Thread by @GbengaWemimo

Her mother said "You proud people, this is how you hurt yourself. You know my daughter has been doing all these and you didn't find yourself another girl to love by the side? Don't you know that some women need a firm hand? What better firmness can you show a wayward lady than to

provoke her to jealousy?
You have been like a son to me and I know how much you have loved my daughter these past years but if all the things you have come here to report to me is true, you have been slow and a little foolish.
What I am telling you is what I will tell my own son

Women don't want to be with men they can take for granted and from the look of things, you have conceded all the power to her in this relationship and she is using it to her advantage at every turn
You need to man up and do the needful or let her be"
He was seated on the dining

set with her mother and four siblings
He could see "pity" written all over their faces
He understood their position
Contrary to what her mother believed, he was not so foolish
He was only in love and he felt there was no point for the two of them to become wild at the same time

They met when he was sixteen
She was fifteen
They all moved into the recently completed four flats apartment at the same time
She was attending Command Secondary School, Ojoo
He was attending St. Patrick secondary school, Bashorun
Their parents were civil servants
She was very

quiet by nature
Her nose was often buried in novels and books
That was what attracted him to her
She conducted herself like someone who knew what she was doing
He was a bookworm too, although, unlike her, he enjoyed hanging out with boys in the estate once in a while
All they do

was play football on Saturday mornings and some chess or scrabble on Saturday evenings
They always rotate their hangout venues
As they grow older, the other boys started driving and forming cliques
His parents had a car but he wouldn't dare touch it to please his friends
He tacit

-ly withdrew from them and started studying more for his examinations
Somehow they started talking and got to like each other a lot
He wrote his examinations and gained admission to study Law in the University of Ibadan and Mass Communication at the Polytechnic Ibadan
He accepted

both admissions
She wrote her GCE and gained admission to the Polythecnic Ibadan too
She had the option of writing the examination again in SS3 or accepting the admission
She accepted the admission and moved to the Eruwa Campus of the school for her studies
It was a divine

arrangement in his opinion
He had someone in the same class who could help him write attendance, buy handouts for him and inform him when to show up on campus for his tests and examinations
That was when their relationship started
The daily phone calls and text messages were the

unseen cords binding them together
He traveled down to Eruwa for his tests and examinations
He stayed in a cheap guest house in the town
He spent all the time with her, studying and catching up
All her friends automatically assumed he was he boyfriend
She didn't deny it
He asked

her out eventually
She said yes
He was 18
She was 17
They were both in ND 2
She had a friend who went to the same secondary school as her
They didn't become close until they met at the polytechnic
That was the only other person in her life on campus
They played chess, ludo and

scrabbles together
Her friend was much older than the two of them
She was in her early twenties
Her friend was also dating a young man who was working with a bottling company in Lagos
The young man her friend was dating was about 25 years old
They all met once in a while when

he was in Eruwa and the young man also came around to visit his babe
Something happened that wasn't very clear to him during their ND 2 first semester
His babe suddenly moved away from Anko, where she had always moved to New Eruwa
It didn't make any logistical sense to him
Anko

was a trekkable distance from campus
New Eruwa was not
He didn't pay any attention to it at the time
Then he noticed that his babe's friend was no longer in her life
It was as if she had been deleted totally
He tried to ask his babe what the issue was
She said it was not a big

deal
Friends often grow apart
He was busy coping with the demands of the two institutions to probe any further
They finished their ND 2
She had to undergo one-year industrial training with a media house
He was able to focus solely on his academics at the University
By this time

the two families had made serious progress
His father had completed his house and they had moved out of the estate
Her father, a bursar, had been transferred to Akure for work and the family moved with him
He met her friend at the Radio station owned by his school
Because of his

diploma in Mass Communication and his status as a student on campus, he was given a 50 minutes belt once a week to host a Student's life show
Her friend was there for her industrial training programme
They got talking and her friend told him she was no longer with her guy
Wow!

