Breakfast and Heartbreak: My Valentine's Day Story

It was February 14, 2025. Unlike my roommates, who were busy preparing for their date night, I lay peacefully on my bed, watching a K-drama series on my laptop. It's not that I wasn't interested in Valentine's Day, but I had given up on relationship matters.

I used to be more invested in relationships than my roommates, or should I say, worse. However, the kind of heartbreak I've experienced over the past few years has left me unable to imagine being in a romantic relationship with anyone. My last heartbreak occurred on Valentine's Day the previous year. Mike and I had been dating for a year, and he was the longest-lasting of all my previous boyfriends.

Mike was the definition of the perfect lover: loving, sweet, and attentive to a woman's needs. He was also great in bed. He frequently bought me gifts and surprised me with beautiful gestures. He was supportive, and I couldn't help but want to spend my life with him.

However, Mike was secretive about his past. He claimed to be an orphan with no close relatives and worked in an oil and gas company in Abuja. I often stayed at his place, but there were no family pictures or mementos. There was no indication that he was hiding anything.

The biggest surprise I got from Mike was on Valentine's Day. I had spent the previous night at his place, and we had deep conversations, laughed, and had a romantic evening. The next morning, Mike's doorbell rang. He was asleep, so I quietly got up to answer the door. To my surprise, a woman stood outside with two kids. I assumed she was Mike's cousin, as he had mentioned her before. However, he had never mentioned that she was married or had children.

"Good morning, ma. Mike is asleep... please come in," I said politely, thinking she would be my future sister-in-law. However, she gave me a condescending look that made my heart skip a beat.

"So, you're the whore who's been frolicking with my husband," she accused. I was shocked, not by her outrage, but by the statement itself.

"Excuse me? Who are you, and what are you talking about?" I managed to say, but she responded by slapping me. Before I could react, she beat me mercilessly, leaving me on the floor.

I woke up the next day in a medical ward, having fainted during the attack. After my discharge, I discovered that the woman was Mike's wife, a lecturer who had been abroad on study leave. The kids had been with their grandparents during that period, as Mike had claimed he couldn't take care of them.

I was heartbroken and unsure if I could ever recover from the trauma. Ironically, Mike never contacted me again, not even to apologize.

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SEX Not LOVE

He kissed me softly, his fingers fumbling with the button of my shirt. Every instinct in me screamed that this was a bad idea, but the warmth of his lips clouded my judgment. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him to stop. Instead, I leaned in for more.

When he finally succeeded in unbuttoning my shirt, his hand found my breast, squeezing gently. A soft moan escaped my lips. His every touch ignited a hunger deep within me. He trailed kisses down my neck, his lips warm against my skin, before moving lower, placing a featherlight kiss on my nipple. A shiver ran through my body.

I could feel him harden against me. He cupped my breasts, sucking delicately, his touch careful—almost reverent. One hand cradled them as though he were holding something fragile, while the other ventured beneath my skirt. A knowing smirk played on his lips when he felt how wet I was. His movements were confident, practiced, yet he had told me he had never done this before.

I was new to this too. Still untouched. Still innocent.

Maybe that’s why I believed him when he said he was a virgin. He was a church boy, after all—always preaching, always inviting me to service. It surprised me at first; he was too handsome to be so devoted. But we became friends. After every service, he’d walk me home, our conversations filled with nothing but school, God, and scripture. He never gave any hint that he was interested in anything more.

That’s why I was shocked when, two weeks ago, he came to my house and confessed his feelings. I was speechless, but excited. Why wouldn’t I be? He was smart, good-looking, and God-fearing—the kind of man any girl would want. So, without hesitation, I said yes.

Today, when he invited me over, I thought nothing of it. It wasn’t my first time at his place. But something felt different.

Slowly, he pulled down my pants and slipped a finger inside me. At first, it hurt. But he was gentle, patient, and soon the pain melted into something else—something overwhelming. Before I knew it, we were both naked. He went down on me, his tongue teasing my clit while his fingers moved inside me. My legs trembled. My moans filled the room. I didn’t care who heard me.

Then he stopped.

Crawling back up, he cupped my face in his hands, his eyes locking onto mine.

“I love you, Riri,” he whispered.

He pressed a soft kiss to my forehead before pushing himself inside me.

