Can You Resist A Gift?

THE year I finished Secondary school, I was enjoying freedom because I could visit friends and stayed out late. There were parties too. My friend from school lived near so we went out a lot. One Sunday, we planned to see a play at the National Theatre but when I got to her house, I saw a strange man there whom my friend said was coming with us. I did not like it and it explained why our other friend dropped out at the last moment.

I wanted to see the popular play of the moment so I decided to go with them. The play ended in good time because it was an afternoon show. As we made to leave, however, my friend informed me that we would go to a night club but a sly grin on her face made me to suspect that she was not coming. She knew that I could not possibly go having left home before 2 PM. I knew that she had some design with the man.

I told her that I was not going and thanked the man for paying the gate fee. But this was when the man felt he ought to assert himself and he tried to persuade me to go but I explained that it was late and left them.
The following day, I went to my friend’s, but when I was leaving, the man came to the gate bare-chested and he wore only shorts, that was when it occurred to me that they were neighbours-he lived in a ground floor flat in the front while my friend’s family lived at the back. He has been seeing me coming and going from her house and the theatre outing gave him the chance to approach me.

When he stepped out of his flat, my friend withdrew and left two of us together. Then pompously, he told me that I was “rude yesterday. “You are not sociable”, he said.

I looked hard and closely at this man who I wondered what relationship he thought existed between us total strangers and told him as quietly as I could that I did not plan to go to a club, I wanted to add that if I could take such a decision it would not be with him because I did not fancy him. I could say that, so I left thinking that it was the end of the matter.

A few days after, my friend came to my house and informed me that I could go to any shop and buy anything courtesy of that man, I was not interested. The next offer was to go to Balogun Market but I was annoyed at this stage because it has occurred to me that I was in a relationship with this man. I was a green horn in relationship issues, but growing up in Lagos, I understood enough to know that a girl should be careful of whom she takes a gift from. I knew also that this man came into my life and tried to dig in forcefully. I understood that he wanted a form of intimacy and that he plotted with my friend.

I took the invitation to shop casually after all, he had not been the only one to dangle such mouthwatering in my face, without thinking about it, and I paid my friend a visit. He came out as I was leaving and came up to me. His friends have become interested. I faced him because his presents and invitations were turned down out of fairness and respect for all concerned.
IT would be difficult to explain how I got those things at home, for example. I remember a girl, a secondary school girl who hid such gifts in her friend’s and I did not think that the hide and seek was worth the trouble.

But as I looked at this man, I knew it would not good to take his gifts, it would be too risky for one thing. From his ranting, I understood that he considered me too small to him down. Then he went on to mention the names of all the girls he had slept with, big girls amongst whom was the sister of my friend who changed her mind at the last minute. Was he lying? They were girls in high careers and big salaries.