He told me he wanted to go back to school to do his master’s for a better pay where he worked. I’m a business-minded person. I started my own business when I was doing my national service. After my service, I had a job, but the salary didn’t excite me, though others thought it was a great salary. I saved and invested in my business and later left to run my own business.

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So when he told me he was going to school just for a salary increment, I advised him to do a side business that would earn him extra income. He told me point-blank that we were not all born to become business owners. Others have to serve under those business owners. Which to me was true, so I rested my opinion.

We had dated for two years and were thinking about marriage. What this meant was that our marriage plans would have to take the back seat for a while, at least until he completed his master’s, which I agreed to.

I helped pay his fees. He was my future, so I had to also invest in him. When he was hard on cash and he asked me, I did my best to support him. I sent him groceries. I stocked his fridge with food every weekend. I did everything I could for him to focus on his studies.

A few months after starting his master’s, he had a new job that paid almost twice his previous salary. I was happy for him. He even told me after his master’s he would still have a raise. I said, “Oh then our marriage is going to happen by all means.” I didn’t tell him. I said it in my mind.

He was getting closer to another lady who he said was a course mate. He mentioned her often. When he had group assignments, that lady was part of the group. When he talked about issues in his class, that lady’s name was plastered everywhere in the story. I sensed it but didn’t ask questions. I rather put my ears on the ground and kept my eyes on the issue.

He came home in the lady’s car, and according to my informant, the lady came around often when I wasn’t around. I could confirm this because the food I made for him got finished earlier than I expected. So I did what every woman in my shoes would do. I went through his phone and read their chat.

Everything was clear that they were dating. The lady even asked him to prepare her favorite dish, a meal I had already cooked. When I asked him, he swore heaven and earth that they were just friends, but he later changed his password.

One day, the lady was in the house with him when the informant called to tell me. I quickly rushed there to find the lady had changed into his T-shirt and they were seated eating meals I’d cooked for him. I greeted them and went straight into the bedroom. He followed me and asked why I would enter his bedroom knowing he had a visitor. “Yeah, you have a visitor. I’m your girlfriend. You mean I can’t come here because of her?”

The lady saw what was coming and she quickly changed into her clothes and left. I was expecting him to apologize or say something to calm my raging heart, but he said, “As you can see, this lady has done a lot for me. She’s the reason I got this job I’m doing. I can’t just brush her aside, so give me time to resolve things with her peacefully.”

I’ve never been angrier in my life. I told him to stay with her and never come back. I left his place and carried everything I’d left at his place with me. He didn’t say sorry or try to persuade me to stay. To me, he had made a choice. When he called, I ignored him. When he sent a text, I didn’t respond. Later he said, “I didn’t leave you. You’re the one who left. Let this be on record.”

I invested the pain I was going through in my business and overworked overtime just so I’d forget about him. It wasn’t easy, but slowly I was getting there. Several months later, he came to my place looking like he had fasted for years. He said he’d finally made a choice and it’s me he wants.

But here’s the funny part he thought I didn’t know. He had issues with that lady. Though I’d left the scene for them, my ghost kept haunting them until the lady decided to call it quits. The job he said the lady got for him was a yearly contract. The organization didn’t renew his contract, and he didn’t have the lady in his corner to help him get a renewal, so he had to fall from grace to grass. It was that moment he remembered I was alive.

He was shocked at how I got to know all this information. I said, “You think men are extinct and you’re the only one alive? Even if that was the case, I would have married a cucumber rather than fall back on you.”

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He tried through other people and even had the audacity to approach my pastor so my pastor would plead on his behalf. This is a pastor I revere so much I wouldn’t want him involved in my issues. He went there to sell our issues to this pastor so the pastor would know I was having illegal sex. That was the last straw for me.

Wherever he is now, I hope he’s still suffering from his bad choices. You don’t treat the heart that loved you genuinely this way.

—Martha

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