‘Twas too good to be true

IF things are so perfect that you have to keep pinching yourself to see if it’s all a dream, either you’ve found a love match — or it’s too good to be true. There’s no situation in life that’s perfect, be it a relationship, experience or job — there’s always a catch. And sometimes that catch slaps you silly before you even get a chance to realise what’s happening. What was your ‘too good to be true’ moment? These three people share.

Tanesha, divorced:

I was wild in my younger days and that resulted in me having two children by two different fathers. The fathers were involved, but I always had a problem getting into a serious relationship after the kids, because what man would want to settle down with a woman who had two kids? I had resigned myself to just staying single and serving the Lord, that was until I met Mark at a convention. He was the perfect gentleman — he loved God, but wasn’t excessive about Christianity like the other men in the church. The only drawback was that he was younger — 12 years younger. We started out as friends, and soon he proposed, and that was shocking to me because of my baggage and because he could basically get any woman he wanted in the church. But he insisted that he wanted me, and wanted to be a family. All was well until after the marriage when the quirks started showing. He loved me to bits — but in a weird way, like what he wanted was motherly comfort, instead of a wife’s. He was great with my kids, but I just couldn’t do it after a while, because he wanted to curl up near my bosom every night, was very, very needy, and called me “mommy” like my kids, and never by my name. It was like after the wedding he became one of my kids. After a year I called his mother and told her to come get her child.

Laura, single:

I was living in this yard with a few other families, and after a while one of the units opened up and these two brothers moved in. One was very introverted — the cuter one — and it must have been the fact that I kept to myself that drew him to me. Anyway, I resisted his advances for as long as I could because with my job I hardly had time for romance, but he was very, very sweet, and was a good self-esteem boost. Because while I can turn heads when my face is beat and I’m dressed up, he was seeing me in the yard without make-up, and in yard clothes most times. Anyway, we began going out and I even started lending him my car sometimes, because he said he had crashed his. Soon after, he asked me to guarantee a loan for him so “we” could buy a taxi to put on the road. But as soon as he got the cheque and got the car he disappeared. He literally disappeared — one night we were talking way into the early morning hours about our plans, and the next day when I returned home from work his apartment was empty. He and his brother had left, with no notice. And just when I was getting over the heartbreak, a month later the loan place called asking for him, and you guessed it, because he disappeared, I’m left to pay back the loan for the car.

Kimoya, dating:

My ex and babyfather is a horrible, horrible man — a gaslighter, emotional abuser, and all the bad stuff you can imagine the worst of the worst man to be. For years he didn’t support our son, and I even took him to court, but you know how they say wicked people prosper? Even when the court made orders, he refused to pay, and never faced the consequences because he could charm anybody with his lyrics. His filing came through when our son was ten, and after he left Jamaica it seemed like he changed, and would call and send funds. So I thought he had found a conscience, and everything was good for a few years. Though still sporadic, at least he was being fatherly. About three years after he migrated he educated me about tax refunds, and told me that if I allowed him to claim our son on his taxes, he would get a large sum in tax returns, and send me half. He told our son that he would send the money so he could go on a summer programme abroad, and of course the boy was excited. Well, I signed the forms, he got his tax refund, and then he went AWOL. We didn’t hear from him until a year later, when he came up with this incredible story that he had to be on the down low because he was in witness protection. That was a new low even for him, as I know he just disappeared because he didn’t want to share the money. And he had the nerve to ask me again to sign as if he thinks I was born in a dunce cap.