PERFECTING LOVE III

That semester, Arnold and I got personal. I found out almost all there was to find out about his family. He did about mine (though he didn’t meet them until the following session. He broke up (he claims they never dated) with Yvonne (not real name). (Rose was interested but not dating. Note my choice of words o). Actually, he defined his relationship in a way that Yvonne knew she won’t get anything from their following themselves up and down.
Rose expected to be “promoted” but neither his elder brother, his girlfriend at the time (Yolanda) nor their mum liked her much. These conclusions are from observations. So, she was “zoned” into being a good friend that liked “hanging around” and giving him gifts. He was getting closer to me _“in her very before”_ and she found it quite upsetting but there was nothing she could do about it.
You know I am a good friend. I was a good friend to him. Theresa and Jeffery were dating and 4 of us used to go everywhere together so it started looking like we were double dating. We had pictures to show that though it wasn’t really the case but we were the only ones who knew that. I was strongly there for him and he was strongly there for me, as friends.
He taught me bible at every opportunity. He would actually ask me to share whatever I learnt from my daily devotion with him whenever we saw. This meant I had to study daily to have something to share. He showed me Daniel 11:32. I will never forget that class. We discussed in front of his brother’s room on Bini Road, or was it Yolanda’s room?
Fast forward to the end of my first session. I started suffering from what my pastor calls the _Ogbanje_ in me. Lol. We had call times. My home phone or the neighbour’s. We spoke for an hour daily or thereabout. I started seeing things in the Spirit. I saw his entire wardrobe for the new session (though I didn’t see who bought them). I visited him at home in my dreams. When I told him of my visit and described his house, he knew he was in trouble.
I knew the mortar was under a table in the kitchen. I knew the cupboard in which dog food was kept. There were two types of chairs in their living room. I even tripped on the wood between the living room and the passage leading to the rooms in my dreams. I saw his mum’s full mirror in her bedroom. I laughed at him because his towel at home was pink.

I not only saw everything, I remembered everything I saw. Well, now that I think about it, I find it odd that he didn’t find it worrisome that I was clairvoyant.
I saw the places we would go to together in the new session, the troubles we would have escaping riots, even the sexual advances. Advanced seeing. How was I able to see all these, seeing as we were just friends and he, who was schooling me in the Spirit, didn’t see things in this manner? Was it the work of familiar spirits? I guess I would never be able to test that now…
Anyway, the new session started and he needed a place to stay. When he came to sort his accommodation issues in one of the shirts I had already seen, we went touring everywhere hand in hand. The holidays had bonded us. I ended up asking Jeffery to allow him stay with him in a BQ on Amina Way. That was how aside from sleeping in Idia Hall at night in 200level, I stayed in Jeffery’s room during the day. Theresa wanted to be there with Jeffery anyway.
Arnold wasn’t an _out out_ person so we were mostly indoors. We had a lot of unusual privacy, now that I think of it… I couldn’t cook to save my life but he taught me to cook. Whenever I tried, it was almost always salty. Only thing I could do to perfection was fry eggs, sunny side up. He taught me that too. His jollof spaghetti was gangster. He taught me how to make it as well. He introduced me to jazz; Nat King Cole especially.
That was when we started having attention issues. We got each other’s attention. 101%. Which mean that when I was talking to him or he was talking to me, a burning room was just wasting its time. Seriously. You can’t understand how bad it was. There was once a full room of about 15 classmates shouting our names and staring at us and we couldn’t hear any sound apart from each other’s voices. Those ones were testing us though. They had noticed and they wanted to find out how bad the condition was. These things really upset Rose who was still interested and who was hearing gist about sizzling romance. Lol.
It was on one of those weekends while he was staying on Amina Way that he went home for supplies and money. I had an estimated time for his return and when it was time, I surfaced in their room. His things were in the room but he was nowhere to be found. There was no one there actually. I let myself in and settled down. He returned. Missing people does things to you, really. We had missed each other. We were only usually apart between 11pm and 8am. We usually spent about 15hours together on a daily basis. He had been gone the entire weekend.
He hugged me and swung me around before putting me down. The height difference is about 8 inches. We sat on the mattress and did some staring. Naturally, you know what would follow such staring.

