Stereotyped

I once had an affair with a girl. In more descriptive terms, I was in a relationship with a girl. Trust me, that look you're thinking of giving me is the same look I would have given myself. 

I wasn't living in America, a law was passed that would sentence gay couples to jail for 14 years, yet I dated a girl. I never said much about it for obvious reasons, coupled with the fact that I'm also introverted. I avoided the questions my friends asked, I avoided the questions my family asked, the only person I didn't avoid was my sister, because she never asked. 

When my relationship status was questioned, I always just said I had a lover. No one ever took 'a lover' seriously. It was like 'I have a lover', and everyone goes 'oh, okay'.. the end. 

So I stuck to that. ' A lover', a genderless lover. It worked out fine for me, till it ended.  

4 months after our break up, I'm at home with family, talking and laughing and basking in the light of christmas. My cousin's girlfriend has this pretty necklace on, I grazed it slightly with my fingers and sensed her stiffen, then give me a look I couldn't decipher. The moment passed quickly and I carried on with my business. Then it hit me, like a wave raging in on the beach shore... She had stiffened, because someone must have told her I had a relationship with a girl. She had stiffened because she must have freaked out inwardly at the thought of a lesbian touching her. She had stiffened because where we come from, girls don't date other girls and when they do, silently, they become outcasts. 

This is Africa, modernized by the western world, yet still neck deep in ancient moral beliefs.  Girls shop together, not sleep together. Girls eat together, not eat each other out. Girls don't french kiss each other, girls don't kiss each other's necks or fondle each other's breasts. Girls don't make each other dripping wet or slide their fingers inside each other. Girls have no business being intimate with each other. 

So when as a girl, you defy these unspoken rules, you'll be looked at with distant judgemental eyes. You'll be the one everyone is whispering about, you'll be the one everyone keeps taking a step away from. You'll be the one, who long after you think it's over, there'll be a girl getting off the bed just because you got in, so that she doesn't have to deal with the possibility of you imposing the taboo that is your sexuality on her.