He came into my inbox and said hello without saying anything else. I looked at the message and said nothing back. I left the message hanging in there lonely, dejected, unwanted, in the dark without another word it could engage with. Days later he came again and said hello. I said to myself, “Now his previous hello has a friend in my inbox. They are twins actually because they look the same. They can look at each other and marvel at how beautiful they are and also ask themselves why their creator sent them to my inbox. The next time he said something again., he said, “I’m sorry if I’m bordering you. I just want to be a friend.”

I read the message and marked his English instead of responding to him; “‘Bordering’ instead of bothering? Bro, you don’t mean to bother me but I’m bothered by your English.”

After that message, he didn’t send another. The world was a better place all over again.

He found me in a group on Facebook. It was a new group created. The goal of the group wasn’t clear but everyone came on just to have fun so I assumed that was what the group was created for. It was the lockdown period and having an avenue to have fun was everyone’s goal. I don’t know who added me but one day I woke up and I was there. I was watching funny videos, memes that made me laugh until I cried and other nonsensical posts. The group was vibrant so I stayed and joined in the fun.

His name was Army. All my life, I haven’t come across anyone with that name so I assumed it was one of his wrong spelling attempts that has changed his name. One afternoon I had a call. When I picked up, I heard one of the most amazing masculine voices I’ve heard in a long while. He called my name, “Francisca, how are you?”

My friends call me Franka. In the house, I’m called Kuukua. My primary schoolmates and old forgotten friends call me Francisca. When he mentioned my name, I assumed he was a man coming from my past so I relaxed and spoke to him as if I knew him.

“How have you been Francisca?”

“I’ve been good. Yourself?”

“I’m also doing fine.”

Silence.

Both of us were breathing from both ends of the phone without any word to say.

He said, “You won’t mind me so I looked for your number and called you.” I asked, “Who am I speaking with?” He answered, “My name is Army. I’ve sent you a couple of messages on Facebook but you didn’t mind.” I told him, “You didn’t say anything so I didn’t know what I should respond to.” The conversation took a natural turn and went on and on.

He got my number from my business page on Instagram. He was really determined to talk to me. When I asked why. All he said was, “I don’t know. You sound like fun and from the posts you’ve made in the group and your comments, it tells me a lot about you. You have a huge sense of humour and I guess that’s what’s drawing me to you.”

Once in a while, he would call or text. One day he sent me a message, “Do you believe in solemates?”

“Solemates? What do you really want to say?”

I didn’t want to correct his English. I felt it would be offensive but when he came again, he wrote the same thing, “Solemates?” I responded with the right spelling, “Yeah, I believe in soulmates. Two people would meet one day and the next day they can’t seem to live without each other. The stars may align for them and if they are lucky, they would spend the rest of their lives together. If they are not, they would go their separate ways and live in perpetual regret for missing out on their soulmates.”

After my explanation he called. He said, “I feel you’re my soulmate. I don’t have a lot of explanation to do but everything tells me you’re the one.”

During the Covid, a lot of people were alone and lonely. Our mental health was all over the place because we felt caged and restricted. I thought he was having the same feeling. He was lonely and looking for someone to walk through the lonely streets of Covid with. I responded, “Army, is that even your real name? You see I don’t even know your real name. You don’t know me too. You haven’t seen my face or seen me at my worse. How then do you believe I can be your soulmate? It doesn’t work like that.”

He was insistent. He said he had spent the best of his lockdown days going through my profile and that everything about me was everything he wanted. “I’ve seen every photo you’ve ever posted. Even the ones you were tagged, I’ve seen them and enjoyed them. I know who you are. I know people lie but seven years of your life is displayed online and I don’t think you can live a lie here for seven years.”

When the lockdown entered the third week, we sneaked out to meet.

We met at a beach. He came bearing drinks and meat he bought on his way coming. He spread a cloth on the floor and we sat on it facing the waves. He looked different from the old-age photos on his profile. He looked taller, calmer and more receptive. He saw me and said I looked beautiful in person. That relaxed my wandering mind. The beach was very quiet, you could hardly see footprints on the floor. It wasn’t only humans who were lonely. The ocean too was feeling the effect of Covid. A couple came to pass by and they greeted us. They walked in each other’s embrace while they kissed. We were watching them and making fun of the things love can make people do. He asked, “Do you think they are soulmates?” I said, “Spell soulmate if you want an honest answer.” We burst out laughing.

“You see why I love you?” he said.

