Laila robe into an ankle-length cinnamon jilbab, kept her makeup and scent minimum, and stood beside Sudais in front of the car booth who was in his white kaftan and loud, tantalizing scent as she ordered the arrangement of the food warmers.

"I look at all of this and i think who is going to eat all. This is a lot of food, Sadiya." Sudais said, lifting his palms to rest them on his waist as his eyes followed the food warmers being set in.

Laila hummed, motioning for a small food warmer to be handed over to her as she chuckled humorlessly. "I look at all this and i see: myocardial infarction, Gouty Arthritis, cerebrovascular accident, and many more," She sighed, "Medicine is a total killjoy wallahi."

Sudais shrugged, "Da wuya ya kashe ki?"

"Gwanda dadi ya kasheni." She completed and they burst out laughing.

It was only 11 am, enough time to drop the food warmers at their respective locations and still be in time for Jumu'ah prayers.

In the Masjid parking lot just when Laila had unlatched the door to go out, he caught her upper arm, then released it when she started to turn around. He didn't want to fight with her. "Listen um... I don't know what happened or anything. But you're changing...in a-in a good way. And... i just-i need to say thank you..."

"Ahhttttt." She waved her phone in the air, "It's nothing."

He shook his head, "No. It's everything to me. I mean it. Thank you."

Instead of a big smile that indicated she loved his appreciation, her expression morphed into a tight smile, as she patted his shoulder. "You're welcome. I'll meet you here after the prayer." Then she was out and into the lady's side of the central masjid.

Sudais didn't know what to feel.

On one hand, she had done more nice things to him than she had done their entire married life in a matter of a week.

On the other hand, he had gone into their room earlier to get her a new set of glasses from her nightstand and had met an envelope with the Nile university Clinic Chapter stamp on it. Curious as to what it was, he took it out and read the sheet. It was a suspension statement. About a reckless relationship between her and Dr. Nurain Yusuf.

The man-actually boy, stupid enough to let Laila go was now trying to crawl back into her life? No. He might've not loved her, okay- he hadn't come in terms with his feelings but now he was damn sure he had grown to care for her. Despite their differences, she had gotten under his skin and although it bothered him, He couldn't help it. As such, he was going to do something.

But first, he had to pray.

After prayers, he was on the phone with his informant as he walked among the crowd that headed for the exit.

"....he also prays in the central masjid every Friday. Has a house in wuse district. His shift is always around-"

"I don't think I'll be needing that..." Sudais trailed as his eyes squinted in focus. "I'm seeing him right now in the Masjid! Thank you!" He cut the call before he could get any response and was shoving people this way and that way in pursuit of the man in a cinnamon brown kaftan with a matching cap.

Sudais was fast, but, he didn't catch up to him.

Sudais frustratedly swirled around the massive parking lot in search of the man. He had let out an angry grumble and mother fate decided to smile at him by giving him a sight the man heading towards the last row of cars and didn't let the opportunity pass as he sprinted to him.

Nurain had unlatched his door and pulled it open only for it to be slammed close by non other than yours truly: Sudais.

He turned to snap but found himself smiling at the sight of Sudais. "What a beautiful day it is to run into you. I'm guessing you're here to beg me?" He beamed again, spreading his arms to an infuriating Sudais who found nothing beautiful about the day-well, except a beautiful woman that was probably waiting for him- so, he'd make this quick.

Sudais rose a finger that shook like a club at the doctor. "I don't know what is going on. And i am not interested in whatever stupid history you had with Sadiya that you ruined. But, i want you...to stay away from her. She is married, have some decency."

Nurain's reaction at first was his eyes and mouth going wide in surprise. Then, it morphed into realization as he burst out laughing, dramatically clapping and clutching his stomach as if Sudais said the funniest thing.

Sudais' rage was only fueled, he stepped closer to Nurain and lifted an index at his face which Nurain shoved before stepping back with a tight look crossing over his features. "I see, Laila is scared."

