Yes I'm Stella, the silly lover girl
Yea I dated before meeting Ebuka in fact I met him after my big breakup with Nate
But when I met him it felt like I had found him
The one I pictured walking down the isle with
All the thought jump off from my head immediately I felt the hot slap that landed on my face
'Ah Ebuka what! Why?'
''Who is this person asking you to come and see him'
"Come and see him?" Stella laughed once, sharp and tired.
"Ebuka, that's my cousin."
The room went silent like a radio unplugged mid-song.
He blinked. "Your what?"
"My cousin, Daniel. The one in Ghana. The one whose mom was sick last month?"
She held up her phone with trembling fingers. "Read the chats before you turn me into a villain."
Ebuka snatched the phone, anger still boiling in his chest like water with nowhere to escape.
His eyes scanned the messages.
"Tell Stella to call me when she's awake."
"Grandma keeps asking about her."
"I miss my little cousin."
Nothing romantic.
Nothing secret.
Just family wrapped in ordinary words.
His heartbeat stumbled.
Stella rubbed the side of her face where his hand had landed.
"You didn't even ask me first."
The guilt hit him harder than jealousy ever did.
"I…"
His voice cracked like dry wood.
"I thought I was losing you."
"You almost did," she whispered.
The silence between them grew teeth.
Ebuka sat down slowly, staring at his own hands as if they belonged to a stranger.
"I saw Nate commenting on your pictures again. Then I saw this message and my head just…"
He exhaled hard. "I let my fear drive."
Stella's eyes watered, but not softly. These were angry tears.
"You don't punish people because you're scared."
Every word landed with the weight of iron.
"I know."
"No, you don't."
She grabbed her bag from the couch.
"Love is supposed to feel safe. Not like walking through a minefield barefoot."
"Stella please…"
"I chose you after my heartbreak because you felt different."
She looked at him for a long moment.
"But tonight you sounded exactly like the pain I escaped from."
The door opened.
Ebuka stood quickly. "So that's it?"
She paused at the entrance.
"I never cheated on you."
Her voice softened, but only slightly.
"But trust?"
She shook her head.
"That's the thing bleeding on the floor tonight."
Then she walked out, leaving the apartment echoing with the kind of silence that keeps people awake till morning.
Rain tapped softly against the apartment windows.
Not dramatic rain.
The tired kind. The kind that sounded like fingers drumming on a coffin lid.
Ebuka sat on the edge of his bed staring at Stella's contact.
Last seen: 2 days ago.
He typed.
I'm sorry.
Deleted.
Please let me explain.
Deleted.
I hate myself for what I did.
Deleted again.
The blinking cursor mocked him like a heartbeat.
Across the room, the television played unnoticed. A football commentator screamed about a missed penalty while Ebuka sat in silence wearing the same hoodie from three nights ago.
His phone buzzed.
Nate calling.
Ebuka almost ignored it.
"Guy, you alive?" Nate asked.
"Yeah."
"You sound buried."
Ebuka laughed once without humor. "Maybe I should be."
Nate sighed. "She still not answering?"
"No."
"Bro, women get emotional. Give her time."
Ebuka's jaw tightened.
No.
That wasn't it.
Not emotional.
Hurt.
There was a difference, and for the first time in his life, he could actually see it.
"She looked scared of me," Ebuka said quietly.
The sentence changed the temperature of the room.
Nate fell silent.
Ebuka swallowed hard. "I keep replaying her face."
His eyes drifted to his hand resting on his knee.
The same hand.
Suddenly it felt heavy.
Like it belonged to another man.
"You didn't mean to do it," Nate muttered carefully.
"But I did."
The words came out sharp.
"I still did it."
Silence again.
Nate tried to rescue him from guilt. "At least you know you messed up."
But guilt was no longer enough.
Guilt was cheap. Easy. Quick.
Understanding was the punishment.
Ebuka ended the call shortly after and walked to the kitchen. The apartment felt strange now. Stella's influence was everywhere.
The plant she watered by the window.
The oversized mug she claimed as hers.
The vanilla cinnamon scent still clinging faintly to the curtains like a memory refusing eviction.
He opened the fridge.
Saw the jollof rice she made two nights before the fight.
Couldn't eat.
Closed it again.
His chest tightened suddenly.
Breathing became difficult.
Too fast.
Too shallow.
He gripped the counter.
Images crashed through his mind:
Stella flinching.
Her voice shaking.
"You don't punish people because you're scared."
Ebuka slid slowly to the floor.
For years he had called jealousy love.
Possession love.
Control love.
Fear love.
But now, sitting on cold kitchen tiles while rain whispered outside, he began seeing it clearly:
Love was never supposed to leave bruises.
His phone lit up again.
A message.
Not from Stella.
From his mother.
Your father came by today.
Ebuka stared at the screen.
Then another message appeared.
You're starting to sound like him lately. I hope you know that.
The air left his lungs.
His father.
A man who shouted first and listened later.
A man who treated suspicion like evidence.
A man whose apologies arrived only after destruction.
Ebuka remembered being ten years old, watching his mother wipe tears quietly before guests arrived.
Remembered promising himself:
I will never become that man.
Yet somehow, anger had traveled through bloodlines like inherited fire.
Ebuka looked at his trembling hands again.
Then finally whispered the truth aloud for the first time:
"I hurt someone I loved."
And the apartment, empty except for rain and regret, offered no defense for him.