“Oli wa wa?” he shouted, his voice cutting through the chaotic buzz of downtown Kampala.
The boda boda had swerved, nearly knocking me off my feet. The rider, visibly annoyed, repeated, “Oli wa wa?”; Where are you from?
This time, his voice held less anger and more confusion, even a bit of amusement. I must have looked mad, barefoot, my makeup half-melted in the Kampala heat, my gele slipping off my head like it, too, had given up.
I stood frozen in the middle of Namirembe Road, dust curling around my ankles like smoke. The honking cars, the yelling vendors, the market women calling “mpafu, mpafu, tomato beyi?”, the call to prayer rising from Gaddafi Mosque, it all blurred into static.
But inside me, everything was sharp. Clear. Loud.
I wasn’t just running away from a wedding. I was running from a lie, dressed in white, sealed with Bible verses, and stamped with applause from the congregation.
I looked around like a hunted animal, expecting someone, maybe my auntie, maybe an usher from church, to spot me, grab my arm, and drag me back.
Back to the hotel room in Bugolobi, where my face had just been powdered.
Back to the hall decorated in white and purple, with scripture printed in gold calligraphy on every table.
Back to him.
They said I was chosen. That I was blessed to be marrying a man of God. They saw my smile on the wedding poster:
“Holy Matrimony between Pr. Isaac Muwanguzi & Sis. Esther Namuli”, and they clapped in church. They prayed over us. They praised him.
But no one saw what was happening behind closed doors.
I never really saw his eyes, truly saw them, until the night he came to my room uninvited. He said God had chosen me for him. That I should submit. That I should be grateful. But the way his voice lowered, the way his hand tightened around my wrist, that wasn’t God speaking.
That was control. That was fear.
I met Pastor Isaac when I was 19, fresh in the youth choir at Deliverance Fire Ministries in Wandegeya. I loved God. I loved music. I loved how the church made me feel, safe, seen, held. Auntie always told me, “If the world doesn’t accept you, the church will.” So I clung to it.
I was a church girl. Baptised before I even knew what sin was. Raised by Auntie after Mama died. Daddy disappeared when I was five. It had always been just the two of us and the church. So, when Pastor Isaac called me anointed, when he gave me solo after solo, when he laid hands on me more often than needed, everyone said I was blessed.
I thought I was too.
He was kind, at first. Supportive. He praised my voice. Let me lead worship when others older than me were still waiting their turn. He would pull me aside after service and say, “Esther, God has an assignment for you.”
It felt good to be seen.
Then came the gifts; books about submission, a Bible with my name engraved in gold, even a new smartphone. “For ministry,” he said.
Then came the midnight messages, the phone calls that drifted from scripture to stories about his loneliness, his visions, his calling. The blurred lines came quietly.
Then, one day, he told me God had revealed I was to be his wife.
I was stunned.
He was 36. I was barely 21.
“I’ve prayed about this,” he said, with absolute conviction. “And God has confirmed it.”
“But… I haven’t,” I replied, my voice barely above a whisper.
He looked at me then, his eyes hard, cold. “Are you doubting the man of God? The calling on your life?”
That was the day I stopped questioning.
Who was I to argue with God? Or with the man everyone believed spoke to Him directly?
I thought maybe my hesitation was fear. Or pride. Or the devil himself.
So I said yes.
And that’s when the isolation began.
He told me to stop talking to other choir leaders. “They’re jealous,” he said.
He told me to stop posting photos. “Your body is the temple. You’re causing men to stumble.”
He told me not to apply to university. “The Lord will use you in ministry, not in the world.”
Each restriction felt like spiritual discipline, until it started to feel like a cage.
He never hit me. He didn’t need to.
When I cried, he said I lacked faith. When I disagreed, he said I had a rebellious spirit. When I said I felt alone, he said I wasn’t praying hard enough.
And when he started sleeping with other women, quietly, secretly, carefully, I was told to protect the anointing. Even when a girl in the church came to me, shaking, saying he had touched her during a “private deliverance session,” I was told not to interfere with the work of the Lord.
I confronted him once.
He laughed. A cold, mocking laugh.
“Esther,” he said, “don’t ever let the devil use your emotions to destroy a man of God’s calling.”
And I almost believed him.
I almost married him.
They didn’t know I prayed every night for a way out.
And that morning, when the stylist wrapped my head in golden gele and the makeup artist told me to smile for Instagram, I felt something bend inside me. Not snap, just bend. Like a branch bearing too much weight. I looked at my reflection, beautiful, yes. Radiant, maybe. But I didn’t recognize the girl staring back.
So I ran.
No phone. No bag. Just instinct and breath. My legs carried me across Nakulabye, through dust, through traffic, past confused faces and boda riders who stared but didn’t ask.
Now I stood there, chest heaving, veil in one hand, heart pounding like a drum.
A street preacher stood nearby, shouting about repentance and salvation. His words tore through the noise.
Irony? Maybe.
I was looking for salvation, too.
The boda boda guy revved his engine again. “Do you need help?” he asked, softer this time.
I nodded.
“I need to leave this place,” I said.
“Where?”
I paused. My voice was barely audible.
“I don’t know. But far.”
He patted the seat behind him. I climbed on, and as the boda moved forward, zigzagging through Kampala’s afternoon madness, I looked back one last time.
Not at the mosque.
Not at the road.
Not at the church.
But at the version of myself I was finally leaving behind.
Innocent Baluge is a Nairobi-based author with two published books: My Wandering Mind: A Collection of Short Essays and Brilliant, but Broken, a novel.
Cover photo credit: berobscura