By Yetunde Arebi

HI,Once bitten by the love bug, one begins to see things in a different perspective. Most of the lover’s faults or rather short comings will not mean much again, they are readily overlooked. So was the case with a young I will call Tony. Tony fell heads over heels in love with Debby and subsequently could not deny her anything she demanded of him. Unfortunately, even Tony’s best was not good enough for Debby, as she eventually dumped him for another guy. But how did Tony feel about this? The story begins below.

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I am 29, a Pharmacist, living and working in South East, Nigeria. I have a personal experience to share. It is a story of how love can turn sour when mismanaged.

I met Debby when I was in my third year in the university. We met through her cousin who was my good friend. She was in her first year in a university in the South West too. Prior to our meeting, my friend had been telling me about a cousin of his he wanted me to meet. He was so sure we will hit it off immediately and fall in love with each other. Before this, even though I was 22 years old then, my only experience was one short lived, not too pleasant affair. When it comes to talking to the opposite sex, I was really lilly-livered. But to my surprise, on the first day we met, the three of us spent about three hours talking about everything under the sun. At the end of the day, we exchanged addresses and she promised to get in touch with me.

I did not believe at the time that she would. However, to my great surprise, I got a text from her, a month after school resumed. I replied and also sent to the bargain, a sincere emotional card. Along the line, a relationship started developing and in about a year we were both in love with each other. Then suddenly, she stopped replying my texts and I could not locate her both at home and in school. I was devastated to say the least. However, with the aid of time, my wounds healed and I was able to pick up the threads of my life once again.

I eventually graduated and returned home for my one year internship. One day, I ran into Debby and we began talking. I was not satisfied with her explanations but my love for her came flooding back. Before I knew what was happening, my heart took over and I found myself virtually begging her to let us start where we stopped. This went on for about one year or so.

From time to time, I would go to her house to tell her how I was still crazy for her, hoping she would be convinced to give the relationship a try again. During this time, I got involved with someone else. Queen was just crazy about me. I went for my Youth Service and returned and Queen was always there for me. However, my heart remained with Debby. She was all I cared for and from time to time, I would sneak out to her place and profess my love to her.

About a year after my Youth Service, Debby walked into my office one afternoon and told me she was now ready to go out with me again. Without giving things a second thought, I contacted Queen and after deliberately picking a quarrel with her, I told her I needed a two weeks break from our relationship. She could check me up after that. You needed to see me after that. I was like a love struck, sick teenager.

Everything Debby wanted, I got for her. Except when I had to go to work, we were together. At Christmas and Valentine’s day, I always strained myself to get very good gifts for her. Meanwhile, I always almost used to forget Queen’s birthday.
Except when asleep, Debby was always on my mind. I kept thinking of how to make her happier. Her happiness was my concern. I would put her first before everything, even my family. Once in a while, I thought about Queen and my friends who liked her would always remind me of how much she loves me. But I kept telling myself that love is the most important thing in a relationship. I was so crazily in love that I turned a blind eye to Debby’s faults. Unfortunately, all my friends saw these faults but never told me because they said they did not want to upset me.

Debby was so crazy about getting married and spent most of the time we were together talking about it. So, just one year after completing NYSC, I started contemplating getting married just to please Debby. After much badgering, I decided to take the first step and went to introduce myself to her parents in preparation for the formal wedding introduction. I begged her to accept this first step for the time being because I was planning to open my own pharmacy and needed all the money I could gather at the time. But Debby refused and insisted we must get married immediately.
About this time also, Debby began travelling to Port Harcourt, almost every two weeks. According to her, she was looking for a job and someone there had promised to help her get one. It was that person she was going to see. this sounded strange for someone who claimed she wanted to get married to me and knew that i live and work in another state and will not be moving to the place she was looking forward to get a job from.

To be continued.