Sudais shook his head, tsking. "Laila is scared of nothing and no one, and that is why she is the most amazing woman a low life like you could've had but you just had to mess it up," He started to nod, the sides of his lip coming up in a smirk. "But that's okay. You see I'm personally grateful you were a jackass to her and that you two got separated and she is now with me and you will never have her."

The doctor threw his head back again and let out a loud chortle. "Got. separated?" He choked in between laughter, then pointed a mocking index at Sudais as he stomped his feet at the comedian in front of him.

Sudais' sharp eyes squinted, his lips coiling down. The man was crazy. How did Laila even let him come close to her? "What's funny?"

Nurain's laugh simmered down but never stopped. "What's funny?" He croaked. All signs of lark evaporated from him as he turned rigid, eyes focused, and voice straight. "It's funny because the same 'wife' you trust so much has been lying to you." He said the word wife with disgust and then spit to his side.

Sudais' glare faltered into a smile. Oh, the boy was making up stuff. "Oh. You can't get her so you're making up stories then? That's pathetic boy."

"I'm not," Sudais was compelled to stop laughing when he detected the seriousness and underlying truth in the doctor's words. "Laila has been lying to you. To her family. To her supposed inlaws. And to herself." He paused to get any reaction but Sudais remained neutral. He went on. "The truth and the only truth is that...i never divorced Laila."

Sudais failed the military by letting his reaction at the minute show. His brows drew in, his lips squeezing at the sudden news. He crossed his arms over his torso. "You're lying."

Nurain chuckled. "If you think i am lying, why are you crossing your arms in defense then? Why are you looking far? Contemplating, huh? Why is your gut feeling telling you to believe me, huh?" He nudged his head forward, then spread his arms out, triumphantly. "Because you know it might be a possibility. I mean why all of a sudden was she not going to school? I've known Laila for 9 years, if you have people in the house you live, she's probably yelling at everyone. She's either reading too much, talking too much, or working too much so she can pass time and not feel guilty by thinking. Does any of that sound familiar, big boy?"

Sudais' arms found themselves losing focus as they untangled and slowly dropped, his eyes blurry but his mind sharp. The boy was stating facts. What the hell?

"But most importantly, why don't you ask Laila. Like, 'hey Laila, are you still married to Nurain? Since when have you known?' And hear what she has to say."

Despite his gut agreeing with the stupid doctor, Sudais groaned as he grabbed the man a few inches shorter than him by the collar and seethed. "You're lying."

Nurain neither moved to remove Sudais from him, nor give an emotion; hellbent on staying neutral. "You're breathing hard, your heartbeat is fast because you know i am not lying. You're in denial. But, only way to find out is to ask 'our wife' isn't it?"

Sudais shouted and jerked the man again, knocking the breath out of him as he roared. "She's not 'our wife' She is my wife. You hear me? My wife!" Then he released the collar he had squeezed, body shaking and veins prominent.

Nurain rose a hand in surrender. "Okay, Casanova. Only way to confirm is by asking her, yeah?"

Sudais seethed and held unto his restraints as much as he could as he gave violent noises-courtesy of his heavy breathing. He dropped his arms by and turned to leave, only to hear something that had him reviving.

"While you're at it, ask her who's bed she was in last week and make sure to get an X-ray of her throat to see who's kids are down there too!"

"I. WILL. KILL. YOU!" Sudais grumbled as he lifted his heavy fists and didn't rest until he whacked the doctor's knockout button, his jaw, ragging at the clear image that had been painted for him and that which would forever be imprinted in his mind and before his eyes.

The man winced with a groan as he revived, almost falling to the floor while holding his jaw and supporting himself by placing a palm on the walls of his car.

Although hurt and bleeding, he laughed at Sudais. "Hurts when betrayed like that, huh?"

Sudais groaned as he lifted his knee and bashed Nurain's jaw with it. "Stop talking. Stop talking!"

The man did. Sudais stepped away from the car only to bump into two men who had gathered at the scene but didn't intervene. He hissed as he walked to the other side of the parking lot to find Laila bent forward on the bonnet of his Army Ford truck car.

He clicked the unlock button over ten feet away and got into the car while ordering her. "GET IN THE CAR."

