It was his sister who introduced us. She said we’d make a good match and that we should give it a try. That’s how it started. And now, here we are.

After many months of talking, I finally accepted his invitation to visit him.

I can’t fully explain what my eyes saw that day, but I’ll try. I’ll try.

At first, I was happy to go there. But honestly, it was sad to see the state of his room. His sofas were covered in food stains. Under the cushions, there were tiny bones and small red ants that would crawl onto you the moment you sat down. The floor was thick with dust. It was my first time visiting, so I didn’t feel I could step in and start cleaning.

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And I haven’t even mentioned the outside. Takeaway bowls with leftover food, filled with stagnant water, mixed with piles of rubbish. The kitchen was worse. I’ve told him many times to throw those things away, but every time I visit, they’re still there.

On my second visit, I swept the whole place myself. I hoped that would encourage him to keep it up. It didn’t.

The next time I went, I needed to use the bathroom, which meant going into his bedroom for the first time. In the washroom, there were pieces of toilet roll and used condoms scattered everywhere. I couldn’t understand how someone could let it get so dirty. The sink was filthy, the mirror covered in old toothpaste stains, empty water bottles lying around. I ended up sweeping his bedroom, clearing the cobwebs, and tidying everything because I simply cannot stand being in a dirty space. You should see the inside of his fridge.

This is a man in his mid-thirties. A man who says he wants to marry me.

And yes, I love him. I have come to love him. He earns almost five times my salary, yet he’s always complaining about being broke. He says he’s buying a car because of me and that soon I’ll be the one driving it. But I already drive most of my dad’s cars.

In the whole month since we met, he hasn’t given me a penny, but he always wants to borrow from me. And I give it to him anyway.

I visited recently and saw that he still hadn’t swept since the last time I did it. The rubbish I begged him to give to the waste collectors was still there, and a fresh bag of garbage was packed and sitting in the kitchen. I’ve been visiting for over a month, and that same refuse has never moved. That tells me how long this has been going on.

He doesn’t keep up his oral hygiene or body cleanliness. He doesn’t wash his clothes. Clean and dirty laundry are mixed together in a pile in his room. Whenever I step into his place, my mood instantly drops. I become angry without meaning to. He notices, keeps asking what’s wrong, and I tell him nothing. But deep down, this is what’s eating at me.

I tried talking to him about it once. I told him his room needs to be kept clean. He hears me when I speak, but I don’t think the words ever reach his heart. They go in one ear and pass straight out the other, vanishing into the sky.

This is a man who used to move from girl to girl, though he says he stopped all that long before meeting me. I ask myself, if that was his behavior, how did those girls cope? Did they stay in that filthy environment, excited and happy? Did they do all the cleaning? Did anyone ever bring up his dirty way of living? So many questions keep flooding my mind.

And beyond all this, he doesn’t like to pray. Not once have I seen him pray. I remind him, but he doesn’t seem to care. We are Muslims, we pray five times a day, but Iddrisu isn’t like that. He prays when he wants to, which is almost never because I haven’t seen him do it. Not once. I haven’t even heard him say he was going to pray.

I suggested he move out when his rent expires, find a more spacious place. He asked me to look for a room I like so he can pay for it. He is doing all this because I am the one he wants to marry. It screams effort, but then again, a question mark hangs over it.

He loves me. Yes, I would bet on that. I see how his eyes change when he looks at me, how his mouth curls into a smile. I know love when I see it, and I see it in him. He posts me, shows his friends, tells them I’m the one he’s going to marry.

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But I am deeply troubled by his uncleanliness and his lack of prayer. He keeps repeating the same boxers because he won’t wash them. They look dirty, stained with sweat, small drops of urine and faeces. The heat has even made the fabric at the bottom hard and stiff, but he still wears them.

I don’t know what to do.

— Rashida
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