I knew it was dark and he wouldn’t know all the effort I put in making my hair look nice but I kept combing anyway. I always went out of my way to look beautiful for him and he made it a duty to spoil me with compliments. Once, he called me his sun and even though I pretended it was nothing, I relished it. For many nights later, I replayed it in my head.
We grew up in the same neighbourhood. Same quiet street where everybody knew everybody but didn’t talk to everybody because everybody minded their business. We’d wave when we meet outside and retire quietly at night. Everyone just had their own little clique and in all, we were a circle. In that circle was Mr Sam., his father. He repaired radio sets down the street and I always took my dad’s to him. It was on one to those trips that I met him, Josh.
It started with him smiling at me and me returning with my shy ones. Then he told me his name and frowned when I told him mine. ” That name does not suite a beautiful girl like you.” he had said, “I’ll call you something else.” and he did. He called me names nobody ever called me and made me feel special in a way that was new to me.
He was funny and peaceful and attentive. He listened when I told him I wanted to write things that would change the world and and smiled when I told him I feared I couldn’t. He didn’t ask me to date him but what we had was deeper that every relationship there was. He was mine and I was his.
He was the first to wake me every morning and wish me goodnight at sunset. I knew he only had eyes for me. Our first kiss was the best I ever had. It took me to places I hadn’t been before and I wondered what it would be like to make love to a god for that was what he was to me. I knew our souls would become one and I’d explode with the orgasm.
I took one last look at my hair I had been combing for sometime and decided it was good enough. I had on a V neck top that displayed my cleavage the way he likes it and a high waisted leather leggings. He honked his horn the third time and I hurried out. After a very long kiss, he gave me his phone while he drove out the driveway. Curious, I went to his messages and what I saw shocked me. One Amina he called pumpkin and Toyosi he called his heart. Those were my names! He asked Chioma if she could come spend the weekend and Jane he asked if the money he sent her was enough. Then I saw it, the one that tore my heart. Her name was Stella and he called her his heart. I read it again, slowly to be sure. I thought there was only one sun in the world by clearly, I didn’t know enough about the galaxy. In that moment, I knew it was over, the relationship we never had.