Laila frowned as she stepped into the car but gasped loudly when he jerked the car gas and was speeding out even before she closed the door.

"What? What is wrong with you? You realize this is a-God! Watch out!" She screeched, covering her head with her arms and bringing her legs almost to her chest in fear of him dropping the woman he had almost crashed into. He maneuvered around that and she went on. "Are you alright? Look at how you're driving! Did you just take something? What is wrong with you? Why are you-"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" He roared at her face, his hands wrapped so hard around the steering, he could yank it out if he added a little more pressure.

And she did. Although she did yelp and gasp and scream, 'No!' Or 'You're going to bash him!' More than a handful of times on their reckless journey back home.

He resisted the urge to glance at her when his mind kept involuntarily picturing what Nurain had mentioned. God, let it not be true!

At home, he had pushed his door open before he had switched off the car as he roared at her again. "GET INTO THE HOUSE."

Okay, when he spoke like that, she was scared. She had been scared shitless at a person's voice only a handful of times and it mostly came from Daddy or one of the rude doctors she was placed under their team. Now, it was Sudais.

For the first time, she embraced his force as she trailed him, eyes filled with tears over the echo of his roar in loop in her head. He slammed the door close and took a rough grasp of her upper arm, dragging her down the four steps into the living room and throwing her harshly on the floor.

Laila caught herself before she could crash and break her spinal cord but couldn't do the same for her glasses which ungraciously got knocked off her face and was flying to some other part of space. Yes, the shove was that intense.

Hands akimbo, face and eyes red, that vein on his forehead popped out just like with his hands, he asked, oddly calm. "Did you cheat on me with Nurain?" She didn't answer and he nodded, "Are you still married to Nurain?"

Now, you know the part in the movie when it's raining and there's a revelation, then there's a sudden thunderbolt that flashes light over everyone's horrified face? That was Laila's situation.

She immediately let out a sob as she started to frantically shake her head, then nod, then shake.

"ARE YOU OR ARE YOU NOT STILL MARRIED TO NURAIN?"

Laila only trembled and when Sudais heard shuffles from an unidentified part of the house, he groaned as he bent towards Laila who cowered back but he still didn't stop until he was roughly pulling her along with him to their bed-chamber. He tossed her in again and clicked the lock-in.

"ANSWER ME HALIMA. OR SO HELP ME GOD I AM GOING TO DO SOMETHING WE BOTH WILL REGRET!"

Laila morphed to her knees as she started to inch towards him, sobbing loudly while rubbing her palms together in a plea. "Please..."

"PLEASE? ARE YOU INSANE? WHAT THE HELL IS PLEASE? MY FRIEND ANSWER MY QUESTION JHOR!"

Laila found herself almost close to him but he put a palm out to halt her, anxious of his maddened heart that could push him to do unimaginable things. "Don't. Don't try it. I'm going to ask you again, ARE YOU OR ARE YOU NOT STILL MARRIED TO NURAIN?"

Laila's sob's lessened for a second as she defeatedly nodded and cast her head down.

His world crashed. Right then, it crashed.

His breath glued to some part of his body for a second as he felt lightheadedness hit him and his peer blur off.

His heavy head swayed in slow motion as the image of her nodding and technically saying yes to his question looped in front of his eyes. He took a step back. Then another. And another until he fell on the chaise lounge, bouncing back and then coming down as he started to breathe through the nose he felt like a mountain had been placed over. He couldn't breathe, God it was pathetic.

Since it was hard breathing through his nose, he let his mouth grow agape and breathed through it. Shaking his head, he brought a snail-like hand over his visibly pounding heartbeat on his chest and felt the area burn. Literally burn. Like a sudden fire outbreak. Disbelief settled at the pit of his stomach and the feeling of his insides being gripped and thrashed about increased.

The atmospheric sound that had slowly muted itself decided to unmute as Laila crawled to him, sobbing and begging. "Plea-please! Listen-listen...i-i wallahi," she rose her wet hands in the air and sniffled back the mucus that was aiming to run down her nose and already sticky face. "Walla-wallahi I didn't know...wallahi, He-he...he told me 2-2 days back."

