When you are in love with someone, you would always want the best for them. You would also want to spend more time together and when they ask for a break from the relationship, it may be very hard from your side to give that break easily because it will mean more time apart. But because of love, and the promise that the break would strengthen their relationship Yvette yielded to the request for a break from Steve.
Something to note is that this was not the first time Steve came up with this request. It was the second time and Yvette was very hesitant because the reason for the break wasn’t as concrete.
“I want to think more about where this relationship is going.” Steve had told Yvette.
“A second time, Steve! A second time you are asking for a break.” Yvette wasn’t okay with that idea.
Wasn’t it their collective responsibility as a couple to think things through and determine where everything was headed? She found it very suspicious that her boyfriend would just one day decide it was time to take a break from their love, and he’d have his way.
From how the conversation had gone, Yvette felt so weird about the whole idea. She also felt unheard and that her opinion on how things should be done was not important.
“It would have felt better if you would have at least given me heads up. I mean, you just said it abruptly and it’s like you have no second thoughts about it.” Naively, Yvette tried to reason with Steve.
“But you know how life can be babe, these things do not have a formula or warning.”
The first time Steve asked for a break, the two had fought. They had fought because a certain ex had been making advances on Yvette. Yvette had not responded with the same energy, she kept her boundaries and had been open about the whole thing with Steve.
A week after, Steve asked for a break to think things through, mentioning how that break had everything to do with the Ex’s ordeal. Yvette did not protest or do anything. She said okay, giving the whole request the benefit of the doubt.
“That wasn’t a wise thing to do.” Her friend Sharon had said.
“Did I have an option?” Yvette wondered what other option she had. After all, Steve was a grown-up man, and whatever he wanted, was actually what he wanted.
“What happened to sitting down and having a mature conversation? Meaning any other time an ex or a guy hits on you, Steve will ask for a break. How many breaks in a year will you grant him?” Sharon had tried to reason with Yvette, she did not see any sense in what was going on and as her friend, she thought giving Yvette a piece of her mind was a good thing.
“Tell me shazzy, what good is there in keeping someone who does not want to stay? That I can’t do. As long as I stayed faithful throughout, I don’t need to do more heavy lifting.” Yvette’s said with conviction.
With that, the first break lasted for two months. Yvette stayed faithful in waiting for her man to come out of a break that she did not know the details about.
Steve was nowhere to be seen. Though they lived in one town she hardly saw him. They only communicated through calls and WhatsApp, which was even rare. Some days went before they conversed and Steve would say, that’s how breaks work.
After two months, Steve showed up with an unusual enthusiasm about what the break had done to him in their relationship.
“I would want us to take things to the next level.” With this heavy statement, Steve started his long prose.
He spoke of how Yvette had been the best thing that happened to him. He even mentioned how she was his source of inspiration and motivation. Steve cited how he was more confident of her faithfulness after the ordeal with the Ex.
These were all the things that any woman would want to hear from her man, but unfortunately, these words were not as convincing to Yvette as they could have been under normal circumstances. Yvette found it weird and strange that after two months of being missing in action, he reappeared with the long paragraphs. Sharon, her friend also had the same thought.
“A break didn’t have to make him disappear that way. Unless there was something you did not catch wind of.”
Yvette had so much doubt about Steve’s disappearance in the name of a break and the sudden love bombing. But because she loved him so much, she stuck with their earlier plan of taking a break and coming back to each other. They got back.
This time around, Yvette was not as loving and vulnerable as she used to be. She had changed. Perhaps the break that Steve took made her see love differently and therefore the changes. She wasn’t as enthusiastic as she was, and the spark seemed to have dimmed a little bit.
Within her was doubt. There was a way that Steve seemed after the two months that did not sit well with her. Though she could not put a finger around what this specific thing was, she was sure that her instincts were not faulty. With this feeling, and with this renewed relationship, they went on with their love.
However, six months were hardly over and Steve was here with yet another request for a break. Yvette wondered what reason he would give her this time round and as she was still thinking, Steve mentioned how he wanted to think about where their relationship was going.
She wanted to protest and say no, but she wondered what good it would do. Already, the spark in her was fading and by the day, they were growing distant. She fought back with the faint energy of a dying zeal.
Just like the first time, Steve got his way, and a week into the said break, Steve was nowhere to be seen. He was missing in action only once in a while would he get into communication with her. This time around, the communication was less. Perhaps their love was fading and who knew the details of the prose Steve would come back with after the break of which no one knew in the time frame?
