Last week, Maya deleted her dating apps after another soul-crushing hookup, but panic made her wonder if she'd just deleted her only shot at love. [Missed part 1? Read it here.]
Two weeks of celibacy felt like two years.
Maya's Instagram feed became torture.
Every post showed couples at rooftop dinners, beach getaways, and birthday surprises.
Her body missed the validation, and her ego missed the attention.
Her Friday nights felt pathetically empty with Netflix and leftover jollof rice while watching other people live the love story she desperately wanted on Instagram.
"Maybe I overreacted," she told Kemi over jollof rice at Buka Hut. "Maybe I should just... lower my standards?"
Kemi's spoon stopped mid-air. "Lower them to what? Underground level?"
But Maya had already convinced herself.
She redownloaded the apps that same afternoon.
Within three hours, she'd matched with Emeka.
He was tall, handsome, and drove a Range Rover.
His opening message to her was: "You're too fine to be single. What's wrong with you?"
Every instinct she had screamed red flag and every part of her brain screamed danger, but Maya typed back: "Nothing's wrong with me, I’m just selective 😊"
Their first date was at Nkoyo in Victoria Island.
Emeka arrived 45 minutes late without an apology.
The dinner was mid because he spent the evening on "urgent" calls from "business partners."
When the bill arrived, he suddenly needed to use the bathroom and disappeared for twenty minutes, so she had no choice but to pay, as she often did on most dates.
But after that moment, Emeka became “intoxicating”.
He knew exactly what to say to make her laugh and exactly how to touch her wrist to make her forget his earlier disrespect.
"Come back to my place," he whispered as they waited for her Uber. "I want to show you something."
Every cell in her body said no, but her mouth said yes.
In his bed afterwards, as Emeka immediately rolled over and started scrolling X, Maya stared at the ceiling and realised the horrifying truth.
She wasn't dating.
She was punishing herself.
The problem wasn't finding better men.
The problem was that she kept choosing the worst ones.
And come tomorrow, she knew that she’d probably do it again.
Because Maya didn't know the difference between her gut saying "run" and her loneliness saying "stay."
I see and hear about this all the time.
Smart women accepting crumbs because they forgot they deserve the whole meal.
If you're tired of your own bad choices, maybe it's time we talked about why you keep making them.
Secure your 20-minute wake-up call session and let's figure out what's really going on.
Sometimes all you need is someone to tell you what you already know, but can't say out loud.
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