Yep, what you have been waiting for since I started telling stories every weekend – a first kiss. Cool lips, like the type you would get after a drink of very cold water. The feeling was also akin to the relief from cold water on a parched throat. Do you want graphic details? Well, I am not writing erotica. Besides, this was what, 21 or 22 years ago. How am I supposed to remember the details? Lol.
Anyway, one thing I cannot forget was the touching and romantic speech that came afterwards. Still holding me, he looked into my eyes and likened me to a golden apple. He took his time to describe it with the smooth light green back and the golden highlights at the middle. He confessed that he had known that the kiss would taste and feel like eating such apples; bursting with honeyed sweetness. If anyone said that to you, would you forget?
Like you probably suspected, physical touches, including kissing, became habitual. But we were dental students and so we were almost always in class (8am – 5pm with a one-hour break at 1pm). Save for when we had anatomy practicals, we were not together in class. I had a number of people who were interested in me and so did he. There were also a number of people I was interested in. People noted though that there was something unusual in how we related to each other. My pet name was _Babylove_. I didn’t remember to give him a pet name.
Clairvoyance made life easy for me and well, he had to deal with a number of things. I knew when he wasn’t feeling well. I knew when he was feeling too good. I knew if anything had anything to do with him. I just knew. It went from dreaming about what would happen to him to just knowing something was wrong. Then it degenerated, I could tell what was wrong without dreaming about it. Later, I would feel in my body whatever his body was feeling. I don’t think he liked it much but he never complained. Much later, when we had broken up, when I show up, especially when he had girl troubles, he would just look up at me and say “They have come to tell you, abi?”.
Have you ever had a clairvoyant partner?

How did you cope?
Maybe I should ask him why it never really bothered him or why he never really bothered me about it.
For years after we split, I would still know. The last major one I remember was knowing that his mum would buy a benz (I think it was blue) before his sister’s wedding. I dreamt of it and told him and he denied it. I told him I came for the wedding in my dream and he showed me and he said there was no such plan. A few days to the wedding, when he discovered the plan, he let me know I had been right but insisted that I got the colour wrong. Of course, that changed when they took delivery of the car. I had been right all along.
It should have been a burden to me as well – knowing. However, being a fresh convert, I hadn’t ever experienced any other type of Christian life. I considered it natural to know.
1998 came with some financial trouble. He invested money in a viewing centre for the 1998 world cup. He ended up having no textbooks, no dissecting set, no lab coat, no feeding money. I took care of  that. I split my allowance into two, giving him a portion. I ate from home and brought him food weekends. Do you want to hear that story? Then read it up.
https://jummycaxton.art.blog/2021/12/03/my-little-black-dress/
For those who asked what they did in that story before Heroine left that night, well, this is the no holds barred discussion. She took out black heads. Lol. What did you think I was going to write? Somehow, his face was smooth but he had pimples on his back. She usually sat at his waist, with him face down, while she removed black heads (and sometimes, white heads) from the pimples on his back. Sometimes, this activity would lull him to sleep, her touch being so relaxing.
At other times, it would work some tension into him and make him roll over unto his back. On the day he bought the black dress, he rolled over unto his back and thus, she had to face him, since she didn’t get up from her sitting position. I am certain that you recall that touching etc had become a habit. You can go ahead to finish that story by yourself. They were teenagers after all.

Many experiences stand out during this period. However, I don’t remember them at once. I only remember them when there are triggers.
I remember that we had a grooming routine that had me combing his hair whenever we had to go out together. We didn’t wear each other’s stuff but we fed each other from time to time. Getting physical was somewhat faltering. He imagined he had some experience. I had a lot of textbook experience. I read too much and my mum was a nurse who left the right (or wrong) types of books lying around. There were a lot of tentative explorations. Mostly, we were just glad to be in each other’s company most of the time.
I remember that sometime after I had decided to change to Law, as a way of showing support, he followed me to see Prof F at Agronomy. It was Prof who took me to meet the Dean of Law at the time, Prof. Ojo, to get him to help me process my change of course. As soon as Prof F saw him, he shifted his attention from my mission to the boy that was with me. He started asking questions like “what is going on between you two? I never see one without the other. Young man, what does she mean to you?” Arnold had a cocky way about him, always meeting eyes and answering questions self-assuredly. He told him I was a very special friend. Of course, that had me preening.
That night, he had us take a stroll on Amina Way. I guess Prof’s questions made him really feel lovey dovey all day that day, professing undying affection and making me laugh a lot. While strolling, he made us turn in at Prof’s walkway. I was a bit confused because I didn’t have any business there. He however took me to the back of Prof’s bedroom window and slowly and deliberately took my breath away, under the stars.
He was kind enough to explain that he wanted to give Prof evidence of whatever he wanted to know. This didn’t really make any sense, since we didn’t knock on the door and invite anyone to watch the display. However, as you and I know, this display worked severe damage on the young girl’s psyche. The boy was just a _Don Juan De Marco._

You can Google it!
At this point, there is nothing else to talk about aside from the break up conversation. We were friends and we have stayed as friends since we met, irrespective of the phases of growth of the relationship. The mutual dependence was alarming but maybe when you date seriously when you are too young, it is an issue. He never asked me out, by the way. We just went from gisting about what we would love to have and be in the future to what it would be like to create that future together. We just fell into the habit of planning and doing “life” with each other.