I had a feeling that I was not the father of the child. But I did not become a deadbeat. I learned a lot of things on YouTube and even from listening to my mom talk about pregnancy.

I learned that talking to the child while it was still in the womb created a deep bond, and so I did. I had a whole folder full of pictures and videos of her growing bump. I watched more pregnancy videos and paid more attention to her than I did to any football match in my entire life.

When I raised concerns with my mother, she told me only a woman knows the father of her child. If she says it is you, then it is you. “Maa, you do not understand.”

I caught her a couple of times, and she swore heaven and earth that it was nothing sexual.

According to my mom, I was thinking too much.

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Her boss was one of the men I suspected had something to do with her, but I did not have concrete evidence, which made my accusations useless and full of insecurities.

In fact, she accused me of being the reason she cheated. I wanted to open her head wide and scream sense into it.

In her words, “You were ignoring my needs and I lonely and abandoned, so she fell into the hands of the man she was seeing close to eight hours a week. But, it was nothing sexual”

On the other hand, my parents saw to it that I spent every dime of my money on her. Some days at dawn, she craved grilled fish from one specific vendor in our area. Too much pepper was too much for her; not enough would make her nauseous. Do you know how expensive baby items are? And she had a specific taste she wanted the baby to have.

Whenever I complained that I did not have money, she would report me to my parents, who would always come for my neck.

At the hospital when she gave birth, I held the baby and did not feel anything. I like babies so much, and if anything, I expected an instant attachment to the baby, but it was not so.

My parents were on her side, so I rushed to my uncle and told him everything. He led the way while we conducted a DNA test.

The test result read a Probability of Paternity of zero percent and a Combined Paternity Index of zero. “Is that 99 percent not the father?” I asked the nurse what it meant. She had a pity smile on her face when she said it. ” You are excluded from being the father of the child.” She shook her head, gave me a pat on the back, and left my uncle and me standing there with our hearts in the pit of our stomachs.

Granted that I had a feeling the child was not mine from the beginning before the test and all, I had held her in my arms and played with her, and even prayed over her. Whether I liked it or not, I had come to like her, love her. Her tiny hands, and her face. Her eyes when she made a face to cry. Everything about her warmed my heart. She was supposed to be my little sweet girl

Her family was there, with my parents present. They asked me what I wanted to appease my spirit. I told them, “All of my money. From the conception of the child and your outrageous cravings I had to satisfy, I want it in cash.”

They agreed. After that was done, her parents said they were not going to leave until she told us who the father of the child was. It was her boss.

My parents kept their mouths open throughout when she was forced to tell us how she was managing two men at the same time. Her mother was screaming while I stood there connecting the dots. When I called and she said she was sleeping. When I asked her to visit and she gave lousy excuses.

Her boss had sacked her when she went to him with the news of her pregnancy. He said he was not the one and that I was the one. I was her only hope. She sat there and cried.

It turned into a pity party. Her parents asked that I forgive her. I asked them, as what? Forgive her and accept the child as mine when the real father is alive and kicking?

I want my money, that is all.

I was disappointed. My friends comforted me and said I should be lucky I did not have to take care of the child for many years before the truth came to light. Count your stars. It was a painful truth that I had to let run through me.

All that happened three years ago, to be exact. There has not been any money received in my account. Years have come and gone. Whenever I go to their house in search of her, it is either she travelled or she is not around. At this point, it seems she has moved out, which is really not my concern. My concern is that I have been scammed out of close to tens of thousands catering for her throughout the pregnancy, especially the hospital bills.

In the months and years that followed after that meeting, I genuinely set it aside. If they brought the money, fine. If they did not, I did not mind. A child is a whole lot, and thank God I did not have to deal with that. But as I am speaking to you now, things are slow. Life is dragging its feet for me, and I cannot find my footing in this crazy world. The last time I checked, someone was owing me money that could help me tighten my footing and give my business a new look.

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I want to go for it. I have kept my calm, but things have been slow for me lately.

—Brooke
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