The Scammer Who Had The Face Of My Husband

It was 2017. I had been on Facebook for years but I always remained silent. When people talked about Facebook ghosts, I was the one they were talking about. I read everything on my timeline. The funny ones got me LMAO, the annoying ones got to me so much that it affected my day. But I said nothing. I didn’t comment on any posts and didn’t react to any of the posts I read. I was a ghost and ghosts don’t leave footprints.

One day a guy said hello to me in my inbox. Perry. The first thing that came to mind was, “How did he find me?” I quickly went through his profile and we were already friends. His profile picture didn’t strike me as someone I had read from or seen anywhere around my timeline. Before I could say a word in response to his hello, he texted, “We’ve been friends here for a very long time but haven’t exchanged greetings. I came here today to just say hi and introduce myself to you.”

I went back to his profile again, this time looking at him and thinking if he was a guy I would love to be friends with. His profile didn’t have much apart from photos. I took my time to go through the photos one after the other, each time getting charmed by the kind of face I was seeing. He had a jawline of an athlete and a face of an actor. I wanted to see his full picture before I would be convinced of his beauty so I scrolled and scrolled but didn’t find any.

I responded, “Good to have you here, Perry. That’s what Facebook has turned us into. Friends who are actually not friends but I’m glad you said hello.”

I said more than I should, maybe what I saw of him in his photos melted my resistance and made me open up in a way I shouldn’t have. We said other things and later stopped talking. Before we said goodbye, we promised to talk to each other very often and stop being a ghost in a world where everyone was saying something each passing minute.

We kept our promise. He would wake up early morning and say hello to me. In the afternoon he would ask how my day was going. In the evening, he would talk about his hectic day as a junior doctor and tell me the stories of the patients he encountered. I loved to read his stories. It made me imagine how he would sound while telling me these stories so one day I gave him my number. I said, “Maybe you call me one day. Let me hear your voice.”

It didn’t take a day. He called immediately after he had my number. His voice was divine. I told him, “You’re in the wrong profession. You should have been a radio host.”

The days after we got each other’s numbers were more fun. He’ll drop me a voice note early in the morning instead of a text. He knew I loved his voice so each voice note he sent came with a heavy texture of his voice. When he proposed, he did it through one of such early morning voice notes. I wanted to tell him I didn’t know him. I wanted to say, “At least, let’s meet first before we decide to fall in love.” I wanted to say it was too soon to fall in love but this silly heart of mine wouldn’t take its time. My heart took the phone from my brain and texted, “I’ve loved you since day one. Happy to accept you as my boyfriend.”

We planned to meet. He was in Accra and I was in Winneba doing my national service. Accra to Winneba isn’t a distance too far for two willing hearts so I decided to travel to see him. A day before I did, something happened from his end. An emergency so we had to cancel the trip. That evening, he sent me a video of himself goofing around and it made me laugh. I said, “I can’t wait to see your bubbly self soon. Please fix your schedules quickly and let’s meet as soon as possible.”

The next plan was for him to come over. It didn’t happen so we planned for me to visit him the following weekend. The night before I travelled to Accra, he sent me GHC300 through mobile money followed by a text that said, “I’m very busy performing a procedure but my sister texted that she needs GHC1,000 urgently. I have only GHC300  on my phone. That’s what I’ve sent you. Please add the GHC700 and send it to her for me. Tomorrow when we meet, I’ll give you your money.”

He gave me his sister’s number and I quickly sent the GHC1,000 to her. I called his sister’s number to ask if she had received the money. The call didn’t go through. I called Perry’s number to tell him I’d sent the money but my call didn’t go through. I spent half of the night trying to get to him but I was unsuccessful. I checked his Facebook and I’d been blocked. It started dawning on me that I’d been scammed. His Whatsapp profile picture was gone and all messages I sent ticked only once. You’ll lose money and lose the time you invested in such relationships but nothing hurts more than the wasted emotions.

Two years later in 2019, guess who I found on Facebook, Perry!  Except he wasn’t called Perry but Addison but the profile photo was that of Perry’s.

