Love's Fool - Episode 3

RACHAEL AND I were in love, so in love, with each other. It was pure bliss. I was living on cloud nine, sharing my life and aspirations with the girl of my dreams – or so it seemed.

From the moment we actually became a couple I assumed full responsibility for her. I was brought up with the notion that a real man ought to treat his woman with utmost respect, handle her delicately, and take great care of her – meeting her every need, as humanly possible as he could.

So, with this view in mind, I paid for Rachael’s accommodation because she lived quite a distance from UNILAG. I regularly bought her gift items such as clothes, bags, shoes, jewelleries, and other related stuff. I also saw to her feeding.

Like I stated in the previous chapter I was earning some money as a part time home tutor. Aside from that, I also made money from teaching students (who were offering Quantity Surveying) from other higher institutions such as Yaba College Of Technology, Lagos State Polytechnic, Obafemi Awolowo University and Federal University Of Technology, Akure.

These students, acting on strong recommendations from students in my department, as well as in others, all came to UNILAG for me to lecture them.

In addition to these sources of income my close friends and I ran a kind of Mini Business Centre in our hostel room. We had two desktop computers and a printer; and we received regular patronage from students in various faculties of our school who wanted their documents typed and/or printed out

All episodes of this story can be found here >> https://www.ebonystory.com/story/love-s-fool

. We kicked off the business in our sophomore year.

Furthermore, my pocket money, which wasn’t bad, from my parents, always came in handy, where necessary.

So, taking care of Rachael’s financial needs wasn’t really a problem, as I had cash to burn. I can’t exactly remember ever failing to give her money any time she requested for it.

As far as her academic needs were concerned I was also on point. Naturally, I helped her out with virtually all her assignments. And when it came to the tests and examinations, I usually read her lecture notes and handouts; and then marked out areas where I felt questions were most likely to be set from. I could do this because, to a great extent, I knew the mode of setting questions adopted by each lecturer in my department. I was that good. So Rachael was on a strong second class lower.

When it came to the area of the physical I never pressured her for sex. I was willing to wait, if need be, until we got married.

Now, this doesn’t mean we didn’t relate intimately. We both weren’t logs of wood you know. We normally kissed – sometimes passionately – and cautiously caressed each other.

Read " Black Pages Of The Past " by the same author ( Ikenna Igwe )

. We’d mutually agreed not to take it any further than that.

However, one cool evening, while we were alone in my hostel room, we had both lost control. We were in the process of ripping our clothes apart in readiness for what would, no doubt, have been earthshaking sex when an unexpected knock on the door had reset our sex drives to zero.

We were both annoyed and relieved at the intrusion; annoyed that we’d been obviated from screwing ourselves silly, and relieved that it was perhaps best that we had been interrupted – since we’d agreed to save ourselves for marriage.   

My intense love for Rachael was quite obvious to everyone. Honestly, I became literally obsessed with her. I could do anything for her. At various times my friends, and others who knew me, advised me to take things slow and easy – but I turned a deaf ear. I was already a willing captive in love’s prison.

I have to admit here that one of the reasons I fell hard for Rachael was because she told me she was a virgin. And I believed her. The thing was... I’d always wanted to marry a virgin. I even earnestly prayed for one. So, you can imagine the extent of what I felt for Rachael.

She and I won the Best Couple Award for that year (the second semester of my fourth year in school) during the occasion of our department’s gala/award night.

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Really appreciate your comments.

What will you call this kind of love? Do you think  Fred is still in his right sence