Thread by @nwaoma007

Friends With Benefits; Who Benefits? 🤔
  
1./ It had begun innocuously. He wasn’t an aficionado of social media. He dipped in now and again.

The day he “met” Kemdilim, he’d been frustrated at discovering the extent of the mess his father had left behind after his death.

2./ During his father’s lifetime, Sesan had sidestepped in-depth involvement in the family business even though it intersected with his own personal business. For as long as he could remember, he and his father had been at loggerheads.

3./ It was for this reason that he opted to strike out on his own after a few years working with other organizations.

Upon his father’s death, he assumed control of the business. That was when he realised that his father’s predilection for keeping multiple mistresses

4./ had led him to make business decisions that were tantamount to corporate rascality in his desire to please? Impress? Those women.

He didn’t begrudge his father his pleasures, but the wanton recklessness he exhibited in his lifetime ultimately hurt the business & his family.

5./One could be forgiven for thinking that the man wanted to continue his covert sadomasochistic treatment of his family from the grave.
The stark reality of the true state of affairs in the business had put Sesan in a foul mood that day.

6./ He’d tweeted derisively about men who couldn’t zip it; yet didn’t count the cost of their raging libidos and the women who made a career out of fleecing those men.   

Kemdilim had slid into his DMs tagging him to his tweet.

7./ Ostensibly, she didn’t want to get into a big argument on the TL, but she disagreed with his portrayal of women in his tweet.

His first instinct was to deliver a stern putdown by replying with scathing words. On second thoughts, he restrained himself,

8./ thanked her for her observation and went the extra mile of saying that he hadn’t intended to come across as misogynistic. He didn’t think he had either. It was what it was and the guilty should swallow their medicine.
 
She replied, still arguing her point;

9./ and still intent on taking him to task. She presented further arguments in support of her stance. Again, he was tempted to shut her down with the kind of cold retort he was famed for dishing when people tried to waste his time. But he was at loose ends.

10./ He decided to use her riled–up passion to while away time. They riposted for a while until she gave up. 

She fell into the category he described as Naija feminist-lite. She was passionate about her fairly well-articulated position,

11./ but hadn’t yet sunk to the virulence which characterised many of her ilk in their evangelical quest for equality. He wondered if they truly understood the burdens of being male in general &more specifically in Nigeria &how they concluded that it was an out and out privilege.

12./ He had 2 sisters. Neither of them bore the burdens currently foisted on him with his father’s demise; yet they received almost equal shares in inheritance as he did. If this cup he was forced to drink from was his reward for whatever obscure benefits being male allowed him,

13./he was ready to transition to their own unprivileged gender right now.
Sesan chuckled at the thought. He knew he was exaggerating. He enjoyed being male, enjoyed the upper-hand that was innate to masculinity. Particularly enjoyed being a successful-ish, not-bad looking male.

14./A tall, dark, reasonably good-looking, fairly successful Yoruba-demon? He wore his badge unapologetically. What was not to like?

In his opinion, both sexes had unique privileges they enjoyed simply by virtue of “being” as well as the ever–present accompanying challenges.

15./It was probable that women got a harder knock in several areas; but being a man wasn’t a tea-party either. Bottom-line, life wasn’t a picnic for anyone. Each should bear their cross.  
They ended on a somewhat amicable note. He noticed that she followed him after their convo,

16./ but he didn’t reciprocate. He generally only followed business, world politics, tech and sport. Women and their drama. He wasn’t going to buy into her feminist wahala, he didn’t want those tweets drifting onto his timeline.

About a week later, she DM’ed again,

17./ asking why he hadn’t followed her back and why he hadn’t tweeted again. He admitted that he was too busy to spend a lot of time on Twitter and didn’t like social media much anyway. She asked again why he hadn’t followed her back. He said he didn’t think it was important,

18./ but if it made her feel better, he would. He did and somehow, she began to DM him and after a bit, he sought her out too.  

She was unattached at the time; he was as well and the chats got increasingly risqué.  

At that point, Sesan was drawn back to the present.

19./ He lay propped up against the headboard of the California King bed in the master bedroom of the serviced flat the company leased as a guesthouse on Oyinkan Abayomi Crescent overlooking the Lagos Lagoon. Even though he only lived down the road off Alexander Road,

20./ he didn’t like to bring women into his private space. This guesthouse had served his father for dalliances and now came in handy for him. Perhaps, deny and hate it as he might, he was truly his father’s son.

The thought sent a cold shiver down his spine.

21./ No, he wasn’t like his father. He was more disciplined in his affairs. If there was any manipulating or cunning required in a relationship, that was his domain. Lust? Yes. Love? No. No! His ardour was doused by his thoughts

22./ and his previously semi – erect member deflated to ground zero.  He had been pleasantly exhausted from his exertions, sated yet invigorated. Sex always did that to him. Good sex moreso and sex with Kemdi was always good. Her name rhymed with candy, and damn! Was she sweet?!

23./ Sex with her was better than good he thought with a satisfied smirk on his lips. That was the a major reason he had allowed their relationship? Situationship? Entanglement? Whatever one called it to last as long as it had. Especially after he got serious with Kike.

24./He’d wanted to end things several times, but his pleasure in her body held him back.

He could tell when a woman was getting attached. Oddly enough, despite her much-vaunted independence, it hadn’t taken much. A few multiple-orgasms, some basic gentlemanliness

25./ add a dash of chivalry, the odd bouts of unavailability & a firm refusal to be brought to heel & Kemdilim had lowered her guard (if it had ever honestly been up).