Though Yvette had doubts and did not want to give herself worries about what Steve could be doing, Sharon thought it was a good idea to know what was going on on the other side of the break that made Steve disappear.
“I think you are getting played, girl,” Sharon said as they were having drinks.
“You think?”
“Why else would Steve do what he’s doing? Two breaks in a year. Perhaps he’s seen how understanding you are as his woman,”. The sarcasm in Sharon’s statement was very loud.
“I have had doubts before, btw,” Yvette confirmed Sharon’s thoughts.
“Do you even know where he is right now?”
“At work? I guess.”
“I mean where he stays.” Sharon made her inquiry clearer.
“Yes, he stays in his place.”
“When was the last time you were there?” Sharon pressed more.
“You know the drill. Breaks involve people staying away from each other as much as possible until the time they feel they can come back together.”
“Girl, think.” Sharon had said and left Yvette to decide whether to investigate Steve for herself or leave him to do whatever he felt was right. She realized she had to find out whatever was going on.
The next day, she went to his place, only to be met with a padlock and a dusty verandah, an indication of a long absence from the house. On calling him, he said he was in the house.
“Which house Steve? I am at your place and there’s no one.”
There was a dead silence on Steve’s end, and after a few seconds, he responded.
“Can I call you back in a few?”
“No Steve, do not. There’s no need,” Yvette said angrily as she hung up on him.
What followed was back-to-back calls from Steve, and messages asking Yvette to just pick the talk. Yvette wondered what was there to talk about. The guy was not honest and even the breaks he took from their relationship could have involved doing something unimaginable.
That night, Steve came to Yvette’s house. He apologized for lying about where he had been when Yvette stopped over. Yvette was not hearing any of that. Considering the already faded spark within her toward their relationship, she told Steve that they’d break up, after all, they were just doing fine without each other these days.
“As you continue with the break, you’ll have to extend it because we are breaking up.”
“No Yvette.” As he was about to continue pleading with her, his phone rang. He picked up and asked to call a minute or two later.
“I think we can work things out, babe. It’s barely three weeks into this break and I am willing to cut it off because I can’t lose you, Yvette.”
His phone cut him off as it rang. He picked it up yet again and asked for a few more minutes. As he hung up, it rang yet again. He hung it and kept ringing and ringing.
Yvette could see how agitated he was. It’s like he was in dilemma on whether to keep speaking to her or whether she should pick up the phone that could not stop ringing. He wanted to do both and at that time, it was impossible, because whatever was going on between him and Yvette was steamy and needed his attention. The phone kept on ringing, and Yvette felt something was fishy.
“Who’s that?” She asked.
“It’s nothing. Can we talk please?”
The phone rang yet again.
“Pick it and put it on loudspeaker, if it is nothing, “Yvette had said, sternly.
“I can’t do that,” Steve said.
“Then get out.”
“We haven’t finished talking.”
“We have, and I have told you there’s no more us.”
“Please, Yvette.”
“Then pick it up and put it on speaker.”
“Promise that we will talk no matter what happens.” Yvette looked him in the eye and agreed. Steve picked up the phone and the lady’s soft voice answered.
“Hey, babe what’s up? I have been calling and you are not picking up. Are you okay?”
“Yes, I am okay. Give me a few minutes I will call you. I am at home and in the middle of a conversation with Mum. I will call.”
The lady on the other end agreed and hung up. Steve remained still on his chair as he could not lift his face to look at Yvette who was of course staring at him. Yvette started laughing sarcastically.
“So you’ve been taking breaks to date other women?” Yvette asked angrily.
“It’s not what you think, babe.”
“How did I fail to see this?” Yvette was now having a monologue.
“Can we talk Yvette, this is not what you think,” Steve said, pleadingly.
“I can’t believe this, Steve you take me for a fool ama. Get out now.”
Steve got out and Yvette banged the door behind him and sat on the couch where she cried for hours. She was not crying because her relationship had ended, but she was crying because of her naivety and wondering whether she was a person who deserve such treatment. Perhaps she had been gullible.
Here are other short stories you may want to check out
She Asked Him For An Open Relationship But She Didn’t Expect The Turn Of Events
He Convinced Her To Jointly Save Money For Their Wedding But She Did Not The Betrayal Coming
One Night Changed Their Relationship
A Public Proposal Exposed The Cracks In Their Relationship