Someone had shared his post and it appeared on my timeline. It was the photo that drew my attention. I quickly tapped on the image, went through the profile and went through the photos. All the photos Perry sent me were there, including the videos he sent me. I dashed into his inbox; “Perry, you’re now Addison? How many more women have you scammed? It’s a small world, I’ll get you arrested and reveal your scamming activities to the world.”

The response I got was, “I’m sorry but it looks like you’re talking to the wrong person. I’m Addison. I  always have been. What are you talking about here?” I screamed in my head while I texted, “Shut up over there. You thought I won’t see you again? Do you think God will allow you to go on stealing from innocent women? Your cup would be full one day, Perry. You’ll suffer. I swear you’ll suffer the consequences of what you did to me and all the other women.” His response was, “I’m sorry but I’ll have to block you if you won’t tell me what the issue is.”

I went back into his profile again, reading all the details. This one looked solid. He had his schools well enumerated, his job, the places he had worked and even his siblings were connected to his account. I asked him, “Can we talk? Give me your number if you’re not Perry.”

He gave me a number and I called. The voice that greeted me was calm but firm. It wasn’t as masculine as that of Perry. It didn’t have the base texture that got me swooned. I said, “Wow, it looks like you and I have a common enemy and his name is Perry. He’s using your pictures and videos to scam women. Two years ago, he got me. He made me fall in love with him and later ran with my money and my heart.”

I gave him the details. He went searching on Facebook but didn’t see him. He came to ask for more information and I sent him screenshots. The photos he sent me and all those things. Clearly, he was worried too. He made a post about it on his timeline telling people to be watchful. A week or so later, after unsuccessfully looking for Perry, he came to say sorry. “If you don’t mind, I’ll pay back what you lost,” he told me. “I don’t want you to hate me because of my photos and I don’t want you to have memories of what happened anytime you see my face.”

I told him I’d moved on. “It had been two years already. It all came back to me because I saw your photos.”

Not long afterwards, he started teasing me. Whenever I posted a status on my Whatsapp, he would say something like, “Perry watched your status.” Or “Mrs Perry” or “Perrywaa.” One day I told him, “Come to think of it, the whole thing wasn’t about Perry. It was about you because you’re the one I saw. You’re the mask Perry put on to deceive my heart. I blame you for putting your photos out there.”

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We laughed about it but one day we met. He said, “Before you hit me, let me tell you I’m not Perry. This is Addison.”

Honestly, I saw pieces and bits of Perry in him. If it was Perry’s idea to play the part of Addison, then he aced the role. His bubbly nature, the way he strung his words, how he carried himself about. Our first meeting brought our second meeting and the second meeting brought him to where I lived. After our third meeting, he proposed.

Before I knew him, I’d already fallen for him. It wasn’t the time to play hard to get so I said yes.

We spent Christmas of 2019 together as a couple. We were at the knowing-me-knowing-you phase of our relationship when Covid happened. Before the lockdown was announced, he asked me, “Can you?” I answered, “I don’t know what is it but I can.” He was asking me to lock down with him and I gladly accepted.

Before that, our relationship had been a distant one. I opened my eyes to know everything there was to know about him while we were on lockdown. It took me just fifteen days to believe that he would be a good husband. I didn’t know what he thought about me but the day I was leaving, he asked, “Must you leave?”

I didn’t have a job. I wanted to step out there and find a job before I could make concrete decisions. He wanted me to continue staying with him until something happens. I said no. It was hard to say no to him but getting a job was also important to me. I got a job at the early stages of 2022 and right at the start of 2023, we got married.

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When it comes to love, I know I have a peculiar story. I lost the one behind the mask to see the one whose face was the mask. I tell people how I met my husband and they tell me, “God works in mysterious ways.” God is love so it doesn’t amaze me the way love works. Love works in mysterious ways too and when its works are done, we meet the right people. Perry stole my money and messed up with my heart but he planted a seed along the path of my love journey. The fruit of that seed is what I’m enjoying today.

–Debbie-Ann