The explosion occurred somewhere towards the end of their third year of marriage. Esi decided she was just fed up. For weeks she had not seen Ali. So one day when the gate had been open and she had heard a car drive up, she peeped at it through the curtains. It was early afternoon of a weekday and she had just come in from work herself. She was only dresssed in a single piece of wrapper. When she realised it was Ali, she didn't bother to go and change. She just met him at the door with, 'Ali I can't go on like this.'