It was 2019. He was in 300 level. I hadn’t even crossed the gates of a university yet.

The message came through Facebook. I already knew who he was. He must’ve been scrolling through my timeline. To him, I was just another pretty face, until I wasn’t.

“Wait... if you don’t know who I am, then why’d you message me?”

“Well,” he replied, “I saw a beautiful lady I’d love to get to know better.”

I rolled my eyes, but my cheeks betrayed me with a blush. Not the powdered kind, but the one that flares up uninvited when someone attractive says the right words and your teenage heart doesn’t know any better.

I introduced myself, respectfully, as his friend’s girlfriend. That killed the conversation instantly. He pulled back. I did too. And that was it.

To be fair, that relationship was already drowning. Eventually, it sank. And somehow, after it ended, we got talking again. Mr. “I’d love to get to know you.” And this time, he did.

We just clicked. Same humor. Same vibe. Conversations that made me wonder, “Why didn’t I meet him sooner?”

Feelings grew, slowly, then all at once. A friend warned me: Itunu had a girlfriend. My brain registered it. My heart didn’t. I asked him gently, hoping I had misunderstood.

He didn’t confirm or deny. Just said, “I’ll answer that when we meet in person.”

And like the budding fool I was, I agreed. Let’s blame youth and hope and everything in between.

Months later, when we finally met, he confirmed it. Yes, he had a girlfriend. But also, yes, he had feelings for me.

Mixed signals? Please. Man was a whole radio station.

Still, I was in deep. He wasn’t even all that, finer men existed. But Itunu had charm. Intelligence. That rare kind of charisma that makes you forget logic, pride, even self-respect sometimes.

I tried to pull back. Set boundaries. Act like I wasn’t always available when he called. But who was I kidding? He had lit a match in me. “My kryptonite,” he’d say, smiling like someone who knew exactly what he was doing.

So, I waited, for the moment he’d say, “It’s always been you.”

Two months later, he broke up with his girlfriend. I thought, this is it, my moment.

But it wasn’t.

Through the pandemic, he kept calling. Flirty check-ins. Late-night talks. We moved like a couple with no title. No direction. Just scalar quantities, like my Physics teacher used to say. 

Then November came.

I ran into a friend of his who casually mentioned he was dating someone new, Fatima.

“Fine girl. They’re serious o,” he said.

Heartbreak doesn’t even begin to explain what I felt. It was bitter. Deep. Embarrassing.

I confronted him.

He went quiet. That long, guilty silence where you can literally hear someone breathing through their lies.

Not only was it true, they’d been together since March.

March.

So all those “I miss you” texts? Sweet nothings? The pandemic calls and fake intimacy? He was eight months deep in another relationship.

“Wow,” I muttered.

“Mad o.” I laughed. Not the funny kind, but the one that bursts out when you realize you’re the joke. The setup. The punchline.

He said something about “bro code.” Because I was his friend’s ex.

Funny how that didn’t stop him from initiating every kiss.

I stared at my ceiling and let it sink in: he never wanted me. Not really. Maybe I was just convenient. A placeholder. Something shiny to distract him when he got bored.

It took heartbreak to peel off the rose-tinted glasses, to see the man beneath the charm. A cheat. A liar. A manipulator.

I never got closure.

But I gave myself something better, clarity.

It wasn’t that I wasn’t enough.

I was too much for someone who never had the intention to show up fully.

Now, I wear my smile proudly.

Because he lost me. And that’s the real tragedy.

Not that he chose Fatima.

But that he thought he could string me along… and I’d stay.

It was never going to be me.

But now?

It’ll never be him.