Shades of Love and Hate

The hotel receipt didn’t scream “cheating.” It whispered it. Quiet. Mocking. Fatal.

It was tucked in the inside pocket of Chuka’s Ankara jacket — the one he never let the dry cleaner touch.
Protea Hotel, Port Harcourt. Room 408. Two nights.
The same weekend he swore he was in Accra, closing a deal with some fintech startup.

I stared at the slip for a full minute, wondering if this was one of those dreams that feel like drowning — the kind where you wake up coughing for air.

But I didn’t wake up.

I folded the paper, walked into the kitchen of the home I designed with love, and placed it under the ceramic fruit bowl I bought on our honeymoon in Morocco.

How poetic.
He lied under the same roof we built with truth.

---

My name is Isioma. I design beautiful things. But I couldn’t design a love that stayed.

I met Chuka six years ago. He was the kind of man that filled a room with that calculated, tech-world charm — confident, decisive, a good listener when it counted.

We married fast.

Everyone said we were the Abuja power couple — the interior designer and the tech genius. But our marriage wasn’t a partnership. It was a presentation.

Smiles at events. Kiss on the cheek. Coordinated lace attires at church.

Meanwhile, I slept cold.
I gave love like food, warm and always enough. He received it like a guest — grateful, but distant.

And yet I stayed. Because love, they said, was patient.
But patience is not loyalty when the person you’re waiting for has already left.

---

I didn’t confront him right away. I played the long game.

I started asking questions like a woman too secure to be suspicious.

“How was Ghana?”
He kissed my forehead and said, “Hot, stressful. I missed you.”

Lies roll easily off a man’s tongue when he believes your love is blind.
But mine had begun to see.

I hacked into his email. I paid a discreet PI. I kept the smiles at brunch.

Until I saw it.

A picture.

Anita. My cousin. The one I helped raise.
In Chuka’s car. Wearing his shirt.

I wanted to vomit.
I wanted to kill someone.
I wanted to disappear.

Instead, I smiled at her Instagram post the next day:
“My peace ✨”
She wasn’t even hiding him. She just didn’t know I knew.

---

Pain will make you do things your healing self will struggle to explain.

I didn’t leave Chuka. Not immediately.

I got colder. Sharper. Strategic.

He noticed. “You okay, babe?”

“I’m just tired. Too many projects.”

He offered to book a spa trip.
I almost laughed.
He thought I needed pampering.

What I needed was revenge.
But not just any revenge.

I wanted to break his soul.

And the easiest way to do that… was through Eze.

---

Eze was everything Chuka wasn’t. And that was dangerous.

We’d known each other casually — he and Chuka were co-founders of a booming tech startup.

Eze had always been respectful, distant, but curious. There was a gentleness in his eyes I ignored for years.

But now, I used it.

I showed up at his office with plans for redesigning their lobby. Professional. Innocent.

“Chuka didn’t mention this,” Eze said.

I smiled. “Chuka doesn’t mention a lot of things.”

His eyes flickered. He knew something.

He offered me water. We talked designs. But I noticed how his eyes followed the slope of my neck when I leaned over the table.

I gave him more reasons to look.

A month later, we kissed in his car.

It wasn’t love. It was war.

Except…
Eze didn’t play the game. He saw me. And worse — he listened.

One night, I broke.

I told him everything.
The receipt. The betrayal. Anita. The rage.
And how I used him.

He didn’t walk away.

Not then.

He pulled me into his arms and whispered, “You didn’t use me. You reached for something safe.”

God, I wanted to believe him.

For a moment, I did.

---

But secrets are like termites. They chew through everything — even moments that feel like love.

When Chuka found out, he didn’t scream. He just smiled — that cold, dangerous smile.

“Well done, Isioma. I broke your heart, so you burnt my entire life down.”

Then came Anita.

Pregnant.

My aunt called. “You’ve destroyed this family.”

Eze?

Gone. He said he couldn’t be in the middle anymore. Said he needed time.

Time.
What a useless bandage.

I was alone.

And the Abuja whispers were loud.

“She seduced Eze to get back at Chuka.”
“She’s jealous of Anita.”
“Some women can’t handle not being the center of attention.”

I stopped getting contracts.
Clients ghosted.
My reputation — gone.

That’s when I packed my things, deleted Instagram, and moved to Enugu.

---

Healing isn’t pretty. It’s not yoga and scented candles. It’s crying on the bathroom floor at 2 a.m. It’s learning to sit with the version of yourself you hate.

I started therapy.

My therapist, Mama T, wore wrappers and drank zobo during sessions.

“You think forgiveness is for the people who hurt you,” she said once.
“But it’s for the part of you that wants to stay bitter. That part will kill your joy.”

I hated her.

Until I didn’t.

Until I found joy in small things again — morning light on white walls, laughter at roadside suya stands, designing for the orphanage nearby.

I stopped stalking Chuka’s life.
Stopped blaming Anita.
Stopped wishing Eze would text.

And that’s when he did.

---

The letter came first. From Anita.

It was short.

I didn’t plan to fall for him. I didn’t plan the pregnancy. I know nothing I say will make this right. But I just wanted you to know — I named her Isioma. Not out of guilt. Out of love. You raised me. I failed you. I’m sorry.

I cried like a child.

Then came Eze’s message.
Just one line.

I heard you’re in Enugu. There’s a small café near Polo Park. Want to talk?

---

Some scars never fade. But they stop bleeding.

And sometimes, the people we think are gone forever… circle back when we’re no longer drowning.

I don’t know what comes next.

But I do know this:

I am not the woman who begged for love.
I am not the woman who used it as revenge.
I am the woman who rose after breaking.
And there is power in that.

---

💔 Takeaway:
Revenge may feel like power, but healing is the real revolution.