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“How is your sex life like?” My therapist asks me.

“He hates me.” I say into the phone.

“He eats you? Well, that’s good. Who is he?” She asks in a rush and I hear her scribbling down.

“No, he HATES me. It’s like I cause him pain. He looks at me like I cause him pain.” I say and speak of the devil… He is walking down the corridor with his broad shoulders and easy gait and I can’t help but sigh. 

“You don’t have to sigh so loudly.” She says and I imagine her rolling her eyes. “I asked about your sex life and you were going ‘He- something that rhymes with eats- you. What was I supposed to think? I think we should even examine the fact that he comes to your mind first for sex.”

My heart stops.

“Rosemary?”

I don’t want to examine anything with her. I always imagine her brain is one giant microscope, a search tool that preys on other people’s brain. I don’t know why I still pay her to pick mine apart though. “I think I’ve offended him unknowingly.”

She sighs, exaggeratedly.

“Rasheeda says they went to school together and he was a typical nerd. Apart from the position he is holding in this company at such a young age, I can’t correlate him with what I envision when I hear ‘nerd.'”

“But well correlated with Sex.” She says, snidely. “Does his name rhyme with sex?” She ventures.

I ignore her and keep musing to myself. Or to her. Or to both of us.

“She said he worked on the project Defence for over eight ladies in their final year along with his and even wrote a summary for them to cram for the Defence. At least, we’ve established he is a ladies’ man.”

He is going back to his office and when he passes mine to get to the elevator, our eyes meet briefly before I take mine away. Not before I glimpse that look again though. I swivel my chair such that I’m backing his path to avoid accidentally seeing him again.

“His name doesn’t rhyme with sex. His name is actually Tunbosun Yakub.” I say and someone clears their throat behind me.

I drop my new Samsung S8 out of fright. “Jesus.” I say, clutching my chest.

“I wanted to wait for you to finish your call…” He explains. “…but then I imagined it was getting sensitive. My bad.” 

I don’t say a word in reply. I just stare stupidly.

“There is a meeting for 2pm.” He says in a clipped tone and walks away.

I just stare stupidly.

When did he…. How did he…

 I just hope he didn’t hear that sentence. The one that came before ‘Jesus’.

Awkward.