Must Read: Poetic Heart Season 1

Season 6 years ago

Must Read: Poetic Heart Season 1

My last relationship ended barely a month after it had begun. It was hardly any fault of mine.
Tochukwu had the worst case of roving eyes I had ever seen, or even heard of. He was as quirky as he was handsome. The only reason I dated him, was the quality of genes I felt would be passed down to my – our children if we eventually got married. We met at a friend’s party. He happened to be the emcee of the event and I remember vividly, been drawn to his languid mannerism. I, however, didn’t throw pathetic glances and inane smiles as did my obnoxious female counterparts. He walked up to me after the party and we got talking, turned
out he was the first cousin of my friend.
Although I’m leery of giving out my numbers to guys I meet at parties and clubs – sly, smooth-talking devilish ones most especially. I bent my rules a little and gave my number (main line) to him, my silly justifying reason then, being…he was related to a good friend and was therefore not a total stranger. Each morning after that, I awoke to the gentle buzzing of my phone. He sent me beautiful albeit Google-lifted messages. I chose to forgive his tactlessness and appreciate the gesture. The latter was quite difficult. I couldn’t help but imagine how many millions of ladies, myself included, having the same professed message sitting in our various inboxes. Some inexperienced ones, actually believing it. Resignedly, I chose to ignore them. Not everyone could be as poetically gifted as my second boyfriend Chisom. Although, I never believed a word he said.


My name is Anita Okorie, and as I like to add, I am the most practical person I know. There are many things I have to be grateful for in this life, one of which is my adroit understanding of the male species. Maybe a little thanks is due to my dad Ejiro Smith. The unsimilarity in our names is due to the fact that I bear my Mom’s name, Tabitha Okorie. The reason is quite cliché, they were married for barely twelve years when my Mom discovered he had another family apart from us and the worse part of it was, we were the other family. Fortunately, I happen to be an optimist who sees at least one good in every bad circumstance. Then I learned my first profound lesson in life: “Men Lie.” Seeing as I am veracious enough to recognize the biasness this statement could cause, I’d rephrase it, especially now that I am older and more considerate: “Humans lie, but mens' are pathological.” It simply can’t be helped. That first lesson has seen me through a lot, even till date, nine years after I learnt it. And as a practical person that I am, I’d prove it to you with two experiences. The first of which was gotten through my Dad.


Most people wonder how ignorant my mom and I could have been, to not have noticed the little signs of unfaithfulness my dad must have left trailing. Truth is, there were hardly any. Reason is, He is a pathological liar (still is, a leopard never changes it spots).


Growing up in the first decade of my life, Dad travelled a lot. According to him, he was a travel agent (it’s obvious why it made sense to me then, and you can guess why now I don’t take words at face value). There was always an explanation for every question that popped up.
For instance, once when he wore the same cloth for more than two times in a week to work, because he didn’t have enough corporate wears, Mom asked, “Why wouldn’t let me shop for you?” and he responded. “I am a man, we don’t need these things.” And then when he came back from a said business travel, with different set of cloths, Mom would ask, “Why do you only buy stuffs when you travel?” he would say, “Caught my fancy, couldn’t help it.”

It only made sense to us (myself and mom), when he had been caught and Mom discovered his first wife had access to his account, and every dime he spent wasn’t lost on her. The fact that he opened another account in my Mom’s name and left her in change of every expense also made sense too, his first wife wouldn’t get suspicious because of irrelevant spending, and Mom too wouldn’t have to bump into any documentation of his other account (this went both ways). I guess maintaining two families was so demanding, he didn’t want to add extra expenses by buying things he didn’t need (good thing his lying expertise came in handy).


Even though till date no one knows the exact work he does.

Another example is, when Mom would complain that she couldn’t find most of the cloths he travelled with, as he mostly came back without them, he would reply. “John took them.” John was his imaginary brother (don’t ask why we didn’t question his absence from the wedding album, because Mom did, although that’s a topic for another day). But sometimes when the ‘John-took-them’ line wouldn’t fit, like when Mom asked why he got the exact of two shirts, he’d say. ”I got it in two, in case john
decided to take one.”

When asked why John never came over but always seemed eager to visit him only on business trips, he’d sign, shake his head solemnly and say something in the lines of “That one, ever since he’d lost his girlfriend to childbirth, he’s a bit touchy about
family, but he’ll soon come around.”

My Mom was never one to hold on to an
argument. Still isn’t.

The list is endless, and naming them tale after tale, would lead to the exhaustion of the country’s supply of ink and paper. So I’d go next to another experience I had. This so happened to be my first boyfriend Kelechi, a relationship I won’t be forgetting in a long while.


Although it’ll hardly qualify as a relationship, seeing it lasted for barely a week.