She had been planning a wedding with him for eight months. Someone else had been raising his child.
It was a Saturday morning and I was doing the most ordinary thing.
I was sitting at the kitchen table at my parents’ house in Ampang, still in my baju tidur,half awake scrolling through Facebook with a mug of Milo going cold beside me. Khairul (name changed) had visited the evening before for dinner with my family, as he did most Fridays. He had left by ten, the way a proper fiancé does. We had been engaged for eight months. Our wedding date was set for the following March. The deposit for the venue had already been paid.
I was scrolling through his Facebook because I had been tagged in a photo he posted the night before, a picture of the two of us at his cousin’s kenduri the weekend before, and I wanted to see if anyone had commented. I was not snooping. I want to be clear about that because I know that is the first thing people will ask.
I found the photo. There were a few comments. Relatives congratulating us, a few heart emojis from his friends.
And then one comment, from a woman named Suria.
There were three words in Malay: “Bila balik, sayang?”
I stared at it for a long time. Long enough for my mother to come into the kitchen, see my face, and ask me what was wrong. I told her nothing. I went to my room and called Khairul.
Who Khairul Was
I met khairul one year ago at a friend’s open house during Raya. He was charming in that easy, unhurried way that some men have, the kind that makes you feel like you are the most interesting person in the room without him having to try very hard. He was 32, worked in logistics, based in KL. He told me he was from Johor originally, that he came up for work, that his family was still down there.
I was 24 when we met, working my first proper job in HR. He was patient and attentive and he made everything feel easy.
We dated for two months, properly, with our families aware. He came to my house. I went to gatherings he hosted for family visiting from Johor. He met my parents early and was respectful in the way that makes mothers relax and fathers nod slowly. When he proposed it was simple and sincere, at a restaurant in Bangsar we both liked, with a ring that was modest but chosen carefully.
My parents liked him. His parents had met mine. Everything was proceeding the way these things are supposed to proceed.
I had no reason to look for anything because there was nothing that told me to look.
What He Said
When I called him that morning he did not try to lie. I think he knew, in that moment, that there was no version of a lie that would hold.
What he told me, over the phone, stumbling over his own words in a way I had never heard from him before, was this:
Suria had gotten pregnant several years ago, before he moved to KL. When he found out, he did the thing he felt he had to do. He married her, a nikah sirri conducted by a local ustaz, not registered with JPN. It was enough, in his mind, to make it right in the eyes of God. They had one child together, a girl, now three years old.
When I asked him why he never registered the marriage, he went quiet for a moment. Then he said it was complicated. That he had always intended to sort it out. That things moved fast and he never found the right time.
I know now what that really means. In Malaysia, a man who wants to take a second wife legally has to go through the Syariah court. He has to prove he can support both families financially. He needs, in most states, the permission or at least the knowledge of his first wife. An unregistered nikah sirri bypasses all of that. It kept Suria off the official record. It kept him free to walk into a mosque in KL and marry me without any of it showing up anywhere.
It was a structure that protected him and to ease his conscience.
He had not ended things with Suria when he moved to KL. He had been managing both lives. Driving down to Johor every few weekends under the excuse of visiting family. Sending money to keep things going.
He said he had always intended to tell me. That he had been trying to find the right time. That he loved me and that was real and he did not want to lose me.
I remember thinking, with strange clarity, that the right time had been a year ago. On the day we met, if he wanted to be technical about it.
I told him not to call me again and I hung up.
What I Did
I sat on my prayer mat, not praying exactly, just sitting, because it was the only place in my room that felt solid.
My mother knocked on my door an hour later. I let her in and I told her everything. She sat beside me and did not say a word for a long time. Then she called my father in. Then my aunt who lives two streets away was called, because in my family when something breaks, the women gather.
By the afternoon, my father had called Khairul’s father in Johor. That conversation I was not present for. I was told it was short.
That is the thing about this kind of betrayal that nobody prepares you for. It does not just happen to you. It lands on your whole family, on people who trusted and welcomed someone into their home every Friday evening for a year. My mother had already started on the wedding favours. My father had already adjusted his savings.
The shame of it is not yours but you carry it anyway, at least for a while.
What I Found Out After
In the days that followed I found out more.
A mutual friend, when I finally told her what happened, admitted she had heard something once, a vague rumour, but had not wanted to say anything without being certain. I understand why she stayed quiet. I also understand that I wish she had not.
I found Suria’s profile eventually. She is 31. She is not a villain in this story. From what I could see she was a woman raising one small child, posting the ordinary things people post, apparently under the impression that her husband was working in KL and coming home when he could.
What I kept thinking about, once I understood the full picture, was the child..
Because a nikah sirri that is never registered does not just leave the wife legally unprotected. It leaves the children in a complicated position too. Registering them under the father’s name requires his cooperation, his documentation, his acknowledgement. If he was not present or willing, the NRD could not put his name on their birth certificates. His children would carry ‘binti Abdullah’, a label that follows a child everywhere in this country, on every form, every document, for the rest of their life.
He built himself a very clean exit. And he left behind people who would spend years dealing with the mess of it.
What made it worse, when I finally allowed myself to think about it clearly, was the maths of who knew.
Khairul’s parents had sat across from my parents at our engagement. His mother had held my hand and told me I was a good girl. His father had discussed the hantaran with mine over teh tarik like two men sealing something honest. His aunts had come to the engagement, eaten my mother’s food, and admired the hantaran trays.
And every single one of them already knew about Suria. Already knew about the child. Had eaten at that table. Some of them had held this grandchild.
They sat in my parents’ living room and said nothing.
When my father called Khairul’s father after everything came out, the response was not the shock of a man hearing bad news. It was the careful, measured tone of a man who had been waiting for a difficult conversation to eventually arrive. He defended his son’s right to take a second wife. My father came to find me afterwards and sat down heavily and did not say anything for a while.
He did not need to. I understood from his face what kind of family we had almost married into.
I have thought about reaching out to Suria. I have not yet decided. What would I even say to her?. That I am very sorry. That I did not know. That her child’s father is the same man who sat at my family’s table every Friday evening for a year and let everyone believe he was someone worth trusting.
Maybe she already knows about me by now. Maybe she found out the same way I did, not because anyone told her, but because something small and accidental slipped through.
That is how it seems to work, with men like this. They do not get caught. They just eventually get careless.
Where I Am Now
I am 27 years old and I am starting over in a way I did not expect to be starting over.
Some days that feel devastating. Some days, and I know this sounds strange, it feels like a door opening onto something I cannot see yet but that is at least honest.
I do not hate Khairul. Hate would require more energy than I currently have available for him. What I feel is something more permanent. A closed door.
The wedding deposit is being managed. Some of it is recoverable. The venue was understanding. My mother handled most of those calls because I could not.
I am not sure when I will be ready to trust someone again. I am trying to be patient with myself about that. My mother says make doa and let God handle the rest.
For now I am just trying to get through the days. Cancelling the things that need cancelling and returning the things that need returning.
Submit your story to ym.efillaerni@olleh and you may be featured on In Real Life Malaysia.
Read also: ‘I gave up my family to pursue my dreams’ Shares 34 YO M’sian woman – In Real Life
https://inreallife.my/i-gave-up-my-family-to-pursue-my-dreams-shares-34-yo-msian-woman/
‘I gave up my family to pursue my dreams’ Shares 34 YO M’sian woman
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