Saying Till Death - Episode 4

Susan cried for at least 30 minutes (i'm not exaggerating oh) not silent tears, she was crying those kind of tears that involve a lot of heaving, and blowing the nose and generally not looking pretty. I just kept saying "calm down Susan, calm down". Finally she calmed down, she became very quiet. I put a call through to the make-up artiste to get her to come and re-do the bride's make-up. After my call Susan broke her silence, "You can tell her not to worry about the make-up, i'm going home".

I pleaded with her to consider the fact that her husband, her family and friends were in the hall expecting her return, i asked her to minimise the effect of whatever may have happened by going back in. Stubbon Susan insisted on going home and since she could neither go to her family home, nor her new home, i decided to take her to my own house. I got the driver and he drove us, there was a lot of traffic on our way and all i could do was hold her hand because i knew she wouldn't want to say anything until we got home.

Finally we got to my house and thankfully it was quiet, everyone has gone out. I got her a glass of water to drink to help her calm down. She started to talk about what happened and i was beginning to understand why she was so agitated.

According to her the only part of the wedding Nonso had indicated any interest in was the spraying of money. He had reminded her on their way to the reception that all money sprayed during the reception would be picked by his sister and she had agreed to it. Somehow when they started dancing his sister was nowhere around and she had asked Tope one of the bridesmaids to help her pickk the money from the ground, the other bridesmaid's joined her and Tope moved some of the money out to her car and also used the opportunity to get more bags to store the money.

Apparently the minute Nonso noticed that Tope was not around them anymore he got upset. He asked susan were her friend was and because she wasn't aware that his mood had changed she laughingly asked whether he wanted to be dancing with tope, she told him that Tope had taken some of the money to her car. He asked why she had done that and while Susan was explaining that they didn't have enough bags to put the money in, Nonso shouted "thief, you want to hide the money abi?" and quickly followed it with a slap. He asked her "how much did you contribute to this wedding?" and slapped her a second time. It was after the second slap that she walked out of the hall.

I felt so sorry for her. Why would anyone slap their newly wedded wife over money? Why hadn't he come rushing out full of remorse and pleading with her? Why hadn't he made any attempt to reach her by phone? Did no one care? Her parents, his parents, her friends?

I had to be a good friend, my friend had just promised for better, for worse. I explained to her that she would have to talk it over with him, that she had to return to the hall, or at least to meet up with her husband. It was their wedding day after all. Susan was having none of it, she insisted that she would sleep in my house and decide what to do in the morning. I couldn't argue anymore and at this point i was even thinking why bother? The husband himself hadn't called and i was here "drinking Panadol" on his behalf.

I went into the kitchen to make two cups of horlicks for us to drink, it was still about 6pm and she wanted to go to bed. While i was making the drinks the doorbell rang, i rushed to the door and checked the peephole.

 It was Nonso.