FORECASTING LOVE IN MARRIAGE

CHAPTER 2:WHAT THE SILENCE HEARD

– WHAT THE SILENCE HEARD~

The car ride home was a mobile tomb. The silence was not merely an absence of sound; it was a physical presence, thick and heavy, pressing against the windows, filling the space between Abdulsalam and Mariam in the back seat. The driver, a man wise to the ways of this household, had turned the radio off ten minutes into the journey, recognizing a storm better left undisturbed.

Abdulsalam stared at his phone, the screen dark, seeing only the reflection of his own troubled eyes. Mariam’s words from the interview played on a loop in his mind. “I can see the man he used to be.” Each repetition was a tiny, precise incision. She hadn’t attacked him. She had mourned him. And in the world of politics, eulogies for the living were far more dangerous than criticisms.

He chanced a glance at her. Her profile was turned towards the window, watching Abuja blur past—the gleaming government buildings, the sprawling estates, the bustling markets. She was a statue of composure, but he saw the slight tremor in the hand that rested on her lap, the way her fingers were clenched just enough to whiten the knuckles.

He had to say something. The lawsuit call, her public declaration—it was a avalanche, and he was standing at the bottom of the slope.

“Mariam,” he began, his voice low, meant only for her. “What you said in there…”

She didn’t turn. “Was the truth. You asked me what I saw. I told you.”

“You made it sound like I’m already dead to you.”

Finally, she shifted, her gaze meeting his. It wasn’t angry. It was…resigned. “Did I? Or did I simply hold up a mirror to what you have become? A man who takes a midnight call about a divorce lawsuit but doesn’t have the courage to discuss it with his wife in the light of day.”

The accusation, delivered so softly, hit its mark. “It’s not like that. It’s a strategic move. Kabiru Danladi is digging, he’s looking for any weakness. If he attacks our family, I need to be prepared. This… filing preemptively… it was Nasir’s advice. It’s to protect us.”

“Protect us?” A faint, bitter smile touched her lips. “You file for divorce to protect our marriage? Abdulsalam, listen to yourself. You are speaking the language of your enemies, and you don’t even hear it.”

“Nasir understands the game! He knows how these people think!”

“Nasir,” she said, turning back to the window, “is a man who serves one master: opportunity. I have never trusted his whispers in your ear.”

The argument was cut short as the car pulled into their driveway. The gate swung open, and the familiar sight of their home should have been a relief. Instead, it felt like returning to a beautiful fortress under siege.

---

Inside, the house was quiet. Too quiet. Fatimah was in the living room, a textbook open on her lap, but she wasn’t reading. She was waiting. Her eyes, so much like her mother’s, tracked them as they entered, absorbing the tension that radiated from them like heat.

“The interview was good,” Fatimah said carefully, closing her book. “You both looked… strong.”

“Thank you, ya haya,” Abdulsalam said, forcing warmth into his voice. “Where is your brother?”

“In his room. He’s been there since we got back from school.” Her gaze flickered to her mother, a silent question passing between them. Mariam gave a slight, almost imperceptible shake of her head. Not now.

Abdulsalam felt a pang of exclusion. This silent communication between his wife and daughter was a language he had never learned. He headed for his study, the weight of the day demanding the false sanctuary of four walls and a heavy door.

As he passed Khalid’s room, the door was ajar. He paused, peeking in. His son was at his desk, not on his phone or playing a game, but sketching in a notebook with a fierce, concentrated energy. Abdulsalam pushed the door open slightly.

“Khalid.”

The boy didn’t look up. “Yes, Dad.”

“Is everything alright?”

Finally, Khalid lifted his head. His eyes, dark and perceptive, held his father’s. “You tell me.”

The challenge was there, just like at breakfast. Abdulsalam felt a surge of frustration. “I am your father. You will not speak to me in that tone.”

“What tone?” Khalid asked, his voice flat. “The tone of someone who can see you’re lying? Mom is sad. Fatimah is worried. Aisha is confused because she feels the silence but doesn’t know what it means.” He looked down at his sketchbook. “And you’re in your study, hiding from it.”

