The best kind of relationships begin unexpectedly, when you get that astonished feeling and everything happens so suddenly. I have heard numerous people say, you fall in love with your friends or that you can not be in love if you are not friends or that you marry within your circle of friends, blah blah blah  and  mehn…. I have my own twist to this mix. I am no expert in this area of relationships but I must say after this read we shall need to have a conversation. ……..

We had been friends for over 15 years ,,,,and yet I told him “I wanted to be more than friends” and he fled !! seriously ,,,who does that?  i know what you are thinking but before you judge me , hear me out.

It had been years of getting to know each other ,omanyi investment on both ends, the prayers , the teas , swimming plot, sijui travel parties,late night phone calls , texting all day and night, denying we had a thing for each other ,staring and not wanting to be caught, blushing when caught …..baby,  we did it all. At some point I could no longer stand on my legs, the butterflies were intense,,,of sweating in the cold because we are next to each other…. we would talk and talk on end ,,,as in !!!  you gotta understand  our vibe was the ish  bannnange…………

The whole tall dark and handsome mix,,, and he played basket ball, of you guys !!! He was a poet and said things like ” you complete my lines” gwe !!! spingles down my spin ….. I riyo fell for this man… Naye picket fences will be the death of me i tell you. i was already Mrs …… wait did i mentioned his name ? oh gosh…… !!! Anyway  where were we ? yes ,,,me floating on air just talking to him, singing ” thank God i found you , i was lost without you……”  bambi riyo riyolo  falling flat !!

Please note this was not just me falling, he gave signals, confusing ones at that about this vibe between us , the guys in our circles would tell me how he went on and on about me and nagged them saying I was his favorite drug, his heart beat !! ….oba who uses such words in this era……but you see  in as much as all the signs pointed to the fact that we were happening and loving it, he was not making a move. Like what do you do for such a person , munyambe ! hmmmn? The queen of getting her hope’s up had met the king of mixed signals , a heartbreak was in order!

let me tell you why people say christian brothers are slow, precisely that.but are they really slow?   It’s difficult to explain and maybe I will need some christian brothers to come explain what happens in that space between knowing you love her and she likes you mob and doing nothing about it,,,,as in?????? ate don’t give me that jazz of waiting for perfect timing …….hmmmnnn, for how long?  till the cows come home ?

Any who so after a long period of contemplation…I told myself well…whats the worst that could happen? Just express how you feel  to your friend, if he likes the vibe, you hit it on ,,,if he doesn’t ,,, you move on….maaaaaammmmaaaaa….  I have never desired the ground to swallow me like then. Bad idea ,,, i repeat bad bad idea. so this beautiful evening i garner all my feminist confidence and as we walk home from the game , I shyly say, “look i care about you in a much deeper way than mere friendship, i know you love me, so why haven’t you made a move on me?” he goes like what ? babe be serious . ko me ….ateeeee….. now check, am being serious ! so the other thing in life about having male buddies and always joking with them is they never take you seriously. And there we were, the cat out of the bag that i could not take back and a clueless friend standing before me saying “i love you but i …..ummmnnn……you cant be my gal “. Everything he said after that was gibberish , i could see his lips moving trying to shed more light on his long explanation but i could not hear a thing. my mind was on a roll……but what was i thinking really ?  like what did i expect? okay which woman in their normal mind vibes a guy? like really, what possessed me to forget my traditional love for being wooed and serenaded and all the ‘car door ‘opening and letter writting mix ???? .  …..so what now …… what next…..?

Gwe !!! Telling someone such a personal and intimate thing leaves you feeling exposed and vulnerable, and rejection simply slams home that you went out on a limb and received no reward. My head is spinning ,am sweaty, I can hardly hear anything , i’m now moving as fast as my legs can carry me ,  in fact i want to faint , or maybe die , anything to save me from the embarrassment of vibing a guy,,,,but you see…in my defence …. i wanted to know warrups , i needed to know. I was tired of over-analyzing his mixed signals and driving myself crazy interpreting the many question marks in his “whats up baby??? “texts. I had learned that when a guy asks a girl out, he makes a decision to size her up, to see if she’s a good fit for him, so i thought to myself, wouldn’t it be awesome if i got to be the one to decide to size him up, to see if he’s a good fit for me ? I was curious, i was excited, but i also needed answers and the only way i knew to get them was to be bold enough to ask for them.

I can not tell you what happened after, that part of my memory was erased. I am not even sure how i got home but i did, and  i never stepped out of the gate or read a mills and boon ( the things i loved to do) for long, locked myself up and wept days on end.  My family and friends started saying i had developed hysteria….. hahahahahha but those days were exhausting ,,,ah ah … anyway… i finally got over myself and started living again. So i am known for breaking the norm, speaking my mind blah blah blah ,,, but this, even i was shocked that i was shocked i had pulled this move , Yamaawe!!!

So why was I embarrassed ? what was sooooo wrong about telling a guy i liked him? not any guy by the way, my friend of many years? Even me i couldn’t answer my own questions. Can i answer these questions now? hmmmmnnn… stay with me. Here is what i know now, asking a guy or gal out is not so much about the answer that they give you, but more about how you are going to feel, given that answer. You can and should put your heart and your welfare first and i think back then i totally forgot what my welfare meant.Rejection is one of the many things i am never sure how to deal with, but i kinda sailed through this particular Phase. If you have asked him or her out and have been rejected, be kind to yourself and remind yourself how much courage you contain to have at least tried to do the right thing by laying your heart on the line. Sometimes you don’t win, other times you do but you cannot deny the fact that you had the strength of character to ask.    Sometimes what you are most afraid of doing is the very thing that will set you free, and buoy did this set me free……how?

Hehehehhehe ….. Ma’ friend !!!  ……that will be a story for another day.