He could almost pinpoint when she began believing there could be more between them.

26./ She had been facing a particularly challenging time at work and was in sixes and sevens over how to navigate a difficult client and a deputy who was intent on showing her up and stealing a march on her. If she played gentle, she could come across as weak.

27./ Possibly appear to be lacking in the relevant capability. If she was aggressive, she would play into the hands of those who would jeer and say she was being the “typical hormonal woman” who lacked mastery over her emotions.

28./ Her deputy was a man with much aplomb and savvy at office politics. He would slyly imply that “Women didn’t always quite deliver” but not Kemdi, that Kemdi was different.

It was subtle, but he was eroding the Client’s confidence in her.

29./ Undermining her while seeming to compliment her. Kemdi; bless her was one of life’s straight-talkers. She didn’t take bull-shit in her professional life and she didn’t know how to bow to anyone especially when she knew she was better.

30./ There was a long weekend coming up and he sensed her tension and felt she deserved some spoiling. He had planned a surprise trip for them to Portofino in Italy. Booked them into his favourite albergo and treated her to some major 5-star luxury. By the time they returned,

31./ both had destressed, were slightly sun-burned and pleasantly exhausted. She’d had some space away from the situation and rediscovered her natural perspective.

With fresh fire in her belly,  she took the fight to “the streets”. She decided to beat her deputy at his game,

32./ added some sneaky trump cards which she ordinarily didn’t play; but needs must and she was ready to fight fire with water. She hadn’t come that far to be beaten by a two – faced rat.  Kemdi laced her savvy at the job with her feminine arsenal.

33./ Soon, her deputy was left eating her dust. She was promoted after that Client was wowed by her delivery and Sesan celebrated with her again by allowing her to treat them to a beach-resort weekend in Ghana.

Maybe that had been an error in judgment on his part,

34./he generally didn’t let himself ‘chop’ a woman’s money, no matter how little, as it gave them a sense of propriety. 
 
In response to her increased “comfort” after that Ghana trip, he minimised his time with her, was vague about his availability and whereabouts nonetheless,

35./ she persevered and they remained an item-ish in her mind’s eye. He rarely took her out to places he was likely to run into his regular friends. She’d never been to his house nor had she invited him over to hers either. She knew he lived somewhere in Ikoyi,

36./ he knew she lived in Lekki area across the bridge and often drove to Phase 1 to jog on the Link Bridge. 
     
Sesan sighed. Women were almost boringly predictable. Sometimes he didn’t blame men who were utter bastards to the women in their lives.

37./ Especially if they weren’t looking for long-term commitments. Not that it ever stopped any woman from pursuing her ambitions where a man was concerned.  He sometimes thought that women enjoyed challenges in chasing the opposite sex as much as and sometimes more than men.

38./ The more elusive a man made himself, the less of himself he gave to a woman, the more determined she became to wrestle him down like he was some prize bull and she a professional bull-fighter.

39./ Occasionally, it was impossible to avoid being cruel if one was determined to avoid being conquered; but he tried. He maintained boundaries & with minimal verbal expression, his body language was often sufficient to let whichever woman was nursing ambitions in his direction

40./ know that he was not going to be hog-tied.

Despite having declared his stance explicitly from the start, his situation with Kemdi and her now undisguised growing attachment to him unsettled him.       

Sesan’s thoughts drifted back to the beginning.

41./ He had been explicit about wanting a no-strings thing. Friends with benefits really, to call a spade a spade. He enjoyed her and she enjoyed him. They’d reached this consensus after about a month of conversation which had grown progressively raunchy.

42./ One night, she asked him what they were becoming, women almost always asked that question. He fielded her question by asking her what she thought they were becoming. She retorted that if she knew, she wouldn’t be asking.

43./ Sesan admitted to her that he wasn't interested in a relationship. At that time, he was single-mindedly focused on rebuilding the family business which had become near moribund thanks to his father’s profligacy. Love could come later or not,

44./but marriage was definitely in his 5-year development plan. He fully intended to settle down with a woman who suited his plans to have circa 2 children and a dog. But not yet. All his energies were presently channeled towards rebuilding the business &stamping his brand on it.

45./ Kemdilim had agreed emphatically at the time. She didn’t want to marry or be owned by any man, she certainly didn’t want a long-term relationship with a Yoruba guy anyway, even though she admitted that she had no firm basis for that.

46./ She was drawn to their conversations and was curious to personally sample then dismiss the wizardry that won Sesan and his Yoruba brothers the moniker of ‘Yoruba demon’ for herself. The drift into sex had taken another month after that fateful conversation.

47./ She declared that she was a focused career person; that her primary interest lay in shattering the glass ceiling and ensuring her financial security and independence from anyone. She didn’t have the time nor inclination to nurture a full-on relationship.

48./ She may one day have a child and may consider engaging in a long-term relationship with the father of that child. If marriage came at that point and there was mutual understanding, so be it, but not now. 
T hat had been 3 years ago. At the time, Kem was 28.

49./ Throughout this affair, he maintained a careful distance. Largely it worked. But about 5 months ago, he sensed that she had begun to expect much more and it had given him cause for concern.  
 
The sounds of running water from the en-suite wet-room ceased.

50./Kemdi always showered after sex like she washing him off her skin. Charming. Recently though, after that shower she teased him into a less hurried lingering session, more love-making, less raw sex. It seemed she wanted to leave her mark on him. It worked, up to a point. 

TBC