He asked her why
Her friend said she caught him having sex with his girlfriend
That was over sixteen months before
He didn't suspect anything but things added up drastically
He recollected some things he saw that he didn't take serious at the time because he was too busy trying

to sort out his own academic issues
Her friend said she found out his babe was still dating her man six months after she caught them having sex
She said her man was the one that rented the new apartment in New Eruwa for her and they were both seriously working on getting married

It was as if he was reading a horror movie
He knew her friend was right
Their relationship took a turn for the worse at one point and it felt as if his babe wanted him to get the message and go away
He saw all the signs but she didn't say anything to him to indicate that the

relationship was over
She replies to his messages whenever she could and she always says the right things
Sometimes she would travel down to visit him on campus and spend some days with him
It felt like she was just stringing him along
He couldn't really say why
The news was a

devastating blow for him but they were still very young
She was twenty and he was twenty-one
He decided to cut his losses and stop pretending he was a relationship when he was not in one
So he blocked all her numbers and stopped calling
He felt it would be cruel to call her and

report everything he heard
It would be too undignifying for the two of them
It was fun while it lasted
Two months after he moved on, during the break, she came to his parent's house
Just like that
He was in his room listening to Michael Bolton's "White Christmas" when his younger

came to inform him of her arrival
She said she came to have a heart to heart talk with him
She wanted to know why he vanished and blocked her everywhere
What wrong did she do for her to be treated so poorly?
Did she not deserve at least a phone call to explain?
He felt terrible

He told her everything he heard
She said it was true
She also told him that it was guilt
She said she was in the room one day when her friend's man came visiting
Her friend had traveled home to see her parents and he was not around
They were playing LUDO when one thing led to

another
It was not words
It was a "Stop it" that escalated to a "Who is your daddy" moment
She said she had always hated her house because it was located among the indigenes
She wanted an environment where students were many
She told her friend's man after they had sex and he

rented the new accommodation for her immediately
He saw to it that all her needs were met
She was able to live in the now
She said she had believed whatever they were doing would die a natural death once her friend returned from Lagos
Unfortunately, her friend returned and caught

her and her boyfriend having sex in her friend's room
(It was closer to campus and she would often go there to spend some time with her friend's boyfriend in between lectures)
That was how everything ended on a sour note
She told him she had come to her senses and would like him

to give her a second chance
By this time she was in tears
He felt sorry for himself and for her because he really loved her
He forgave her and told her she had been forgiven
They started the relationship again
She went back to school for her HND and things really settled down

He got to his final year and discovered she was seeing one of her lecturers in the Ibadan Campus
(That was where the HND classes hold)
It was too much for him to bear
He didn't know what he was not getting right
He really loved her and he was doing his best to prove it to her

He didn't know when he dressed up and went to see her mother
He needed someone to intervene
His heart was being shredded to ribbons
Her mother had always been aware that they were seeing each other, especially since she came back in tears
Her mother listened and gave her verdict

It was a brutal verdict
Her mother ended the discussion by saying "Thank God I have not collected dowry from anybody. When she is ready, she will bring home the man she wanted. Until that time, please take care of yourself"
Her mother's response was not what he expected...
He had

felt her mother would call her and tell her to be with him.
He kept wondering whether it was how he presented his case that made her mother act the way she did but there was no going back after that
He closed his eyes and called off the relationship
Four months after calling it

quits, he met another lady
A law student from OAU
They met at a conference and became friends
He went to see her in her school and they were both on their way to Ibadan to attend his mother's 58th Birthday anniversary when his phone rang
It was her mother...
She said "Hello, how

are you? I wonder why I have not heard from you. Your friend is here, she said you have neither been calling nor picking her calls"
I will like you to forget whatever had happened and call her
Settle this thing and move on with your life"
He said "Okay ma" and switched off his

phone.
That was the last day he picked her mother's call too
He had given it his best shot and it dawned on him that the pattern would probably continue all his life if he doesn't break it
So he held his new friend's hands and looked steadily into the future

PS: He and his new

friend got married in 2015
They settled down in Ile-Ife
They later relocated to Malaysia when he secured a job with a multinational company
The lady also got married in 2015, she is currently in her third marriage

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