Unit001A:
"You're 25, have a good job and sometimes you're pretty too. Why don't you have a boyfriend like your sister does?" Your mum asks for the millionth time this month.
You shake your head at the 'sometimes you're pretty too' part as that offends you more than the comparison to your sister. It's not your fault Sheila is the more outgoing twin and has many friends. You leave your mum with her troubles in the kitchen and go back to your room, her words eating you up all the way.
Sheila always tells you that you're single because you're introverted. "Do you expect to meet a guy when you're all alone at home?" She teased you last weekend as she was making up and preparing for a hangout with her friends. "Perhaps a handsome stranger will lose his way, knock on the door to ask for directions and fall in love with you as you point him in the right direction."
At this point, that's probably the only way you're going to meet your boyfriend. You turn your mind away from your sorry, single state and begin to scroll through your favourite online shopping mall looking for a new dress. Shopping always makes you and Sheila happy, except she derives her happiness from being in an actual mall, while you're perfectly content with the online branch.
An idea creeps up in your mind as you veer off the mall webpage and settle on Twitter. There is a thread for the fresh princes of Lagos and you dive into the thread to feast your eyes on delicious looking sons of Adam. If you can get dresses online, why can't you get a boyfriend online too? You go through almost a hundred pictures, slightly disappointed none of them look anything like Will Smith, but they would do. Introverted single girls do not have much of a choice.
After narrowing down your options, you settle for 4 of the best looking ones among the pool. You won the prize for best in English Language in SS2 so grammar is not a problem. Carefully constructing a light but flirty opening message, you send each of them a DM. Because they're strangers, they'll never know you copied and pasted the same thing in each of their DMs. Then you sit back and let the god of single ladies fight for you.
Unfortunately, he's asleep because hours after that, there's no reply from any of them. Just as you're about to lose faith, he shows up and three of them reply almost within seconds of each other. You're pained because the finest of the lot isn't among the three. Perhaps he hasn't read your message yet, you try to console yourself, but you see "seen" at the bottom of the message and the truth laughs in your face. You have been ignored.
You have no time to sulk around, you still have three potential boyfriends in your DM. The first guy turns you off with his bad grammar and shorthand. Sheila often calls you a grammarnazi but you can't be bothered to like what you hate. The second guy replies with an emoji and you emoji him back too. The third guy says he has a girlfriend and you hiss. If he has a girlfriend, what is he doing advertising himself on a thread like that? Maybe he checked your profile picture and determined you're not pretty enough to be a side chick. A whole you.
Anyway, you and second guy get comfortable and fall into a texting pattern. He's cute now that you've seen his picture more than once, and he's funny too. You exchange phone numbers by the second week, and you're already spending several minutes on the phone each day. He has a really nice voice, the kind of voice you can listen to reading something as boring as the terms and conditions of a service. You're going to click "I accept" anyway.
The third week, he asks you out on a date and you can't believe it. You don't know who is more excited between you and Sheila as she announces to the whole house that her twin has finally found a boyfriend. You tell her he's not your boyfriend yet, but you're blushing anyway.
He picks you up at your bus stop, and you see he's actually better looking in person, and makes you feel relaxed instantly. Too relaxed. Your body is already loosening up, even the parts that should have stayed shut. It is at this moment you realise eating beans the night before a date is a really bad idea.
He notices you're uncomfortable and asks if you're okay. You clench your teeth and lie you're fine. The god of single ladies hates liars so he whispers to your insides to release a bit of gas. You wind down the glass and hope the moment passes. It does.
But your tummy starts to protest in retaliation. Your village people have settled heavily with your tummy and their plan to disgrace you must work.
You scrunch up your face in pain and try to calm your nerves but no such luck. A gas escapes again, and this time he notices.
"Are you okay?" He asks and you nod painfully.
The god of single ladies is done with your lies and sends an earth shattering gas to escape from you as punishment. If you think that's bad enough, your village people spray the latest version of eau de gutter scent to accompany the gas.
Five minutes later, you're dropped on the side walk and your ex-not-boyfriend-yet zooms off leaving you behind. As you walk home, you can already picture your mother and sister's disappointed looks. You think that's bad enough, but you check twitter and see he has made a thread about the experience describing in detail every bit of it. He doesn't tag you though, thank God for small mercies. Oh, he already blocked you everywhere by the way.
In essence, you realise, the only way for introverted single girls to get a boyfriend is to NOT get a boyfriend.
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