TALES OF A HOPELESS ROMANTIC (Ep. 5)

 When a guy tells you to lose weight because of your tummy fat, which you didn't really care about in the first place, that should be your first amber flag (something like that). Although guys like presentable, dashing looking ladies, they should look for them and not try and 'improve' them to their image. I was told that, 5 weeks into the relationship. Personally I took it as an insult, but the sweet nothings kind of covered them up and I excused his inconsiderate words, saying that I've not been as serious in exercising. That's when I decided to be more serious in my swimming classes in school.

Now since I'm in a relationship, my mom literally became the police in my life. My phone usage was drastically cut to the weekends only, with a curfew to 10pm. When the urge was too much to talk to him, I would sneak the phone to do actual research then chat with him on my IG DM. I just remembered something interesting. Before I show you more amber and deep red flags I nicely ignored...

After I said yes to him, I didn't want to tell my parents, at all. In an African home, there are just some things you don't do. One of them is being involved in relationships at an age below 23, you're considered immature and young in the mind. So we agreed to be lowkey and secret until I was ready to face them with the news. Maybe after I'm done with school, I thought, I will sit them down and tell them I met the most amazing guy in my life. If they refuse, they can't do anything because by then I will be an adult. Well I thought I was being lowkey, while on the other side the police has already gotten a whiff of what is going on. She just had to bid her time right, to catch me and cuff me.

On the day I was caught, I was treated really well. I went swimming, then went to a local restaurant called Nyama Mama. I considered it as a 'all the best gift' for my final year. Well, she talked about that, and I nodded to her words of advice till...

"So, how's Gangster doing?" she said his name, but let's flow with gangster.

"He's doing fine." I replied, my heart beginning to race so fast.

"And his family?" she pressed.

"Also fine." I sank my teeth into my millionth? chicken. What's her deal?

"What has he planned to do after school?" Ok, these questions are making me feel uneasy.

"I don't really know, I mean, he's just done with school, but he has plans of improving his ball game, he's business minded and has a few ideas he wants to try." I calmly replied (did it sound calm to her, or some desperate frog gasping for air)

She nodded her head, and took another piece of chicken. I continued eating, thinking that his story has died. "Are you two dating? And don't lie to me." she calmly asked. The calm before a horrific storm. I calculated the sin, tan and cos of lying, and none came to my mind. So, I had no choice other than to come clean.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she questioned me, now ferociously finishing the piece of chicken. Hehe, I smell a lecture coming. And yes, it did.

After the session of the lecture was over I asked her how she could knew and she told me that he texted something with 'babe' or something like that. I thought, I had other guy friends, and some we were joking along those lines and she never found out, why him? Long and short of it is that I told my guy what happened and he chuckled and said, it will be all fine.

Connect that to my first date. That was the source of the lecture.

Mid year reached when the MOCK exams before the final ones were taken. I FAILED so bad, I've never seen those grades in my life. The police looked at my report form disappointed with me, and she bluntly said, "This relationship is distracting you. He's done with school, he has nothing to stress. You have school then this, one has to leave, and definitely this relationship has to go. It's not my decision to make though."

Now, let's go back to the flags. One of the things that I now realize is that there was so much opposition, visible and invisible to our relationship. Church had a guideline against dating in high school, I couldn't openly talk about it. My authority at the time strongly advised I drop the relationship. My mom is there. I felt blocked and choking. This relationship was supposed to add on happiness in my life which to some extent it did, but, the external forces against it were too strong. Him on the other side is chill, carrying on with his life, his parents chill, he had no stress. He also had no idea what I was going through because I didn't say it, and by then I didn't know exactly what was happening and why it was happening. So, in my final term I asked for a time out to focus in school (I used that as an excuse to think about it...it didn't even help lol) but I concentrated in my final exams and really passed, a true contrast to my MOCK exams. I felt really proud of myself.

Before the results came out, he DMed me on IG two days after I was done with exams and for me, life went back to normal...or so I thought....

(if you wanna get the video version of this episode, follow my IG @karmelitz._)