no longer juggle.

I kept hiding it because once Miriam started speaking, she didn’t stop where the issue stopped.

## She Ate While I Asked
That evening I cooked because she had gone to work and I wanted the house calm before I opened my mouth.

Rice, stew, and the last two pieces of fried plantain.

I wiped the table twice, lined the plates properly, and waited until she loosened her handbag from her shoulder.

She didn’t thank me for the food.

She sat, switched from her work shoes into rubber slippers, and started eating like the day had been too long for courtesy.

Her cracked phone lay beside the water bottle, face down, with a faint smear of stew on the case from the week before.

I stood for a second longer than I should have, then sat opposite her.

‘Miriam, our rent is overdue, and the landlord has been on my neck.

He gave us twenty-four hours.

Can you help me raise something so we can settle him?’

She kept chewing.

I watched her spoon move from plate to mouth and back again.

Metal touched ceramic with a small, steady click that somehow felt louder than her breathing.

When she finally looked up, it wasn’t with surprise.

It was with the kind of cold a person keeps ready.

‘Do you know you are shameless?’ she asked.

I felt the words land before the sentence even finished.

The ceiling fan was turning slow above us, pushing warm air in circles.

Outside, somebody’s radio was playing old gospel.

Inside, my own house had gone tight around my ribs.

I said, ‘I’m asking because right now I can’t carry it alone.’ That was me still trying to keep the issue small.

I didn’t know she had been waiting to make it bigger.

## The Word She Used
Miriam dropped her spoon into the plate and leaned back like she needed space to measure my failure properly.

‘A husband asks his wife to pay rent for the house he and his children sleep in, and he still expects respect?’

I tried to keep my voice level.

‘It’s temporary.

I’ve been jobless for months, yes, but that doesn’t mean I won’t recover.

We just need to avoid being thrown out.’

She gave a short laugh that had no joy in it.

‘At this point, what exactly makes you the man of this house?’

There are insults that sting and pass, and there are insults that stay because they are built to reduce you in your own chair.

She looked me straight in the face and said the only thing still giving me the title of man was what sat between my legs.

Not work.

Not provision.

Not respect.

Just that.

I remember gripping my knee under the table so hard my fingers hurt.

I also remember answering softly, because my children were in the next room with their exercise books open.

‘I’m still a man, Miriam.

I just don’t have a job right now.’

She didn’t lower her voice for the children.

‘A man who can’t feed his family, pay school fees, or settle rent is what, John?’

I had no clean answer that would save my pride and save the evening.

So I chose the smaller sentence.

‘Tell me what you can