My dad died very early. I was very young. When I was in my first year at university, my mom also died in my sister’s arms. When we met days after her death, my sister told me, “Mom said I should take care of you. We’ll be fine, I promise you.”

When I completed school, I went to stay with her. That was where I met Sammy, and he became my boyfriend. When my sister got to know him, she wasn’t impressed. She thought I needed a man who had something to give. “A father figure, something you’ve lacked since you were a child.”

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It was too late to talk me out of love, so she grew to accept that Sammy was who I wanted. He didn’t have a job. My sister was worried. I told her he would soon have a job and all would be fine.

He would come to see me, and my sister would cook for him. My national service allowance would come, and I would share it with him. Where I was doing my service, my boss liked me very much. She always spent time with me outside work and even called me a sister. One day, I told her about Sammy, just in case an opening came up anywhere across the company.

She assured me she was going to help. Then Sammy had an opportunity to travel to Nigeria to do a three-month contract, which could lead to a permanent employment.

He needed money to travel and something more for his upkeep, but I didn’t have that much. When he went around asking and didn’t get any, he told me the opportunity was slipping away. I could see he was deflated and helpless. There was no joy in him, but what could I do?

I spoke to my sister and begged her to give us a loan. “We’ll pay once he gets there and starts earning.” My sister gave us GHC2,000. It wasn’t a loan. She said she was doing it because of me. I handed over the money to him and told him it was a loan from my sister, so he should do whatever he could to return it.

He went to Nigeria, worked for three months and returned empty-handed. He complained about how bad the job was and how little the money he received was because he was paid in Naira. A few months after his return, my boss got an opening for him in one of the branches. He didn’t even attend an interview. He went there and started working right away.

I could breathe a sigh of relief. When I told my sister about it, she was so happy she kept jumping up and down, telling me God had shown me favour. After my national service, I was retained by the company and was assigned another role with a good salary. Sammy and I were well placed to start talking about marriage.

A year later, marriage discussions were far advanced between us. I’d met his parents, and they had expressed interest in seeing us get married as soon as possible. My sister wasn’t married, but she had started buying the things I would need during my wedding. Sometimes I looked at her and wondered about the kind of heart she had.

I was going to work one morning when I got out of the car and, out of nowhere, a motorbike knocked me down. My bag flew into the air while I landed in a gutter nearby. I heard voices screaming and people rushing to the gutter. Some good Samaritans carried me to the hospital after the rider had run off the scene. I didn’t see my bag or whatever was inside it, including my phone.

At the hospital, I asked a nurse for a phone and called my sister. Less than two hours later, my sister was by my side, tending to me. It was obvious I was going to spend some days in the hospital. In the evening, when she was leaving, I begged her to tell Sammy about it. She forgot. According to her, if Sammy had a good heart, he would have come looking for me when he couldn’t reach me on the phone.

Early in the morning, before she came to the hospital, she decided to go to Sammy’s house, tell him what had happened and come to the hospital with him. She got to his house and knocked on the door. Sammy asked who it was and took forever to open the door. There was another woman in his room. My sister asked who the lady was, and he said the lady was his sister.

My sister would have believed him, but the lady heard the conversation and decided to come out and tell my sister that she wasn’t a sister but a girlfriend. The lady was in his shirt and obviously wasn’t wearing anything underneath. According to my sister, she started boiling, especially when she asked him if he knew where I was and he responded, “I should ask you this question. How can I know where your own sister is?”

My sister beat him black and blue and left a cut under his left eye. When I saw a photo of his face after the fight, I thought he had fought with a beast. I never knew my sister was that strong. She beat him, came to the hospital as if nothing had happened and told me, “Sammy might join you here. I’ve beaten him.”

He didn’t join me. He took the case to the police, and my sister was detained. I still hadn’t heard from Sammy after two days in the hospital. After beating him, my sister told him what had happened to me, but I guess he had his own wounds to care for, so he didn’t bother about me. My sister was bailed, and right from the counter, she came to see me. She said, “You see the kind of man you were dying for? If men were good people, I would have had one for myself.”

Sammy came to the hospital three days later with a plaster on his face, trying to twist the story. He looked funny. All I was thinking about while he was in front of me was, “What did my sister use to cause this much injury? Or is she a cat?” He talked and talked, but the only thing I did was beg him to withdraw the case against my sister. “She’s all I have, and she’s the one taking care of me here.”

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He did, and I thanked him. When I was discharged, I thanked him again for letting my sister go but told him I couldn’t do it again. He begged me but didn’t accept once that the lady was indeed his girlfriend. My sister had always chosen me. It was my time to choose her too.

I have the things we bought for the wedding. We are selling them. Just in case you need them, reach out. They are new, just that they too suffered a portion of heartbreak.

—Maame Efua 

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