DON'T LEAVE WHEN IT IS TOO LATE.

The story.

Udauk was too weak to continue with the evening chores around the house because of her pregnancy. She bent over the kitchen cabinet in search of a tuber of yam she was to prepare before her husband returned from work. At the point of stretching her hands to reach the tuber of yam under the cabin, she felt a sharp pain down her abdomen. Her left lap was swollen from the beating she got the previous night from the monster's husband. She was still short of three months from her due month. That's when she was to put to birth.

The shape pain was accompanied by a loud scream. She dropped the knife she had with her and tried to settle on a table-size stool lying close to the gas cylinder in the kitchen, but she couldn't. She fell and started screaming, reached out to her phone, and dialed her husband.

Mr. Sam had branched Madam G's Native Kitchen to settle for a while before heading home as his habit demands. He was busy at his usual joint with a bottle of chill CHAMPION LAGER BEER and a plate of 405 when his wife called. 

In his habit of not picking up the wife's call or returning it on time whenever they have a misunderstanding, snubbed the call, gulped a mouth full of the acholic content as Timaya - "I CAN'T KILL MYSELF" hit at the far end of Madam G's Native Kitchen.  The phone rang again but Sam ignored perhaps with the mindset that the wife was calling to complain as usual.

At this point, Udauk was bleeding in the kitchen, crawling and groaning as she scamped for help alone. At about 30mins she couldn't move her legs again as the bleeding had made her lose so much blood. She fainted and lay lifeless on the floor in a pool of her blood.

45mins later, Sam staggered into the sitting room raining curses on the lifeless wife, ordering her to bring his food to the table before brimstone rained on Sodom and Gomorrah that evening. In a bit to flex his alcoholic muscle with the wife made his way to the kitchen only to meet the wife in a pool of blood lifeless. Then and there it dawned on him that the wife was in dying need of medical attention.

He made for the main road and reappeared with a taxi to convey the body to the hospital. At the hospital, medical personnel swing into action in a bit to save Uduak from the cold hands of death. 

Uduak was stretched into the operating theatre and within a short while red light on the entrance was visible. Uduak was put through surgical blades but she had long gone the same with the unborn baby.

Doctors said afterward that her umbilical cord had been cut as a result of the severe beating she received from her monster husband. Sam stood in the hospital speechless and dumped. The wife was finally freed from his caging and beating by the cold hands of death.

After her death, stories from the rumors and gossip mill had it that during courtship Uduak knew of Sam's monster attitude but instead chose to endure rather than seek help. Even her friends and family advised her against venturing into marriage with such a man, but she said she was aging and as such needed to marry.  Aside from this, she was hoping Sam would change in due time, but he never did.

Udauk never lived to tell her story.

NOTE!

A lot of women are going through hell in what they call marriage.

Some have turned to pieces of rags, slaves, etc. all in the name of marriage.

While some others have lost their youthfulness, eventually their lives all for marriage.

To some, they are pressured, and to others, they just want to feel among others.

They fail to share their pains just because our society pays deaf ears to all these and for fear of what people will say. Many times, they end up in 6 feet just for marriage.

Don't leave it in the surgery room.

Don't leave without your life.

Don't leave when it is too late. 

Patrick Ekong