“Tell me more,” I answered.

He went on and on with his dreams for us and how he would marry me if I give him a year. It wasn’t about the marriage but the passion with which he said it. I told him to get up and he did. “Let’s go home,” I said. “Which of the homes? he asked.

We made an hour’s trip to his house deep in the night. We met police barriers. They questioned our intentions of being out when we were supposed to be sleeping. We told a lot of lies just to escape them. When we finally got to his place, I started asking myself questions. It didn’t feel right. “You just met him. You don’t even know him. Why would you end up at his place at this time? What do you want from this?” All these questions were begging for answers and were asking me to do one simple thing, walk away before sex happens. I couldn’t walk away. When he made an attempt on me, I gave in.

I’ve not had the time to think about why I did what I did that night but I might have been lonely too. My boyfriend travelled and later sent me a breakup message. I was in the process of healing when all of a sudden Covid raise its ugly head. Healing comes faster when you have people around who take your mind off your pain. Covid robbed me of friendship and quality engagement to heal the wound of my heartbreak. The lack of people in my life made me bury myself on social media, posting memes and laughing at what was posted. I was doing everything to get distracted and it worked. Once Army came along, I realized it didn’t really work. I covered the hole and pretended it didn’t exist. He pushed my cover and the wounds came out. We made love. The longest I’ve ever had as if I was filling up the void that was left inside of me.

When the morning came, I left his house with a heavy head. “Now he has gotten what he came for. To make matters worse, I’d proven to him that I’m cheap so he could get it the very first time without any fight from my end. I will go home and pretend this never happened. I will close it like a chapter I never read. I won’t remember. I will try.”

He called to check up on me. He texted me a lot of bad English but I was too drained to make corrections. He wasn’t feeling the vibe so he asked me, “Are you ok? You sound too dull for my liking. It’s like you’ve lost some colour.” Those questions gave me the courage to speak my mind.

“You’re thinking I’m cheap, right? I gave it to you without a fight. I’m no longer worth the struggle, right? Say the truth.”

He laughed at me. He said I was thinking like a girl; “Look here, we are not kids. What happened happened because we wanted it to. It’s not a statement on anyone’s moral compass. If you’re cheap then I’m cheap too. Get your mind off and let’s be us again.”

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He was trying hard to get me out of my feelings but I saw it as a ploy to get more of me. He begged to see me but I didn’t. He begged to make things right but I wasn’t ready. When the end of the lockdown was announced, he said, “I know where you work. I will come and get you. Or you want me to put up a missing person flyer?”

He came to my office one late afternoon and he never left until I closed from work that day. We sat in his car and we talked from 5 pm until 2am the next day. At some point, I slept off. I could hear him talking from afar. He tapped me and said, “Show me where you live and I’ll take you home.”

He came again and again and again until there was no feeling of guilt but most importantly, I fell for his effort. “If sex was what he came for, he might have given up long ago but he keeps trying. Let me soften up and go with the flow and see how it goes.”

We started a new relationship from the ashes of the one that happened at the beach. He no longer talked about sex. At some point, I thought we were even siblings and that was not good so I told him to spice things up. We could hold hands and kiss once in a while but the mistake of sex never happened again. What kept happening was the spelling mistakes each time we chatted. “You didn’t do spelling in school?” I asked him. He answered, “Unfortunately my spelling teacher died when I was in class two and I never had another until I matured.”

Covid put us in a cage and all we could do was sing as the caged bird does. I sang my songs on social media and he found me. We were together when the government dictated how many people you could have at your own wedding because of Covid. We saw couples wearing masks at their own weddings and thought it was a good idea. Our kids would grow up and see us in our wedding photos wearing masks and ask why. We would tell them where it all started and tell them masks because we met when the world was sick. We were the only healthy ones because we found love.

We couldn’t get married during the Covid because of another long story but true love is patient so we took our time for the tides to slow down.

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When we got married last year, we didn’t wear masks but the essence of the occasion wasn’t lost on us. How it started from hello and silence. How he made things difficult with his bad spellings. Our first sin and how we nearly ended the relationship before it even started. “Is that how the soulmates thing works? Would you say I’m your soulmate?” I asked him. He answered, “If you were not, then why are we here?”

I wanted to be sure of the kind of mate he was talking about so I asked him to write it, “Soul or sole?” I don’t want to end up being stepped on with your sole so make it clear today. Sole or Soul?”

Here we are today, happily married for a year and waiting for what forever would bring.

–Franka

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