Love you, maybe.

CHAPTER 2

You know what I don't get, Chelsea?”

“Not unless you tell me” Chelsea answered half heartedly. She was at work trying to complete the report on the last marketing survey they had collected from their customers but Chika her co-worker and gist partner would not stop pestering her with talks.

“Why have you never dated? Oh...wait, are you a virgin?” Chika shout-whispered to her and she was sure half of the entire department heard her too. “No! I'm not!” she shouted. Her cheeks burned with embarrassment and if she could have sunk lower into the chair she was currently sitting in she would. Yes she was and not like she was ashamed of it, she just didn't want her to be telling it to half of their colleagues who were men and who would like to try to woo her and cross their checklists.

“So when was the last time you had s*x?” okay, now she has gone and done it. Her cup of patience was full and running over. She turned sharply to Chika and addressed her, “first of all, that is none of your business Chika, secondly whether I'm a virgin or not is not your problem. Thirdly, I have work to do which you have been interrupting me with your incessant chatter for the past thirty minutes, not allowing me to do anything productive. Besides this is the office and that is hardly a talk fit for such environment. So please go and Do something, find someone else to talk their ears off and allow me to do my job!”

“So you are a virgin. You've not been getting some and that's why you're so strung out" she answered her with a mischievous grin.

“Didn't you hear everything I just said?”

“Oh I did, but I also heard the ones you didn't say too. I'll go and leave you to work now, but this discussion is far from over.” Then she pointed her middle and index fingers at her face and then Chelsea's face in an I've-got-my-eyes- on-you way. She turned back to the desktop screen and sighed in exasperation. What did she do to deserve Chika? But she smiled nevertheless because, Chika might have a big mouth but she had a heart twice as big and was a mama bear to her. When she began working here as a newbie, all the men were swarming her as a newbie, everyday not less than three men prepositioned her. She was getting pressured and beginning to dread coming to work when her Angel in human form Chika resumed work from her paid leave and it took her only one day to take in all that was happening to her and stepped up to the challenge. With her deep boisterous voice, she warned them off and officially announced that she was taking her under her wing and no one should dare to harass her or they would be served their balls on a plate or shoved down their throats. The threat, true or not worked like magic and she found respite and could finally breathe and enjoy crunching numbers. But Chika had other sides to her, and with time she came to realise that you take one part, you'll have to accept the rest that came with her-the whole package.

Chelsea thought herself an introvert but she was outgoing too. She was friendly and jovial but she didn't like or take nonsense either. After two years of working at MarTech, she developed a will of steel. In a competitive environment where 75% of her colleagues were men she had learn to be strong and not be a push over and to assert her opinions and ideas. So you may be wondering what the gist was about her virginity, truth is she had not intended to still be a virgin at 33 and with the body of a twenty five year old.

A long time ago, a 19 year old Uoma fell In love with a strapping handsome 23 year old boy named Jide. Jide was her sun in the daytime and her moon in the night. He was funny and smart and intelligent and made her laugh at the right times and blush and the right times. She had gone ahead and imagined their future together, oh the beautiful babies they would make, their lives full of joy and singing birds every morning when they woke up to a beautiful day everyday for the rest of their lives. And as it is with every good thing, there is always the true test to prove that which is real and not. And in their case she was to prove her love to him by giving up her body to him. Her heart which was her most priced possession was already his so why not her body? After all, they were going to be married and they'll have each other's body to themselves. An evening to The Night, she was visited by Nonye who was a best friend to Jide and therefore her best friend too. He approached her at dusk, sent her little cousin to call her out. She came smiling, thinking that her love had sent his best friend with news or a letter for her as he used to do sometimes. It made her feel truly special. But this particular evening, there was no letter or gift or good tidings either.

“Uoma, Jide did not know that I am here. I came on my own to warn you, about tomorrow night”

“I don't know what you are talking about, Nonye"

“Look, you are a very nice girl. The nicest I have ever met and you don't deserve to be treated the way Jide has been treating you and is going to treat you"

“Jide has been treating me well, Nonye you of all people should have know this. You're his best friend"

“Which is why I know what you and him are planning to do tomorrow night. He has been playing you all along. He and us"

“You're lying"

“No I am not. Every letter or love notes that you have sent to him we have all read it. And every letter he had ever written to you was dictated by us"

“We and us? Who do you mean?”

