2: It's not as good

"Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and the withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed and rare."

¶

I open the house hoping that there would be no one in the house today and that they won't be until I'm out. Ade doesn't work and hasn't bothered looking for one since he lost his last job, but he gambles a lot and any money he makes from gambling, he keeps it so he can gamble away the next day.

Today is Tuesday and hopefully, he is at the betting bar, probably drunk already.

Why the hell am I wasting my time thinking about him?

I enter into the kitchen and pick the things that belong to me there— which is everything. I bring the moving bag out of the kitchen to the living room and I pick the things that are mine. We no longer have television because just like most of the important things that used to be mine in this room, I sold them and saved the money.

If I could move this apartment, I would because I paid a few months' rent on it already and I know broke Ade is never going to give me back that money.

I move back into the bedroom where I carefully scan to see everything in the room making sure that I didn't leave anything behind and then I spot a glass framed picture of me and Ade on the nightstand.

I walk over to the stand and I pick it up to properly look at my younger self as well as Ade, with our goofy smile and innocent face. This picture dates back to almost nine years ago. Before we began dating, we were friend, childhood friends and you could say we both grew up together, but that is a sad soppy story I'd rather not touch.

In this picture I have so much innocence in my eyes, Ade looked as entitled as ever in it though and it makes my blood boils that he now has my best friend trapped in his web of lies and fake promises.

I might hate her now, but Ade is the last man I would pick to be with her. But saying that to her would put me out as the jealous one who can't stand her ex-best friend's happiness.

I smash the picture to the floor and it breaks into pieces and I pick the paper photo up before tearing it into two before tossing the one Ade happens to be on back on the counter.

My eyes catch a few bills under the bed and I bend down and pick up the fifty dollar notes. I reach under the bed to see if there is any left there and to my sadness, there is nothing there, except a wooden box. I can tell that it wasn't there last week when I cleaned the room and my curiosity gets the better of me and I pull the box out.

I am beyond shocked when I see more than two dozen of fifty dollar bill scattered in the box. I close my eyes and open them, but it isn't a dream or imagination, this is real I am staring at real currency, I neatly arrange the bills and I see lottery numbers in the box.

I stare at the numbers 41, 6 and 11 and the total money the son of a bitch called Ade won according to this card is a hundred grand, on the 17th of last month and he never told me about it.

I don't really care for the money he makes because I work and I feed myself just fine, but this last month he sat and did nothing while I struggled to feed us and pay the rent and he acted like he had nothing to offer all the while keeping a hundred grand locked up and spending it on his whore Sharon.

Screw both of them! They probably met up behind my back and laughed at how naïve and stupid I was. I wish I can find them both and give them a piece of my mind.

Screw it! I hate Sharon and I don't care what Ade does to her at this point because she deserves that and even more!

I worked my ass off at the bar to feed both of us and when he finally got his big break, he didn't pay back or even take responsibility for things happening in this apartment.

I pick up every single banknote in the box and I count it and the money in total is thirty-five thousand.

Just when I thought he couldn't afford three-months' rent, he has. I return the money-empty box under the bed where I took it from and put the money into my purse. With this money and my bank saving, I will not only be able to start over, but I will also finally be able to move to a completely different state.

I move the bag back into the living room and in that very moment, the devil walks in.

Oh, I'm sorry, devil, comparing this excuse of a man to you is an insult.

He is messy and sloppy and I can tell you that that is not how the devil operates.

He's in a red shirt and a black beanie over his dreadlocks and a black jean. He seems to be raring a beard now and that's something I didn't notice yesterdays but in my defence when one catches her boyfriend in bed with another woman the last thing you will do is try to take note of what's different about him facially.

His sees me and he jerks back a little and I don't know if it's because of fear, guilt, surprise or all of them at once, but I would rather he had a heart attack and died this minute.

"Quynn, what are you doing here?" the bastard dares to take my name.

I smile mischievously, "I live here Ade, I should be asking you that question as amongst the both of us, one person hasn't paid rent for over a year." I pointed out the obvious and I notice the uneasiness within him, "but don't worry. I didn't come to chase you out, I'm the one who's leaving and as for what I'm doing here, I came to take the rest of the thing that belongs to me and I am done doing that now." I walk over to him and opening his hand, I drop my key into it. "You can give it to Sharon, tell her it's my way of supporting whatever it is she thinks she has with you."

He sharply inhales, "You know it didn't happen the way you're making it out to be in your head."

Oh, my head? Someone didn't only win the lottery, he now reads minds too, what else am I going to find out about Ade today?

"How else did it happen? Did you slip and find yourself in her vagina?"

He sighs exasperatedly, "We stopped having sex more than two years ago, what did you expect me to do? I am human you know."

And I'm a stick! Awesome!

"Not stick your dick inside my best friend's vagina is one of the things I expected you to do, but we can't always get what we want now can we?"

His face loosens and there is a satisfaction that settles there in the next second, "You're not mad that I cheated, you're mad that it was with Sharon."

I grit my teeth and my hand balls into a hard fist, I so want to beat his face in with a bat because that exactly what he deserved. "You could have gone for another, but you did it to get to me"

He knew what he was doing when he went after Sharon and Sharon probably thought it was because he truly liked her.

Men like Ade don't love anyone, at least not more than they love themselves, just look at how he has treated me so far and we practically grew up together.

"Yes, I did when I first started flirting with her, it was to make you jealous, to try to get to you, but then I realized that she was way better than you, she didn't nag me all the time to get a job, she supported me and she was there when I needed someone the most and I fell in love with her."

Well, she was there supporting you through your shit while I worked myself out at the bar so both of us didn't end up on the street, but I guess we won't see it that way.

The moron completes his boring speech by saying, "And I plan on giving her everything."

Not with your last thirty-five thousand dollars in my purse, you aren't.

"Well good luck to the both of you."

Hearing him profess his undying love for Sharon didn't even spark any anger or jealousy in me because he had said those same words on me before.

Only time will tell.

In the meantime, I need to get myself out of this place before he goes in and realize that his thirty-five thousand dollars is missing.

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