No place felt safe

For three or four days after reaching the coastal town, we stayed in a hotel, trying to decide what to do next. We had survived the journey there, but we still needed somewhere we could live without being afraid.

We talked about our options and tried to make a plan. We had left with so little, and every decision had to take account of the money we had left. We still hoped that, somehow, we could find help, return, and begin the life we had wanted together.

Then we learned that our car had been traced.

The car had carried us through the first part of our journey. It had held our few belongings and allowed us to leave whenever we needed to. Now its registration number could lead those searching for us to our next stopping place. Keeping it no longer felt safe.

We had to leave it behind.

We left the car at the hotel and took our belongings with us. It was another loss at a time when we already had very little. Until then, we had at least been able to decide when to set off and which road to take. From that point onward, we would have to continue by bus.

It was a night bus.

As we travelled through the darkness, we were still trying to understand what our lives had become. Only a short time earlier, we had been planning a future together. Now we were leaving behind the vehicle that had helped us escape, carrying what we could and hoping the next place would give us a little more time.

That stage of the journey took us roughly a thousand kilometres away.

Through a friend, we found somewhere to stay. A relative of that friend opened their home to us. We had never met this person before, yet they were willing to give us shelter when we needed it.

We stayed there for four days.

After the uncertainty of hotels and travel, having a home to stay in offered some relief. We were grateful to the person who welcomed us and to the friend who made that connection possible. Even in those difficult days, there were people whose kindness mattered deeply.

Their help gave us shelter. We continued to manage with our own small amount of money; no one was financing our journey. We remember that distinction clearly, and we remain thankful for what people were able to offer.

For those four days, we had somewhere to stop and consider what might come next. We wanted to believe that we could stay long enough to work things out.

Then our location was discovered again.

The distance we had travelled had not brought the safety we hoped for. Once more, we had to gather our belongings and leave. Each departure made it harder to believe that the next place would be different.

We were grateful for the shelter we had received. Leaving did not diminish that gratitude. But kindness could not remove the circumstances that kept forcing us to move.

By then, we felt we needed to go much farther away from the region where our journey had begun. We decided to travel north, hoping that greater distance might finally give us a chance to settle.

With our car left behind, we continued by bus. Over the next three or four days, we travelled onward, taking our few belongings from one stage of the journey to the next.

We remember the weariness of those journeys. There was the physical tiredness of travelling, and there was the strain of never knowing whether we would be able to remain wherever we arrived. Even when we stopped moving, we still had to think about what to do next.

Our money was limited. We needed somewhere to stay, but we also needed enough to leave again if circumstances forced us to. It was difficult to plan a future when so much depended on getting through the next few days.

Eventually, we reached another place farther north and checked into a hotel.

This time, we stayed without contacting anyone. We hoped that keeping to ourselves would allow us to remain somewhere without being found. After so many departures, we wanted a pause long enough to think clearly.

But the silence brought its own loneliness.

We had each other, yet we felt cut off from the help we had once expected to find. We had approached people and sought protection through the legal system. We had travelled long distances and accepted temporary shelter. Still, we had not found a place where we could begin to feel secure.

In that hotel room, the fear and exhaustion became overwhelming.

We were afraid that if we were found, we would be forcibly separated. After everything we had been through, the thought of being taken away from each other felt unbearable. We did not know how we could protect the life we were trying to build together.

We had experienced kindness along the way. We remembered the stranger who guided us through the rain and the person who opened a home to us. We believed God had preserved us through moments we could not explain. Yet remembering those things did not make the fear disappear.

The fear of losing each other began to overshadow every thought about what might come next.

During that stay, overwhelmed by the fear of being separated, we began thinking about ending our lives together.

It is painful to remember how trapped we felt. Fear, isolation, and exhaustion had narrowed our view until we could no longer see a way to stay together and be safe. Looking back, we recognise those thoughts as a measure of our despair.

More than anything, we wanted to live together. We wanted the chance to marry, make a home, and build a family. Now we were sitting together in another unfamiliar place, struggling to imagine how we could reach even the next part of that future.

Looking back, we believe God had not abandoned us in that room. At the time, we could not see how help would reach us or what we were supposed to do next. The faith we had begun to learn on the road was being tested in the loneliness of that stay.

We had travelled far beyond the place where our journey began. We had left our car behind, received shelter, and moved again. Now, with very little money and no clear plan, we felt that we had reached the end of what we could endure.

In that room, we could not yet see how we would go on.