PAUL, I AM PREGNANT!

Good morning lovelies, (if its still morning to you). Reading through the stats, I am really glad with the patronage I am receiving round the world. I do wish this can even be translated to many other languages asides English, to promote the patronage. I do appreciate each and everyone of you that visit, you motivate me daily to continue on this journey.

Karen is my friend, my very lovely friend I had met in my mandatory year of national service to my country known as NYSC. I can be a really vivacious person when I do want to be, and Karen just ticks all my boxes. We had met on a Whatsapp group chat for corps members headed to Ondo state, after interactions on the group, our chit chat came to our private inbox and it still went on well.

It was like I had met her all the times of my life. When we finally met, I was a bit scared that she might not actually have the same vibe that she had online, on here physically. But it was not to be, she was a live wire, on and offline. At times, I even felt she was too much for me. Like most people in the emotion filled three weeks orientation camp, I also had a girlfriend. No – It was not Karen, but Karen was still my live wire. At any time, you met her she was happy. “Vivacious” was just the description of her!

After the coronavirus enforced end to our three week orientation course, I and Karen became friends though in different cities of the country. While I was in the Southern city of Port Harcourt, she was in the nation’s capital city Abuja. I liked her, she was smart, more so when she told me she had a saving of over NGN 700,000 (USD 1,818.47) in savings. It endeared me to her, how she could be so frugal and economical in such recessive times. With all these, I was glad I had made quite a friend in the national service scheme, But…..

My friend came to me seeking my counsel on a ‘situationship’ that she had found herself entangled in. Contrary from what you may think, my beautiful Karen was the one being ‘entangled’. She has been having sex with this dude for a while, and it turned out that she had fallen in love with this dude, but the dude who is still broken from the heartbreak he suffered from a seven year relationship with his high school sweetheart, was not in any shape to love. She met me on things to do to make her love him. I had to assure her that she is so loveable and adorable the way she is, but if she is having one-sided feelings for a guy then the need to quit the sex has come.

But she was in love, I told her that she needed to demand clarity or leave. On the D-date where she was to be ‘clarified’, he stood her up! She was mad. My Karen was really mad. My counsel to her? “We all see the red flags but we chose to be ignorant when blinded by love”. At that point, I left things the way they were, only for her to hit me up yesterday that

“She is pregnant!”

“How can you be pregnant? have you told him? how old is the pregnancy?”

She told him, but dude was not ready to have the conversation, and my dearest Karen asked me, “What do I do, Paul?” It was a really rare time, when I had no answer to reply but felt I had to. I was a bit happy and a tad sad when she said, “Paul, I can’t do an abortion, I will keep the baby”.

I was lost for words!

P.S.: The names used on the article were changed from the real names, and I do plead if this bear semblance, but this is a real life story, and your counsel would be appreciated as she would also be in the wings, reading the comments.

Paul Chikaike Kalu alias Paul Kay is a prolific writer of prose, poetry, and articles; a content creator, a guest columnist on magazines and blogs, a copywriter with huge experience in ghost writing. A member of Association of Nigerian Authors. Author of THE VISIT, (his first published work on paperback) now on Amazon and on Okadabooks. You can reach out to him on paulkalubeam@yahoo.com