"I promise. This is the last time. I promise."
That's what you said the last time you got drunk. You're not a bricklayer, so you manage not to make concrete decisions.
Remember what happened that day? Sorry, stuff like that precipitates with the effect of alcohol on your mind so let me remind you of what happened. You were drunk, the club table suddenly turned around to a stage in your eyes and you began to reenact Michael Jackson's thriller video. Your mind was altered, as if to say auto-correct censored the words struggling to leave your mouth. In your words, the bottle tasted better than the beer itself and you needed the ventilation to be opened for the window to come in. You bragged about things your father had and those you dreamt he owned. In your own hallucination, the leaves in the gutters resembled those on your bed sheet, even more beautiful that every human had to lay on.
All these started when you told all your secrets to a bottle. You could have told your wife, but was she not responsible for your present predicament? It started that day she looked straight into your eyes and told you that the N5,000 you gave her for her weekly upkeep was way too small—as small as your manhood, that was the exact simile she used. You love your wife, don't you? She gave you something you always wanted—a daughter. Why won't you be grateful? You were surprised at her outburst that day but since you loved her, you left home with a resolve to work harder in order to make her happy.
Weeks later, the insolence intensified. She stopped dishing your food. Whenever you asked for it, she hissed and the hiss walked into the kitchen to bring the food. You stopped sleeping on the same bed. Well, she now sleeps in the sitting room. Sometimes, you wonder why she doesn't sit all night since it's a sitting room. All that doesn't matter now. It doesn't. She had already told your neighbours that you're HIV positive.
You're not promiscuous. Like the line in the national pledge, you're faithful, loyal and honest. You remember how buying oranges from an Aboki gave you the virus. Apparently the Aboki was infected and it is unfortunate that he mistakenly cut himself while peeling the orange. A drop of blood fell the moment he sliced your orange into two unequal halves. The rest, they say is history.
After seven tests confirming the same thing, you mustered courage and told your wife. You both went to the hospital with your hearts on a thread. You prayed so hard for her to turn out negative. God answered your prayers. She knows your secret and vowed not to tell anyone. Unfortunately, it was too late before you understood what your mother meant by never trust anyone.
Never trust anyone. You made the mistake once. Now, you're repeating it again—with green beer bottles this time around.
— Abdulhameed Ridwan O
— Shomade Abdulazeez