She lifted two fingers at his chest and immediately gasped, falling back to her butt when he whipped at her, pink sclera, sharp eyes with rigidity and venom oozing off of him.

"TWO DAYS BACK? AND YOU DIDN'T THINK TO TELL ME?"

She wailed an ugly cry as she shook her head more frantically, her arms that had flown to defend herself slowly falling down from over her face. "I-i...i was scared. Wallahi! I am scared. I'm...i'm sorry."

"SORRY?" He roared, shoving his arms every which way. "SORRY YOU SAY? DID...DID YOU CHEAT ON ME WITH NURAIN RECENTLY?"

She hesitated but nodded, sniffling and wiping her teary face with her jilbab which came back smudged with kohl, tears, and dirt. "I'm...sorry...I'm so...sorry. Please, don't tell my dad." She inched closer to him, bowing as she caught his leg and slanted her upper body to align her head with his toes. "Don Allah...do-don Allah!"

Sudais was calming down but her words reversed everything. With all his willpower, he shoved her off his leg and abruptly stood up, stretching an arm. "WE'VE BEEN LIVING UNDER THE SAME ROOF FOR SIX MONTHS NOT KNOWING WE WEREN'T MARRIED. YOU WERE MY WIFE AT LEAST UNTIL YOU FOUND OUT WE WEREN'T MARRIED BUT YOU STILL CHOSE TO CHEAT ON ME? AND WHAT YOU CARE ABOUT IS YOUR FATHER FINDING OUT?" He then brought his tight shaky finger to his temple. "YOU CHEATED ON ME JUST WHEN WE STARTED TO FORM AN ATTACHMENT! A YINNI NA? (ARE YOU MAD) KINA HAUKA NE?"

Laila gently shook her head, pink, weak eyes meeting pink infuriated eyes, chests heaving, breath lacking, one was shaking in anger, hurt and the other was shaking in hurt and doom.

This was it. This was how the world ends. How her world ends.

Still, she won't give up. She whispered, not knowing it was going to be her last. "Please...don't leave me..."

He extended an angry arm toward the door. "NOT JUST YOUR DAD, THE WHOLE WORLD IS GOING TO HEAR ABOUT THIS! GET OUT!"

Her eyes widened as she whipped them up to his heaving and jerky figure, then started to shake her hands and head. She was going to speak but he repeated. "I SAID GET OUT! PACK YOUR SHIT AND GO! GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY SIGHT." Then lunged at her, grabbed her arm, and forced her up.

Laila started to struggle but quickly decided against it and went limp, stomping at his pace and weakly looking up at him as he unlocked the door of the room. Where was she going to go now that he had told her to?

Once wide, he shoved her out of it and slammed the door into lock.

Laila had no idea what room she stumbled into. The blurry liquid in her eyes and her lack of glasses aside, she could swear she couldn't see shit. She took a few steps forward only to walk into wood. She winced, jerking at the pain that shot through her and using that as an excuse to let out a scream and hit her fists back into the wood. She was guessing it was a drawer.

It hurt like a bitch, but she needed the pain somewhere other than her tight chest. So she went on, occasionally switching to punching the palm of her other hand with her fist, screaming, groan, gasping in realization, drowning in thinking of which shops would most likely sell her poison without a medical license, scream, sob, hit the drawer again until she was lightheaded, and repeat until she was slowly stepping back.

She fell to the floor and started to violently cough.

On the other end of the hallway in the now thrashed grey-themed room, Sudais sat slouched forward, staring into space with his head leaned into his hand and mouth dry of any saliva as he had screamed it all off two hours ago.

As he thought deep into it, he concluded he wasn't Laila. He wasn't going to sit down even after he had cooled off without hearing the other side of the story since he was falling madly for her. He had acted on impulses. Now, it was time to be mature, and make Mama and Baba proud. Maybe clear things up, make things work.

He was not ready to forgive her for cheating. Technically, not cheating. But he had to find out how the hell a grown woman not know she wasn't divorced, because, from all looks of it, she was clueless.

