The Woman I thought was An Angel: chapter 4

The Woman I thought was An Angel: chapter 4

The house was quiet. 

Chinedu was asleep in the room, the fan blowing slowly over him. The hospital had weakened him. His face looked older. Tired. 

Ada sat on the edge of the bed, staring at him. 

Her Bible was on her lap, open to Psalm 23. But she wasn’t reading. 

Her chest felt tight. Her skin felt restless. 

It had been weeks since she last felt... wanted. Since she last felt that rush. 

And now, with her husband sick, the old feelings were coming back. Like flood water breaking a dam.

She closed her eyes and the memories came.

---

Three years ago. In Port Harcourt.

 When She was 22. Broke. Angry at God. Angry at life.

The first man called her "fine girl." Paid her rent for 3 months. Bought her wigs, phones, clothes. And slept with her as they want.

“Baby, you’re special,” he’d say. “Other girls don’t treat me like you.”

Then there was another. And another. 

Soon it wasn’t about rent anymore. It was about the attention. The money. The way men looked at her like she was the answer to all their problems. 

Deacon Paul used to pick her up after night vigil and drop her at hotels. After one round,“God will understand,” he’d whisper.  

Bro. Emeka from choir would send her money every Friday. “For your upkeep, sister.”  

Oga Tony called her his “happiness.” He paid the most.

They pampered her. “You’re different.” “You understand men.” “You know how to make a man feel like a king.”

For a while, she believed it. 

She told herself, This is just business. This is just survival. God will forgive me later.

At night she would count the money and feel powerful. In the morning she would go to church, raise her hands, and cry during worship. 

No one knew. Or if they knew, they pretended not to. 

Because she was good at it. Good at being two people.

---

Ada opened her eyes. Chinedu shifted in bed and mumbled her name in his sleep. 

“...Ada... don’t leave me...”

That pulled her back to now.

She looked at her wedding ring. The man who prayed for her. The man who paid her bride price. The man who told her “I will love you even with your past” on their wedding day — even though she never told him the full truth.

He thought she was delivered. He thought she was new. 

And for 1 year, she tried to be new. 

But the body remembers. The mind remembers. 

The quiet nights. The need to feel needed. The need to feel alive, the need to have ogasm for two weeks. 

Her phone buzzed on the bedside table. 

Unknown number. 

“Baby, I miss you. Are you free tonight? I can come. Just for you.”

It was one of the old numbers. One of the men who still checked on her.

Her thumb hovered over the screen.

He’s sick. He needs me. I’m his wife. I made a vow before God. 

But another voice whispered: You’re still young. You still have needs. He can’t give you what you need right now. One time won’t hurt. No one will know.

Double mind. Double life. 

That’s what she had been running from.

She stood up and went to the bathroom. Splashed water on her face. Stared at herself in the mirror. 

The girl in the mirror was wearing a church wrapper and a wedding ring. 

But behind her eyes was the girl from Aba Road.

“God, help me,” she whispered. “I don’t want to go back.”

But the phone buzzed again.

And the war inside her got louder.

---

That night she didn’t go anywhere. 

She sat by Chinedu’s bed and held his hand till morning. She prayed. Real prayers this time. Not the ones she said for show.

But when morning came and Chinedu was still weak, and the messages kept coming, she knew the battle wasn’t over.

The old life was calling her. 

And the new life was lying sick in her bed.

She had to choose. 

But choosing was hard when part of her still missed how it felt to be chased, paid, and called “special.”