtain my master’s degree. He never allowed me to settle for less than I could become. He pushed me to dream bigger, do better and believe in myself.
I often told him that much of the woman I became was because he believed in me.

I met Eben at one of the darkest points in my life. By then, I had already lost so much. I remember the day clearly.
I had gone to a pharmacy to get medication for my brother, only to discover that I did not have enough money to pay for them. I was explaining my situation to the pharmacist when I noticed a man sitting nearby. He was visiting the pharmacist, his friend, and had overheard our conversation.
That man was Eben.
There was something about me that caught his attention. I did not know what it was. He simply offered to pay for the medication. I was grateful, thanked him and left.

I did not know that I would see him again. The next time I went to the pharmacy, Eben was there.
He remembered me. He asked about my brother. I told him I had lost him.
He was visibly saddened and tried to console me. What surprised him was how calm I appeared. My brother had only died recently, yet I seemed almost too composed. I told him that losing people no longer shocked me. It was a strange thing to say, but it was the truth.

I had become familiar with grief.
I had lost my parents. I had lost my siblings. One after another, the people I loved disappeared from my life.
Although I tried to look strong, Eben saw what I was trying to hide. He saw the pain in my eyes. They were beautiful eyes, people often told me that, but then they carried a sadness that no smile could completely conceal.

When he finally made me smile, he noticed my dimples. And he was smitten. He wanted to see me again. He suggested lunch and I agreed because I felt I owed him for what he did for me the other time. I did not know that lunch would change my life.

He was a good listener and very easy to talk to. I told him everything about myself.
I even told him how my extended family members had begun to think there was something wrong with me. Some believed I was possessed. Others thought I was jinxed and somehow responsible for the deaths around me.

After losing my brother, I had reached my limit. I was tired. I was only waiting for death to come for me too.
I did not think I could survive losing another person….then I realized, that was even possible anymore. I had lost everyone. I was alone.

For some reason, I felt safe with Eben.
I had spent years learning how to hold myself together but that day, I finally let my guard down. And I broke. I cried.
He did not try to stop me. He simply sat there and let me cry until I had nothing left. Then he politely asked if he could hold me. I nodded. And he pulled me into his arms.

I cried for so long that I eventually became too tired to keep my eyes open.
The next thing I knew, I had fallen asleep in his arms.
Eben noticed that I had gone completely quiet. When he looked down, he realized I was asleep. He could have woken me up, but he didn’t.
There was something peaceful about my face, perhaps because it was the first time in a very long while that I had allowed myself to rest.

Some of the restaurant staff had seen me crying. They understood that I needed the sleep and did not disturb us.
I occasionally stirred to make myself more comfortable in Eben’s arms and each time, he thought I fit perfectly there. I slept for almost two hours.
When I woke up, it was already getting dark.

For a few seconds, I had no idea where I was. Then I remembered.
I was embarrassed but Eben made me feel as though I had done nothing wrong.
I told him I could not remember the last time I had slept that peacefully.
I did not know it then but I had just met the man who would become the safest place I had ever known.

When Eben discovered that I had deferred my university admission to take care of my brother, he refused to let me give up on my education.
He encouraged me to go back.
He supported me in every way he could.
And on the day I graduated, he proposed.
We got married after my youth service.

For fifteen years, Eben made it his mission to make life easier for me.
He was my rock.
He was an intentional husband and a present father to our three children.
He was everything I had once thought I would never have.

After years of losing people, I finally had someone who stayed. He was my reward. My blessing.
Together, we built a home that felt like a safe place from the rest of the world.
We had plans.
So many plans.
We had our whole lives ahead of us.
That was why his death broke something inside me that I have not been able to explain.

That night, Eben led our family in prayers before we went to bed. He was healthy.
He exercised. He ate well. He took care of himself. There was absolutely no reason for me to think anything was wrong.
I woke up during the night to use the bathroom. When I returned to the room, I saw him sprawled across the bed.
I tapped his leg.
I asked him to sleep properly.
He did not respond.
I tapped him again.
Still nothing.

Eben was not a deep sleeper, so I thought he was pretending.
I tried to push him towards his side of the bed. That was when I realized something was terribly wrong. He was lifeless. I had left him for only a few minutes. And he was gone.

I remember staring at him and thinking it had to be a mistake.
Eben could not just die like that.
Not Eben.
Not the man who had rescued me from the darkest parts of my life.
Not the man who had taught me that life could still be beautiful.
But it was true. He was gone. And I was left behind.

The days that followed were the worst days of my life. I had known grief before, but this was different. This grief had no bottom. It cut deep.
I was numb.
I barely ate. I barely slept. I did not want to see anyone.
I had no desire to continue living.
What was life without Eben?
He had been my peace for fifteen years.
My safe place.
My person.
And now I was expected to wake up every morning and somehow continue without him. I could not understand how the world was still moving when mine had completely stopped.

One afternoon, I sat alone in the house, surrounded by memories of the life we had built together.
And then I remembered something someone in my family had told me years ago. I had been told to go and find out why I kept losing everyone I loved.
Back then, I had ignored it.
But sitting there alone after Eben’s death, those words returned to me.
They would not leave my mind.
For the first time, I began to wonder if there was some truth in them.

What if they were right?
What if there really was a reason why everyone I loved kept dying?
And for the first time since Eben’s death, something other than grief began to take root in my heart.
Fear!!!

I tried to dismiss the thought, but it stayed with me. That night, I opened an old box containing photographs of the people I had lost.
I spread them across the floor and stared at them one after another.
My parents.
My siblings.
Eben.

There was something unsettling about seeing all their faces together.
Then I noticed something I had never noticed before. Every photograph had been taken shortly before their deaths.
And in every single one, there was a strange woman standing somewhere in the background.
I froze.
I had never noticed her before until that night.