I sat next to him in a program and we struck a conversation. After the program, we exchanged contacts. I wanted to know him more. He looked well refined and polished. He sounded like someone who had everything and had everything figured out in life. I liked him but for the next two months or so, he proved to be someone who didn’t have time for so many things. He won’t respond to my calls and wouldn’t call back to say, “Oh I saw your missed call” or something. My texts to him never got answered until maybe too long a time later. I gave up on him.
One day he sent a text and asked if I was free for a meeting. I met him the next day and throughout the meeting, he kept apologizing for ignoring my calls and text. In the end, he said, “I’m a little less busy now so we can take it from where we left off. I watched his fingers, no ring on but my mind kept telling me he was a married man looking at his age(in his early fifties) and how he carried himself about. I didn’t ask him. I didn’t think it was appropriate to ask such a question on a first outing.
From then on he started showing me how kind he could be. It was difficult meeting him due to business schedules. We couldn’t talk all the time but he had unconventional ways of telling me he was thinking about me. I received a cake and wine one day at the office. It came with no name and the delivery guy also refused to tell me who sent him. Later in the day, he sent a text, “I hope you enjoyed the cake and wine?” “Oh, so it was you?” I responded. He brought me lunch often and sent money to my account especially on Fridays. He would then say, “Just enjoy the weekend while I’m away. See you soon,”
One day he proposed to me. I said, “You want her to come and beat me?” He answered, “She’s very gentle and calm. She won’t bite.” “Oh, so he has someone,” I said in my head. I probed, “Who’s this gentle and calm woman, a girlfriend or a wife?” He answered, “A wife. We’ve been married for seventeen years with three kids of our own and two adopted.” I was quiet for a while. He said, “You don’t have to worry about anything. I won’t take over your life. I just need you to be around me on your own terms. I’m not pushy and won’t ask you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
From there we were lovers.
A lot of things changed from there. He had time to talk to me and respond to my text. We met often than we used to and I accompanied him on most of his weekend trips. For over a year, he called me “Sweetheart” and I called him Kobby. We attended conferences and high-profile business meetings and through him, I got to know beautiful places I could only dream of and met people I only heard their names on TV and the radio. One day at such meeting, he introduced me to a gentleman as his personal secretary (He always introduced me to people as his PA whenever we were in places like that). Later that same day, I met that gentleman at the restaurant in the hotel.
He said, “Hello, Felix here again.” I said hello. When he realized I was alone, he came to sit next to me. We talked and laughed. He had this huge sense of humor I hadn’t seen in a man. When he was leaving, he gave me his card and asked for mine. I told him, “I don’t have a card yet but I can mention my numbers to you if you don’t mind.”
Two weeks after that day he called. And then it became a daily routine; to wake up in the morning to his messages and then in the afternoon, he would check up on me and ask how work was going. In the evening he would call to wish me good night. He liked me and I knew where things were leading toward. He asked me out one day and he proposed. “You’re not married?” I asked. He answered, “No I’m not. I’ve been in a couple of relationships recently that didn’t work out. Maybe I’m the bad person. Say yes and let’s see if indeed I’m a bad person.”
“Let’s see..”
He wouldn’t let me be so one day I said yes to him and a whole new chapter was opened in my love life. I wasn’t expecting so much from him from the onset but as the days rolled into weeks, he proved to me he was capable of so much more than I could think of. He said all the right things and did everything to keep me hooked to him. I started rethinking my relationship with Kobby. “Kobby is married. No matter how long I stay with him, we won’t have any future together. Felix is new and in my age league. He’s the future.” I texted Kobby one day; “Am I allowed to see someone?” He asked me, “Are you seeing someone or you’ve met someone you think you like?” I answered, “Sort of.” He asked, “You trust him that much?” I answered, “Yeah I do, judging from how serious he’s taking things with me.” He said, “Hmmmm.”
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I took that ‘hmmm’ to mean he knows I’m dating now. There was no time to play a double game so I slowly cut him off to concentrate on what I was building with Felix. When a guy proves to be everything, you also give him every reason to trust you. But I had to confess my past to Felix right? That the man who introduced me to him as his PA was actually my boyfriend. It wasn’t an easy thing to do but I had to do it. I told him, “You know something? I wasn’t actually Kobby’s PA. He was someone I met and was kind to me. Later I got to know he was married so our relationship didn’t really take off.” He answered, “I suspected it but didn’t know how to ask you about it. So how far with him now?” I answered, “Nothing. There’s nothing between us. Actually, we were over before I thought of saying yes to you.”
Nothing changed between me and Felix.
Two years after knowing and dating Felix, he said we should get married. I thought it was one of his usual jokes to get me high up for nothing. And then he started making marriage arrangements, bringing his family to see my family for the knocking. Three months after that, we had our wedding and walked away from the church as husband and wife. Kobby was there. At first, he was angry that I didn’t tell him who I was dating and then he asked me, “Does he know you and I were dating?” I answered, “No, he doesn’t know. I didn’t think it was necessary for him to know.” He answered, “Good. He’s not supposed to know what I do in my private life.”
His feelings and how well he wanted to protect his secrete didn’t matter to me. What’s important is that I have someone I can call my own and can share my past without judgment. The feelings of old flames don’t matter anymore.
