Being in love in a world full of millennials
characterised by selfishness, pride,
laziness and a sense of entitlement is
actually one of the 1000 ways to die
young. Given that I am a self-centered, lazy
and proud millennial, I have no
justification to complain or point
fingers….well it’s my story, I’ll point all my
fingers and toes if I want to.
It’s a hot Saturday afternoon and a work-
free weekend. She has been looking
forward to a free weekend for a month
now. It is finally here and she has all these
things she has planned to do- like playing
tennis, visiting the orphanage, studying
for her GRE, starting a side hustle, visiting
family, sleeping, watching some movies,
finishing up a novel, cleaning her house
and finally washing her 4c hair.
It’s already 12:30 pm and she has only
managed to get out of bed, brush her
teeth and eat. She’s terribly bored and
lonely and although she has her to-do list
for the weekend, the activities are
unappealing to her. She’s lonely, so she
picks up her phone and calls her
girlfriends.
“Baby girl, how far? Would like to see a
movie this evening? I’m paying”
Friend 1: “Ah babe, I’m out of town o,
went for my cousin’s child’s naming
ceremony.”
Friend 2: “I am in school, I have lectures.
Maybe tomorrow?”
Friend 3: Doesn’t pick up.
Rather than turn off her phone and sleep-
the wise choice- she makes a bad
judgement call and dials his number.
“Hi Toms, you around?”
“No. I’m at work. What’s up?”
“Was thinking I could come around,
maybe we can hangout, go somewhere
nice. Ah! Maybe the Amala spot”
“Too bad I’m working. Maybe you can
come over for the night?”
At this point she knows the correct
response to give but no, she consciously
blocked all sources of good reasoning. She
gives him the wrong response, the one
that puts all the power in his hands. He’s
been dodging going out with her.
Anything that happens in the light with
the clothes on? Count him out. He only
wants to have ‘fun’ with her. She knows it,
even if he didn’t say it directly, she caught
the vibes some months ago.
What can she do? Being a romantic in a
world where romance is almost extinct
makes her an endangered species. Toms
had chased her for a year and done
everything right, he knew her soft spots
and the things that made her tick, and he
used them well. He played her well, at least
now he’s getting what he wanted – and at
no cost, to the disgust of Friend 1.
“How can you be sleeping with him and
he doesn’t fuel your car or give you money
to take care of yourself? The least he can
do is buy the fuel you use to drive all the
way to his house every time”
She had been confused the day Friend 1
made the statement above. Do men
actually do these things? Why didn’t she
ever meet those kind of guys? Should she
breakup with Friend 1? Aren’t these the
kind of friends her daddy told her to run
from?
Thankfully, she is over thinking that Toms
feels anything for her but she wouldn’t
end it. He doesn’t provide the emotional
cushion that she needs, but he provides a
physical cushion for the time being.
It’s 5:30 pm and she’s packing a night
bag, preparing to go over to Toms’ when
Joe calls. He wants to take her to this new
Art Gallery that just opened up in town. Art
Gallery, it’s her kind of thing, she would
absolutely love to visit it but not with Joe.
He is becoming too close, catching too
much feelings. She doesn’t want him
catching any feelings for her because she
doesn’t like him like that. So she declines
his offer and lies that she’ll go with him
the next weekend, but she plans to give
him some distance for the next few weeks
so as to kill any feelings that maybe
developing. Same thing she did with
Emeka, Osas and Ayomide.
Her mummy maybe right after all, maybe
she needs deliverance. She’s always
chasing after men that aren’t meant for
her, and chasing away the ones that
actually care about her and give her their
attention. Or maybe her mother is wrong,
there’s nothing wrong with her. She just
has a type, and the men that genuinely
care about her aren’t it. She isn’t
necessarily chasing after men that aren’t
meant for her, who’s to say they aren’t?
She didn’t make the first move, they did.
Maybe they just got bored of her or
something….
It’s 6:30 pm and she dials Toms to find
out if he is home from work. The phone
rings and rings, no one picks it up. She
wouldn’t leave her house if she didn’t get
a confirmation. After trying to reach him
unsuccessfully for five minutes she
decides to wait for him to ring her back.
It’s 9:30 pm when he sends her a
message on WhatsApp.
“Babe, I’m sorry I slept off. Can you still
come?”
“No. It’s late. I don’t like driving in the
night”
“You can take an Uber or a Taxify na”
“I don’t trust them. Can you come and pick
me instead?”
“I’m tired. But Ubers are safe”
“Don’t worry. Another time. Good night”
She quickly switches to her browser to
google “why do men treat me badly”. Her
inner critic is in charge now and she has
all these accusations and self-depreciating
things to say to her but she wouldn’t let
‘little miss critic’ in today. Not today. She
suddenly remembers she made a list of
things she’d like to do when she finally
had some spare time off work. Writing a
story is one of them.