And just like that, I lost my virginity. To a bastard.

Because, as it turned out, love had nothing to do with it.

Three days later, he was gone. No calls. No texts. Just silence. He blocked my number. Ignored me. Vanished.

I went to his house. He wasn’t there.

I saw him at church and finally, relief washed over me—not because I missed him, but because I was ready to confront him.

But then he looked at me.

Or rather, he didn’t.

His eyes skimmed past me as if I were a stranger. Like I had never existed.

My heart shattered.

I couldn’t even find the strength to say anything.

It wasn’t until my final year of university that I learned the truth.

It had all been a bet.

His friends wagered a hundred thousand naira that he couldn’t get me into bed.

A whole me. A person. A soul. Reduced to a game for a mere hundred thousand naira.

Omor, it will never be well with him.

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UNREQUITED LOVE

This thing called unrequited love is such a cruel experience. It can be more hurtful than rejection itself. My one-sided love occurred during my Senior Secondary School Three (SSS 3). It was an attraction I never imagined possible.

My Mathematics teacher was employed to teach us during my SSS 2 third term. At first, I didn’t find anything attractive about him. I disliked his classes because they were always boring. I would cause trouble in his class, knowing it pissed him off. When I got my report card for that term, I was furious—he had given me an F in Mathematics. You know how teenagers can be—I cursed the hell out of him in my mind.

When school resumed for a new term, I went on the first day because I was bored at home and eager for school to start. My school always held a prayer session on the first day of resumption. After it ended, we all dispersed to our respective classes. I was busy reuniting with my classmates and talking about our holidays. My clique of friends didn’t show up that day, so I was quite bored. I stepped out of my class to take a look around the school before closing time.

I passed by the Physics lab, where my Mathematics teacher stayed since there was no room for him in the staff room. He was inside, looking through some materials on his desk. I opened the door and asked if I could come in, and he said I could. My mission was to disturb him and leave. I went in, greeted him, and wished him a happy new year since it was the beginning of a new year. We had a really nice conversation, and I genuinely enjoyed it.

When the closing bell rang, I told him I was leaving, and he thanked me for coming to see him. I can never forget the smile on his face when he said it. I just smiled and left. When I got home that day, I couldn’t stop thinking about the way he smiled at me, the few compliments he threw at me, and the way he thanked me for stopping by. They were little things I wouldn’t normally think twice about, but for some reason, they lingered in my mind. I was so eager to get to school the next day.

That’s how my unrequited love for my teacher began. I spent more time in the Physics lab with him, either having a good conversation or simply disturbing him. I found it fun. During that period, school wasn’t boring for me. In class, I paid attention to every little detail about him—his light skin, his long slender fingers (which I admired a lot), his height, and the way he spoke. But despite all that, I still found his class boring.

We began chatting on Facebook, though it was mostly academic, but I didn’t mind. He even gave me a nickname—Pretty Girl. I still blush at the name whenever I recall it.

Just as quickly as we started talking, we stopped. I didn’t know why. I tried to find out what the problem was, but I couldn’t. He didn’t even give me a chance to talk to him or come close to him like before. He acted like I was a stranger. I panicked, wondering if my feelings had been too obvious, even though I had tried hard to mask them. This happened during my SSS 3 third term. I was upset. I went to our Facebook chat and deleted all our messages. I decided to ignore his existence, just as he had ignored mine. But it hurt even more. I tried getting him out of my head, but sometimes my mind would wander off to the times we spent together.

One day in class, while making an announcement, he referred to me as That Girl. It was strange—he usually called me by my first name or by my full name. I texted him to complain about how much I disliked the way he referred to me in class.

Surprisingly, he responded and apologized. That conversation led to another, and he finally told me why he had been acting that way toward me. He apologized, and we reconciled.

But it didn’t last long. A month before my external exams, he informed my classmates and me that he was leaving. He advised us to study and prepare well for our exams. I had never felt so heartbroken. At that moment, I wished he had continued ignoring me—it would have hurt less. It felt like a part of me was leaving. I cried my eyes out later that day when I got home.

When he left, I felt a deep emptiness. Going to school no longer excited me the way it used to.Well, that was how my unrequited love for my Maths teacher ended.

#februarycontest2025

#loveconfessions