So, he called….

It was a lazy day, still on bed scrolling through social media aimlessly. As the phone rang, my heart skipped. Our date night replayed in my thoughts. Should I pick up, should I not?

The good side of me was fast in pressing the green icon. I could hear his breath for good number of seconds before I broke the silence…

Me: Are you going to say hello?

Him: Oh, you still have my number?

Me: Really! Was I expected to delete it?

Him: No, I was just checking, you never know!

Me: Alright…. I still have it, hope that puts a smile on your face!

 

I laughed. He did too. But my ears were wide open to pick up the tone and intent of the call. At this point, I couldn’t tell why he called, should I ask straight up, should I not?

His deep voice with a smooth accent interrupted my thoughts: “Hey, tell me, what’s up with our daddy’s son? I don’t want to believe that his career is gone just like that, ‘wajumbe’ and tweeps were brutal, never realized that people hated him that much….”

My subconscious mind jumped right into the conversation, politics in my thing – don’t blame me! Lol! Without knowing, I was on it: Well, I am not so sure, as the chair once said, it depends on how he woke up on the decision day, but, to be fair, daddy’s son has been a liability of the administration for a very long time, so I won’t be surprised if he will be thrown under the bus – after all, this is the time for political sacrifices, rituals need to be made, otherwise ancestors and godfathers won’t be happy, the only tricky thing is that the winner was sacked months ago, so… let’s see how it plays out; if daddy’s son got rescued, what will happen to Dr.? Will he defect?

I could imagine him nodding as I spoke. “That interesting, I haven’t thought about Dr.’s relationship with the chair and its implication, so, you are saying the chair is in a tricky situation, right?” he asked. Words in my mouth started fighting to get out. Yah, sure, but I found myself asking, so you called to talk politics? “I really wanted to know your thoughts, I love your analysis”, he said with a blushing tone. To be honest, I was not flattered, ‘factory default setting” was restored and I was ready to fight him….

Man, ‘this, I love this, I love that’ madness needs to stop and end. You didn’t have the decency to even check if I was home safely, you couldn’t even text if calling was expensive, and now you called to “get my thoughts” because you love it? Have a little bit of respect and manners, let me tell you, next time you want my analysis, you will pay for it, pre-paid, okay?

I wanted to hang up, but something just stopped me from doing that. I took a deep breath after realizing, possibly, I was too harsh, and I should apologize. “Babe, trust me, I was waiting for you to call me and apologize”, his voice mummed! Good Lord, apologize? for what? “You were rude to me”, he said with the confidence of a man who got unexpected and undeserving promotion.

At that moment, I made a resolve to level up with him. I mean, I had to do the next woman he meets a favor. The spirit of all my feminist ancestors possessed me. Our conversation, nay debate, went on and on. There was no justification that I didn’t debunk (I am not bragging, I swear it is true, ask him).

So, he decided to hold on to “you should have been nicer”. As I was about to give up, with sad tone he said, “by the way, for you to pay for the food was a display of arrogance”. I couldn’t resist my laugh; I mean, there is no better portrayal of a fragile male ego than that.

The femininity in me decided this soul needs rescue from himself. Not to be ‘rude again”, I decided to ask him if he has now found the love of his life, and how awesome their date was after our date disaster, two months ago? I made it sound like am envious.

In my mind, I was certain that he will dismiss it and that will make the end of our call, but Lord, little did I know then I was opening a pressure cooker. He spoke limitlessly. If I was a counsellor, I would have billed him generously. First, he complained about how this new girl wanted a new iPhone 11 on the first week, rent, data bundles, Luku, and so forth.

Then he grumbled about how she wanted to eat everything on their date, and she demanded outing with her friends every weekend. To make things worse, he added, she was stalking him, sending “where are you” texts every other minute. He felt she was all over the place, texting his young sisters, cousins and brothers. And he was particularly distraught that she brought kitenge and gave it to his young sister to send to their mother.

You can imagine the expression of my face listening to him, right? Yah, exactly. Groggily, I told him, you are so lucky man, God has granted you exactly what you wanted. So, why complaining?

That was mistake number 2. His outbursts started all over again, I can’t narrate it because you will be bored the same way I was. But, in short, he said, she was desperate to get married, so she was pushing him so hard for she is a gold-digger. He hates it and hates her, he concluded!

If I had the energy, I would have started a whole new debate, comparing and contrasting me and her, exposing his hypocrisy; how he claims to be a responsible man, bragging about his success, but got irritated by “buy me this and that requests”; how he uses marriage as the ultimate prize for women who impress him, but he doesn’t want those who are desperate for it. The list is long, but I have learned my lessons, I cannot afford to commit 3 mistakes in one call.

So, I politely said to him, I hope you find clarity of what you exactly want from women, otherwise, 3.7 billion people won’t be enough for your search. I was intending to close that sentence with a goodbye. But before I did so, I heard him saying, “trust me, I now know what I want. I want YOU.” He sounded authoritative and yet composed. Caught off guard I was, the only rescue was to hang up. I did.

For a few minutes, I tried to think of how best I could have responded to his last comment. But my mind was on a total black out and my body was motionless until I heard a message ring tone on my phone. I kinda knew it was him, and it was…

“Never been so certain about anything in life than I am certain of my love for you,

Am not perfect, I can’t promise that I will be, but I know I can be better with you,

My love;

I am ready to engage your brain,

To feed your soul,

To live in your heart,

To embrace your emotions,

To discover your billions of neurons,

To smell your breath and;

To love you the way you want me to,

I love you; I really do. Please say you love me too;

We can fix what is broken, I can unlearn …”

My heart skipped several times. Suffice to say, I am still staring at his message, not knowing what to do or say….