“We his friends. I can tell you some of the things you wrote to him word for word. I don't want to waste much time here but, don't meet with him tomorrow night. I'm begging you. It is a set up and all of us his friends are supposed to hide in the bushes and watch as he de-flowers you”

She was too shocked and embarrassed to asked anymore questions. She thought it was their special night, she thought she was special and that what they had was real. She didn't know that he took a bet with some boys around the community and he was fulfilling his end of the deal.

“How much was the bet, for my virginity?”

“Umm, five hundred naira" Nonye answered and looked down at his feet. A wave of humiliation rose taller than the coconut tree in her father's compound and swallowed Uoma up. The shame that would have followed her around the village, the snickering behind her. What about her mother or father? She had not thought of them when her world was revolving around Jide. But now that she knew the truth, she felt so stupid for not seeing through him by herself all throughout this time. She thanked Nonye and bade him goodnight. Then she waited till he was gone then she entered the plantain patch and cried for hours until her cousin Ezinne found her and asked her what was the matter and she broke down again and told her everything. Her cousin was two years older but behaved much older and wiser than her age. It was she who came up with the plan to continue to theplace of meeting with Jide, wearing Uoma’s clothes. When she returned, she narrated to Uoma that Jide was very surprised to see her and asked to know why Uoma herself was not there. Ezinne did not answer but proceeded to shout out the names of some of the boys she remembered and demanded them to come out of their hiding places as there was not going to be anything worth watching. Then she threw the five hundred naira note at him and walked away leaving him standing in the moonlightsurrounded by his friends.

Following the incident, Uoma got admission into a polytechnic to study accounting and Business Management and she never went back home again. In fact when people asked her name she introduced herself as Chelsea and not Uoma. And she never got into any relationship again, she poured her time and energies into studying and making her distinctions. If she was going to have s*x, then it was going to be on her own terms, on her own turf and at her own pace. She was thirty three years old wiser and any rose tinted glasses her nineteen year old self used to look at life have bleached to black and white and grey in between.

She finished her task, forwarded her report to her supervisor and stood up to go out to lunch. She met Yemisi on the way “stop ogling my ass Yemisi”

“I can't help looking if it looks so perfect”

“You're a married man"

“Look don't touch that’s the rule. I didn't cheat on her" she shook her head and muttered ‘men’ under her breath. She walked into the cafeteria and found Chika holding court, as usual. She got her lunch and made her way to the table and heard them discussing the upcoming wedding of a former colleagues.

“Will you be attending too, have you bought the Asoebi ?” the question was directed at her from Veronica who worked In communications.

“I barely met her here, one month before she left the company. Why would I attend the wedding, I know her barely?"

“For this Abuja? What about those who don't even know her at all? Friends of friends”

“That's their issue. I will be home enjoying the freedom of weekend. You girls should enjoy and catch cruise”

“I dey go find man, no be cruise o. I wan marry. I'm not getting younger”

“Na sugar bobo I dey find. Those rich cute young fresh guys. I'm not even interested in relationship, I just need man way to pay my bills dazall" Chika added.

“And you will be paying in kind”

“I no get problem with that one na. Me I dey kempe.” As if only remembering that Chelsea was also at the table, she turned to her but before she could say anything Chelsea spoke up “I am not interested in a man, nor his relationship neither his money. Thank you, I am doing very well for myself.”

“If you like, waste time until your kpenkus go dry up, come shrivel like old woman own. That thing is a muscle and it needs its own exercise"

Chelsea blurted out laughing at her description. “dry up and shrivel? Where do you get all these your information Chika?”

“Is it every thing that Google knows? Dey dia na"

And on and on the talk went on around her while she ate her lunch. May be instead of going for an Owambe, she could go for dancing at a club with her friend Larissa this weekend. So she logged into her w******p and sent her a quick chat.

Me: ‘Babes how far?’

Mr: ‘So I’m thinking of taking you up on that offer on the weekend partying...’

Her phone needed and a reply came from Larissa.

Lar: ‘I'm screeeeaaaaaaaming!!!??? What!? I've got the perfect dress for you???. After work tomorrow come straight to the house let’s start getting you ready!?????????’

Me: ‘why are you so excited?’

Lar: ‘Are you kidding me? I've been waiting for this since FOREVER!!’

Me: ‘see you on Friday, lunch hour is over and work calls’

Lar: ‘?Ttyl'