I met her in the most unideal place ever, the church.

It was unlike me to be early for service, it was unlike me to go to church at all. Ever since my Aunty – who brought me up – died of breast cancer, my faith in “THE BIG GUY” had started to dwindle. He could not be that cruel to someone so pure and sweet. That day though, thanks to the two weeks of OWU that had infected my pocket and wallet, I decided to renegotiate the terms of my relationship with the BIG MAN.

There I was, trying my best impression of a Brother-of-the-Lord when she walked in. She wore this red dress, which enhanced her features and contours. She was – I believe the politically correct term is – not tall. I liked to believe I was not into such girls, but this girl drew my attention.

The Holier-than-thou part of me had hoped that she went away with her distracting endowments, but it was not as holy as it thought because the part of my brain that hoped otherwise seemed to have had its prayers answered instead.

That was how we met. She introduced herself to me immediately she sat as Rebecca.

Throughout the service, I tried my best not to look at her caramel coloured, smoothly shaved, legs, crossed by my side. It was not as easy as you would think. Things even got worse when a small child by her other side decided she was his girlfriend and tried his best to tempt his father, not me, by raising her dress to reveal more legs than the Christian Women’s association deemed worthy enough for the Lord’s house. What probably caught my – along with the boy’s father – eyes were that she didn’t wear any underwear. That was the cue for I and this man to enter a competition for the first person to get her digits.

‘Blessed to say’ I won, forgetting the shame of where I was doing this while a man, sweating behind a glass stand, screamed that we should stay away from the sin of the flesh. What did he know? He was not God. Only God can judge me.

My relationship with Rebecca was purely platonic for the first week – much to my dissatisfaction. I finally grew into it, because in my mind, though she followed me home that day after service to ‘watch film’ nothing happened. I didn’t even see as much lap as I saw in church. I missed that little boy at that moment.

Rebecca was at the end of her service year. She lived with her friend and their family. She explained to me she was more a house-help than a friend staying over. So, she liked to hide out at mine, lying to her people that she was still at work. I would have allowed her to move in, but why will I want to spoil my luck with other none platonic girls in the amazing city of Calabar? I, of course, did not tell her that, I am not as stupid as some of my friends say I look.

One faithful Thursday night, while trying to balance arguing football with two of my Arsenal fan colleagues and eating Bole and fish at work, I got a BBM notification (I hope you people still recall what BBM is). It was from my voluptuous platonic friend. She asked if it was okay to lie to her people she was traveling home and instead spend the weekend at my place. Excitement stopped me from eating and I agreed for once that Arsenal was better than Chelsea. Just so I could get the only argument I wanted to win. Getting out of that God damn friend zone and into some friendly-fire zone.

Every attempt to weasel my way into a sex chat was shot down with precision, the secret association of Friend-zoning girls would have given her the ‘woman-of-the-year award’. She was adamant that my place was in the zone of friends. Besides, it did not help that I met her in church and she had never seen me there after that fateful meeting. I settled for her ‘Unrivaled’ attention for the weekend, my friend I spoke to told me she might change her mind.

Friday came and with it came the weekend. The things men do for the P is just amazing. That was how I turned Houseboy o. I cooked for this babe, cleaned the house – more than I did when my mother came to visit, I bought air freshener, juice, sausages. I did so much that one of my foolish neighbours began asking me if my maga had paid. Rolling my eyes. I even took the day off work to make sure the place was perfect for her arrival. After all, the thirty-minutes Journey from her house to mine must have been exhausting. This thought reminded me to buy baby oil for massage.

She arrived. It started out alright. She watched movies, ate my food and hailed my cooking as one of the best she had in any guy’s house since she came to Calabar and she even granted me cuddle access for my pain. During which every attempt to mistakenly rest my hand on her parts, which in fairness to my hand, was everywhere, was met with more blocks than whenever Chelsea parked the bus.

That night, she said she wanted a shirt to sleep as she did not bring any nightwear. I gave her a T-shirt I hoped will reveal much. Sadly, her height did not help, any shirt I had covered her well. I was six feet 2 Inches. She as 5ft 4 inches.

Unknown to me, this girl decided to snoop around the laptop I opened for her to watch a movie. I wish she found pictures of a girlfriend. She instead found my porn stash. Shame killed me, but she found it funny. She also found weed which the Uniport girl who came once every month to keep me company left. That was when the night got interesting.

As a light brain, after smoking the weed and drinking one glass of wine, I passed out leaving Rebecca alone with porn, weed and half a bottle of wine. I was deep in sleep, dreaming about being signed as a Chelsea forward. It was my big day and I was meant to take a Champions League winning penalty. When first I had a hard-on, on live TV. Worse, as I rushed to take the shot, muscle pull followed.

My entire dream came crashing into reality. I opened my eyes and what did I see? My platonic friend, naked, riding my knee like it were a racing horse. On a good day I would have thanked my stars and taken advantage, but God punished me. My knee had locked, and I was suffering from a muscle-pull even a footballer would feel sorry for me about.

This girl ignored my plea, all my plea for her to grant me time to stretch my leg, fell on deaf ears. She rode my knee with the object of my conquest so vigorously, my knee got ‘rug burn’ from the growing pubic hair.

I do not know what was in that weed, but this girl did not let me sleep. She kept disturbing me all night for some. Sadly, the pain in my knee was greater than the hardness of my excitement. So, it ended there.

Let’s just say, she never let her guard down after that day and I returned to the church to re-renegotiate my agreement with the BIG GUY. This time, I sat close to the Pastor.

Another winsh sat by my side, but this time, I did not falter in my faith. I was going to reconnect with my FATHER.