It always sounds like a joke to me when I remember how I got to like a girl and never dated her. During my primary school education, I came across a certain girl named Nadia. This girl would not leave my mind from the day I saw her. This was during a break time and I was supposed to go back to class. The breaktime happens outside the school blocks on the school grounds. I was heading to the school borehole to get some water to drink since I was thirsty. I saw her playing with her friends on the ground near the borehole. Honestly, when we got back to class, I could not concentrate on what the teacher was teaching anymore since I was just thinking about the beautiful girl I saw during breaktime. My mind told me to approach her and tell her how I felt after seeing her, but another mind told me not to.
I was surprised to learn that this girl I’d seen at school lived a few meters away from where I stayed. I found this out when I took a walk with my friends one weekend. I saw her sweeping outside. I can say that she was a neighbor since it took only five minutes to reach her home. After that, I started seeing her when we fetched water at the same borehole. I used to not like fetching water but after seeing Nadia at the borehole, fetching water became one of my favorite house chores. I tried to time it after I learned that she was my neighbor. Nadia never knew anything regarding my feelings and we still hadn’t spoken. I tried to make her a friend and it worked. We started talking the day she came late to the borehole and I offered her a chance to fetch water without staying in the queue. During this exact moment that we started talking, my palms began to sweat.
In the days that followed, my mind would tell me to tell her how I felt, but when we met I felt shy and left without saying anything. After a long period of time, I decided to write a letter to her explaining how I felt and that I would like her to be my girlfriend. I gave the letter to my classmate to deliver to her. The time that passed between giving this letter to my friend and her reading it was 2 days. I knew that she read it because my classmate told me that she opened the letter when she received it. While waiting, I passed by her home in hopes of seeing her but it was not possible since she was a girl who loved staying indoors.
Nadia, learning how I felt about her, destroyed the little friendship that was there between us. The first time I saw her after giving her the letter, she looked more shy than before. It was not only her; I was also shy and nervous at the same time. My mind told me to follow her and ask about her point of view, but when I got near her, I failed to talk. I tried to make some jokes to make the time pass but she told me that she was in a hurry. I realized that she started avoiding me whenever I tried to talk to her at the borehole. We usually sat together and joked but she started focusing on fetching water without giving me even five minutes of her time.
I tried asking her out for dinner to see if I could talk to her in person but she ignored my request. After constantly insisting, she decided to talk to me. We were supposed to meet on a Saturday evening.
When the day arrived, I prepared myself and went to the place where we agreed to meet, the Absinia restaurant. I arrived 15 minutes before the chosen time. While I watched the time pass by, I was thinking that she could come at any moment so I should keep waiting. I talked to myself in my mind about how I was going to behave when she arrived. I waited for an hour but she did not show up. I tried to go to her place but I could not find her. Every time I went to see her after that, her place was closed.
One day, I asked one of her neighbors about her whereabouts. The neighbor said that they were gone. When I heard this I felt like I wanted to go and drink beer to relieve myself from that situation. When I had some beer, the stress increased instead. Until today, I do not know where she went and it still pains me. Thirteen years have passed since this happened. I wish I could meet her now and tell her how I feel in person and not through a letter.
23 February, 2023
