MY NEIGHBOUR’S DAUGHTER

I don’t know why but I felt my pulses go up at the sight of her there. Alone.

“You’re- you’re not the only one that thought of it.” She started.

I was confused.

“You’re not the only one that thought my mother slept with another man. Everyone else did.” She spoke fast.

I was very very confused. She was weird. Like really weird.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” I rose my brows.

“I like you!” She blurted out.

I paused for a moment before I said, “And I don’t like you, Dooshima.”

Her face became red. She was embarrassed.

I felt bad, “No, it’s not like that-”

She ran away. Again. As usual. As always.

She did not get the memo. She did not know me. I did not know her. The only connection we shared was the awkward eye contact we made every time we passed each other.

Did she think this was Africa Magic?

She stopped running. She stood there for a long moment, like a statute.

I was scared, hoping she would not turn around and strangle me for rejecting her love.

She turned around to look at me. A frown plastered on her face. She walked back to me. Actually, she stomped back. Like she was actually going to strangle me.

I took little steps, planning my escape before she finally came to stand in front of me.

Then she asked a strange question.

“How does a girl make a guy like her?”

“You don’t make a guy like you. Because girls don’t chase guys. Guys chase girls.”

“Okay.”

With that, she ran away. Does she ever walk?

I didn’t see her again. For months.

I never saw her outside her house or around the estate. I was beginning to get curious. Worried, actually. Did I push her too hard? Did she kill herself because I turned her down?

I kept pacing back and forth as to what was going on with Oyinbo. Like that, I kept thinking about her every day. I was worried about her.

But then, I began to question why I worried about her.

From that questioning came the ultimate jamb question.

Did I like Oyinbo?

I shook my head. No. There was no way I would like her.

But when night came, all I could been thinking about were her piercing grey-blue eyes. Her tiny figure. Her flat bum bum that looks squeezable like agege bread.

God, what is wrong with me?

And before I knew it… I was standing in front of her house. The very spot she used to wash her clothes.

“Haruna?” I heard a sweet distant voice behind me.

I turned around. There she was. My Oyinbo. The one that couldn’t make me sleep at night.

Seeing her caused a sensation in my body. Something that made my man parts tingle.

Soon, everything began to make sense. The more distant she was, the more I longed for her.

It was the paradox of the chase as a man. We didn’t have to chase and persuade her to know we liked her. It was her absence that brought longing into our souls. Into our bodies. Into our hormones.

“Haruna?” She called my name again.

“Yes? Sorry.”

She moved the big nylon bag from her front and placed it on the ground beside her.

And that was when I froze.

She was pregnant. How-

I saw her father come down from the car next to her with nylon bags too. I stared inside the nylon bags in his hand, they were baby items.

“Who’s this?” Her father asked her.

“Our neighbour, Haruna.” She said in a low tone, avoiding my eyes.

“Ah I see. I hope he’s not one of your sugar babies? I don’t have money to spare on any of those fools again.”

Sugar baby? Like sugar mummy’s side chick?

Oyinbo’s father walked to my side and patted my shoulder.

“Young man, concentrate on school and make something of yourself.” He glanced at Oyinbo and whispered to me, “Don’t let my wife fool you into thinking love is all there is in this world. You’re not the first boy and you won’t be the last.”

With that, he left for the house. I stood there, unable to move.

Wi- wife?

Oyinbo was his… wife?

It made sense, but it didn’t make sense. It made sense that she wasn’t his daughter because of their skin differences. But it didn’t make sense that she was his wife all this while, his child-bride.

Oyinbo noticed the shock on my face. She couldn’t say anything. She did what she did best. She ran away. She ran pass me and back into her house.

And that was how our story ended. There was never destined to be a love story between us.

Between me and my neighbour’s daughter. Sorry. Wife.

DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. All characters, locations, organizations and incidents appearing in this article are fictitious.