He said he loved me in the month of May. I asked him to explain what made him love me because we had only known each other for two weeks. He said a lot of sweet nothings, but I was not a girl to fall for sweet nothings. I wanted something concrete. I wanted a love that made sense, so I asked him to be realistic. He still struggled to convince me. I asked, “Or you saw a beautiful girl and you decided to have a bite and go?”

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He laughed about that and said he was ready and willing to see a relationship through to the end if I said yes to him. I told him I wasn’t convinced, so he should come again.

There are people who have words to say to everything and answers to give to every question. Enoch wasn’t like that. He couldn’t say much, but his actions were very loud. He showed me what he couldn’t say, and he was consistent about it. He called. He showed up. He did what he said he would do, so along the line, I fell in love with him. It was in the month of June when I said yes.

In July, we were talking about the possibility of marriage. He told me he’d found what makes his heart settle. I told him I’d found a man I would say yes to in a heartbeat. What was left was commitment in time. We needed time to be right so we could have perfection in our relationship. Unfortunately for us, in December, before the merry messages flew around for Christmas, I found out I was pregnant.

My safe period failed me. I was embarrassed when he said, “I thought you said you were safe?” I answered, “I might have calculated wrongly, but what I have inside me isn’t wrong. If you love me, you’ll love what I’m carrying because it came out of lovemaking.”

We didn’t argue about whether to keep it or not. We argued about whether to marry before the pregnancy showed or wait until after the child was born. I wanted to marry to cover my shame. He wasn’t ready. Financially, he was okay, but he said he needed to sort out his living space before bringing a woman in. He was living with his parents then.

I understood him and decided we would allow the child to be born and later have a wedding. My dad said no. My mom called me an embarrassment for agreeing to such a thing. “Who puts the horse before the cart? Marriage first. Get him to marry you if he loves you that much.”

When he came home to meet my parents, egos clashed, and my dad sacked him from his house, saying he didn’t want a man like that in his family. Because of the clash with my dad, he told me he wouldn’t marry again even after the child was born because my dad annoyed him.

My mom tried to coerce him, using all the motherly antics. He said no. He wanted the child but not the marriage. Because of these issues, he disappeared from my life, never to be seen again until the child was born. I called him. I went to his place, but his parents also wouldn’t let me in. They were also punishing me for what my dad did to their son. He would pick up my calls and cut them immediately when I asked for money for the hospital.

Even when I gave birth, I expected him to come around as early as possible. I saw him two weeks later when the baby had grown a bit. He came to look at the baby and asked when my parents would be ready for the naming ceremony because he wanted to name the child. Again, egos clashed. My dad asked where he was during the nine months of pregnancy that he would show up to name the child. He asked my dad what that had to do with anything. My dad drove him away to go home and learn sense.

I didn’t see him again for a while. He didn’t send money or good wishes. He didn’t ask me to send photos of the baby so he could see how he was growing. When the baby was about a month old, he sent me a text message saying, “I want to name him after my grandfather, the great Gadago.” He added his surname to Gadago and told me not to give the boy an English name because his family hated that.

He wasn’t there for me during pregnancy, both emotionally and financially. I gave birth, and for a month, he hadn’t asked how the child was feeding, but all he cared about was the name he wanted to give to the child he didn’t take care of. I said no. I did the maths and sent him a bill. I said, “If you desire to name the child, then desire to pay all that you owe me since the pregnancy, else forget about the name.”

He said having a child wasn’t a financial transaction and I couldn’t tell him what to do. He didn’t send the money but would text and ask me, “How is Gadago doing?” I didn’t name him Gadago. I named him Jayden and added his surname to it. No matter what, he was the father, and I didn’t want to take that away from him.

Three years later, the child was going to school. I called to ask him to pay the fees. At first, he said he didn’t choose the school, so he wouldn’t pay the fees and that the fees were too much. When the school gave me the prospectus, I sent it to him. He saw the name on it and started fuming, “Who’s Jayden? Why am I supposed to pay the fees of a child I know nothing about? I only know Gadago and not Jayden.”

I travelled to Canada to work and left the child with my parents. He didn’t ask any questions. We were friends on Facebook, and he knew I had travelled because of the photos I posted. He didn’t say anything or even ask what happened to his son. Two years after I moved to Canada, I came home and took my son with me. I posted a photo of us on Facebook, and he rushed into my inbox, “How dare you take my son overseas without informing me? You’ll hear from my lawyers.”

I didn’t honor that message with a response, but each time he saw a photo of us, he came into my inbox, threatening me to return the child or else he would cause me to be deported. I laughed at those empty threats and ignored the messages.

We’ve been here for close to a year. I took off his surname from the boy and gave my dad’s name to him. I swore that I would do everything within my power to bury every link the child has to him. Even if it means not coming to Ghana again to achieve that, I would do it.

He contacted me one day on Facebook with threats again. He said, “I’ve spoken to the gods of my motherland. I’m no longer taking the legal route to get my son. It’s going to be spiritual, so if you don’t like any trouble, bring my son back before you see your miserable self back in Ghana.”

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I responded to this one, “You don’t have any son with me, and tell the gods of your motherland to find water and bathe because they are smelling. How dare you? Who do you think you are?”

He was writing back when I blocked him. He went to my dad’s house to shout and make noise there. Whoever he meets on the street, he gives them a message to tell me that he would use spiritual means to get me deported. I’m here, still waiting for my deportation. If that doesn’t happen, he should know that he has lost every right to claim the child or even have his name on him.

—Evelyn

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