It was a Wednesday morning when the mirror finally spoke.
Not in words, of course, but in silence. A deep, penetrating silence that made me see everything I had refused to face for years.
I had just finished taking a bath. The scent of jasmine and vanilla lingered on my skin, a luxury I once cherished. I wrapped myself in my white robe and stood in front of the mirror, brushing my hair. That’s when I saw her.
Not me.
Her.
The woman in the mirror looked… unfamiliar.
Her eyes were weary, distant. Her cheekbones more defined—less from beauty, more from quiet suffering. Her lips were pursed, as though they’d forgotten how to smile freely. Her hands trembled slightly, betraying a restlessness that ran deep.
And in that moment, a frightening realization settled in my bones:
I had become a shadow of the woman I once was.
When did I stop laughing with my mouth open? When did I start second-guessing every step, every breath, every word? When did I stop living?
That moment shook me.
I dropped the brush, and without thinking, I pulled open the drawer beneath the vanity—the one where I hid my journal. I flipped through the pages until I found my favorite line.
“This is not the life God intended for me.”
I touched the words like they were scripture.
And then, something inside me snapped. Not violently. Not dramatically. But in that deep, quiet way a tree cracks after years of standing through storms.
I was done pretending.
Later that day, I sat with Mama Nkechi in the kitchen. We sipped zobo in silence until I finally asked, “Do you think it’s wrong to leave a man who’s never hit you, but has caged your soul?”
She looked at me, long and slow. Then said, “Better a woman with a broken marriage than a woman with a buried spirit.”
That night, I couldn’t sleep.
I kept thinking about the red flags I had ignored. The way Chuka never introduced me to his family until after our court wedding. The way he made me cut off my friends because “they were distracting me from building a home.” The subtle control, the isolation disguised as affection, the way he dressed possessiveness as protection.
I had chosen gold over peace.
And now, I was suffocating in it.
Chuka returned from Abuja two days later.
He smelled of leather and expensive cologne. He walked into the house like a king returning from war. I watched him from the hallway as he placed his travel bag on the table.
“Did you miss me?” he asked, flashing that same smile that once made my knees weak.
I smiled back.
“Yes.”
But deep down, I was thinking, I missed myself more.
He told me about his meetings, his wins, his plans to expand the business. I nodded like the good wife I had been trained to be. But my mind was elsewhere.
I was done being quiet.
That evening, as he settled into bed, I asked him softly, “When last did you see me as a woman and not a possession?”
He looked at me, puzzled. “What are you talking about?”
“I mean… do you love me? Or do you just love controlling me?”
He sat up. “Adaeze, have you been watching those American shows again?”
I didn’t smile.
He sighed, annoyed. “I give you everything. What more do you want?”
Freedom.
But I didn’t say it. Not yet.
I knew better than to confront a controlling man without a plan. I needed an exit strategy. A clean one. Quiet. Undetectable.
So, I waited.
I began gathering small cash. Jewelry. Documents. One by one. I stored them with Mama Nkechi. She became my silent accomplice. A woman who had seen too many broken wives in wealthy houses to judge me.
Then I called Chioma from a borrowed phone.
It was the first time we had spoken in over a year.
When she heard my voice, she screamed, “Ada!! Are you alive?! Are you okay?!”
I began crying.
We spoke for thirty-five minutes. I told her everything. The isolation. The fear. The silence. And the moment the mirror spoke.
She didn’t tell me what to do. She just said, “Whenever you’re ready, I’ll be here. Day or night.”
That was all I needed.
That night, I packed a small bag and hid it behind the water tank in the backyard. I told Chuka I had cramps and didn’t feel like eating. He didn’t press. As always, he didn’t notice when I disappeared mentally.
He never saw the cracks in his golden cage.
He didn’t know I was already slipping through them.