Also, knowing how much she feared only one person in the world, her dad, she wouldn't do this on purpose. This was on a 'ruin-your-life-completely' level of shit and he didn't think Laila could pull it off.

It was almost Magreb so he showered, prayed, and changed into a jallabiya before dawning a bottle of water. He figured he might need it to go through with, 'the talk.'

Hoping the woman didn't really consider packing her shit and leaving as he had angrily and unconsciously said, He knocked on the door to the sapphire room and went on to find it empty.

He knocked on the opposite one and got no answer. He pushed the door to widen it but felt it stop in obstruction. He tried again and it was still stuck, but could move slowly if he applied more pressure. When it was wide enough to stick his head, he did find out what was obstructing the door and immediately shouted, "SADIYA!"

Sudais' eyes popped out as he stepped back only to hit the door harder, in the process hitting Laila's comatose body. "Shit!" He cursed himself for being such a dummy and instead managed to squeeze himself into the room and his hands immediately found themselves atop his head at the sight in front of him.

Laila was laying in an uncomfortable position with no sign of life, her body still clad in her jilbab and her mouth, cheeks, floor, and jilbab half dried with blood.

His first thought was; Za'a ce na kashe yarinyar nan!

He shouted as he fell to his knees and immediately started to tap her cheeks. "Laila! Sadiya! Halima! Can you-can you hear me? What are-Ya Allah!" Then get her to a hospital you damn fool. The only voice in his head that made sense roared at him.

"Innalillahi wa'inna'ilaihir ra'ji'un!" He chanted as he picked up her limp body and raced between their home, his car, and a hospital.

Sudais was cast off just before the emergency doctors and nurses stretched her out of sight.

Sudais paced in the waiting area and occasionally stopped to throw his head back and pray, rub his palms, clasp his hands over his head, rock back and forth, clasp his shaky hands in front of his crotch and repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat until a past isha when someone sensible apart from the 'she go dey alright' or 'I'm not sure who you're referring to' people were out to address Sudais.

A nice emergency doctor engaged in a conversation with Sudais before telling him what was going on. "Your wife coughed out blood and passed out from it from 3 main things. We believe she has a heart condition, right?"

Sudais frantically nodded. "Yes."

"That's one of it. The second is ulcer. She-"

"But she feeds well!" Sudais exclaimed and the doctor chuckled.

"Ulcer is not necessarily associated with hunger. Ulcer is a great example of chronic hemorrhage. And the last, some powerful emotion was the main reason this occurred." He went on to explain and Sudais made his conclusion right then and there.

Laila couldn't have known. Cheating on him aside, she just couldn't make this up.

But how the hell do you not know you weren't divorced?

How was that even possible?

Laila was admitted into the hospital under heavy supervision for a day before she was discharged.

Sudais brought her home alone and when he had brought her into their bedroom, he disappeared into the loo.

After his wudhu, he made his way out to find Laila crouched on her knees with her palms against each other as she started, voice still raspy and shaky but not seizing. "Listen. Listen to me, please...i have-had no idea. Wallahi i didn't know."

Sudais asked the one questioning lingering in his head since it all started. "How come you never knew you weren't divorced? It's absurd."

She nodded weakly. "It's a long story."

He nodded too, sitting at the edge of the bed and Laila sitting and slouching on the heart of the rug. "I have all the time until I leave..."

Laila's wide eyes whipped to him. "You're leaving?"

He hummed, then decided to at least answer. "To Lagos. I need to clear my head."

"Please, Don't leave me now. I can't bare it. We can go back to hating each other if it makes it easier. For better for worst. Just don't leave me."

He sighed, crossing his arms and shaking his head. "I'm leaving to clear my head."

She spread her weak palms in question, "You-you can clear your head here. I will stay out of your way. I will-i can't...i just-"

"Sadiya." he started, hoping his stern tone would make her understand that no words of hers were going to make him crack.

She continuously nodded before clearing her throat.

Time to go down the ugly route of memory lane...