Abdulsalam stepped fully into the room. “You are fourteen years old. You know nothing of the pressures I face, the decisions I have to make for this family!”

Khalid finally turned his sketchbook around. It wasn’t a cartoon or a video game character. It was a detailed, shockingly mature drawing of their family at the breakfast table that morning. Abdulsalam was depicted with his face half-turned away, a phone superimposed over his ear. Mariam was a graceful figure, but her eyes were downcast. And in the center, Khalid had drawn himself, his own eyes wide and clear, looking straight out of the page at the viewer.

“I know what I see,” Khalid said quietly. “And the silence in this house is the loudest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Stunned, Abdulsalam could only stare. The artistic skill was one thing, but the emotional insight was unnerving. He had no rebuttal. He turned and left, closing the door behind him, feeling as if he had been stripped bare by his own child.

---

In his study, he finally called Nasir. The phone rang only once before it was picked up.

“Sir! A masterful performance. The public is eating it up. Your composure was impeccable.”

“Nasir,” Abdulsalam interrupted, his voice weary. “The call from the court… Mariam overheard.”

A brief pause on the other end. A carefully calibrated pause. “I see. That is… unfortunate. But perhaps it’s for the best. It forces the issue into the open. Now, we can control the narrative.”

“What narrative?” Abdulsalam snapped, uncharacteristically sharp. “The narrative that I am a man who betrays his wife?”

“The narrative,” Nasir said smoothly, “that you are a modern leader, making difficult choices to protect your family from vicious political attacks. We frame it as a preemptive, legal safeguard. The public sympathizes with a man defending his home.”

The logic was seductive, as it always was with Nasir. It twisted wrong into right, betrayal into strategy.

“What’s the next move?” Abdulsalam asked, sinking into his leather chair.

“We wait for Kabiru’s camp to make the first move. They will leak the lawsuit. When they do, we will be ready with our response: a press conference where you, with Mariam by your side, denounce this invasion of privacy and reaffirm your commitment to your family. It will make Kabiru look desperate and cruel.”

The plan was perfect. Cold, cynical, and politically brilliant. Abdulsalam could see all the moving parts. But he could also see Khalid’s drawing, and hear Mariam’s voice. “You are speaking the language of your enemies.”

“Very well,” Abdulsalam said, the words tasting like ash. “Keep me informed.”

He ended the call and sat in the deepening gloom of his study. He was playing a high-stakes game, and Nasir was his master strategist. But for the first time, a terrifying thought occurred to him: What if the strategist was playing a different game altogether? What if the fall of Barrister Abdulsalam Isa wasn't the end goal of his enemies, but the central move in Nasir Suleiman's own, much darker, plan?

Down the hall, in the master bedroom, Mariam sat at her vanity, slowly brushing her hair. The rhythmic motion was calming. Her phone buzzed. It was an unknown number. She almost ignored it, but something made her answer.

A female voice, professional and quiet, spoke. “Mrs. Isa? My name is Binta. I am a clerk at the court. I saw your interview today. I… I thought you should know. The man who filed the lawsuit on your husband’s behalf, Nasir Suleiman, was in a meeting with Honorable Kabiru Danladi yesterday evening. I was serving them tea.”

The blood drained from Mariam’s face. Her hand, holding the brush, froze mid-air.

The voice continued, hurried now. “I cannot say more. But be careful. The snake is not in the grass. It is in the house.”

The line went dead.

Mariam lowered the phone, her heart hammering against her ribs. She looked at her reflection—a woman who had just been told her world was not merely cracking, but that its very foundations were being deliberately demolished from within.

She stood up and walked to the door of her bedroom. She could see the strip of light under Abdulsalam’s study door down the hall. He was in there, likely listening to the very man who was engineering his destruction.

The silence of the house was no longer just heavy. It was screaming.

And Mariam was the only one who could hear it.