How I wish this was fiction. Oh God!

Am soo dead!

I've been unable to control the thoughts racing through my mind. 'End it all', 'don't share your nightmares with anyone', 'nobody would believe you,' 'there's no place on this earth for you'. Hmmmm!

I wish it had played out differently. It surely was a wrong turn.

The kiss. I believed this guy. Yes, I did. He'd what I needed in my right kind of man but it turned out he had more than I'd needed. He had the disease. He'd HIV-AIDS.

I met him at the Robert International Airport in Liberia. We'd both disembarked a KLM flight from the United States. As though by fate we were later to realise we'd been invited by the same international organisation - Institute of Human Rights Studies (IHRS) for a human right campaign against the abuse of women in Liberia.

Passion for the defence of human rights in the small West African country connected us in a kind of tapestry. He introduced himself first. He threw a smile in my direction. It wasn't meant for me since we've never met. He pierced his right hand through the air to notify me that he was referring to me.

'Me?' I asked, and turned back thinking there was someone, in particular, he was pointing out.

I stood there and looked at him while he made way to my direction. He stopped in front of me. 'I am Kwabena,' he said, frozen with a smile. 'Hi I'm Linda Robertson,' I said. The conversation went on.

We talked about everything but personal stuff. We both shared our dreams, places we've visited across the globe among others.

He's a Ghanaian but does not even know the location of his native country. I'm an African American. I'm yet to decide which of the African countries I'll adopt as my second country. We were both exhausted I realised. I didn't have a Liberian phone number yet so I gave him my hotel address.

'Royal Grand Hotel between the 9th and 10th street,' I said. He said he was going to put up with a friend at Tubman Boulevard. Both places are located in the Montserrado County's capital of Monrovia.

I took a taxi and left. I reckoned he did same. We did not see each other for the next two days. I was enjoying Monrovia, the people, the food and the drinks. And yes the ever popular Saw Beach. This is not your kind of beach. It's a prison for the bad guys in the Liberian society. It's the prison facility in the country.

I later realised that in Liberia every lady is addressed as 'Fine girl' no matter her beauty. I'm not sure one's beauty matters to them. I bagged in several 'Fine girl' calls at every turn I took in the beautiful Monrovia city. It reminded me of Washington, DC back home.

I had a Congolese friend visiting. Loiyan Lusala. She was tall and a definition of black beauty, slim - an appearance that one can mistake for an AIDS patient. She was overwhelmed by advances from some of my white male friends.

I encouraged her to settle on one of them if she was interested.
'They are all welcoming,' she said. 'It will be really difficult to settle on one.'
'You mean difficult?' I asked with the same concern a doctor has for his dying patient.

Even if you are duped by a Liberian trust me it will be difficult to generalise the character of the people due to the generosity of some of them. I enjoyed rice with potato green - a soup I still do for myself anytime I feel for it. Rice with cassava leaf wasn't bad at all.

That was the food I was served the first time I attended the first of three brainstorming sessions ahead of the programme. I kept asking the waiter who served me the meal at the Ambassador hotel near the US Embassy how they prepared the food.

I took his number when I was leaving the meeting ground to my hotel. His name was Ricky Roberts. He was a good chap. He'd tell you all kinds of stories about Liberians.

'Do you know the full meaning of LIB?' he would ask me. 'Do you know the cause of the fourteen-year civil war in Liberia known as the two World Wars?' I'd look at him as though dumb just to get to know the way he pronounces his words.

'Yor getting me?' he would ask. 'Yeh I got you,' I'd reply to give me the appearance of a good listener.  I enjoyed the Liberian colloquia as it's called. He would flash out a smile as though rationing it. 'It's Lying In Big time.' I've heard other versions such as 'Lie to be here' but I kind of believed him. His appearance betrayed him for everything but a thief or a scammer.

On the several occasions we got together, we often part with me leaving him with a $20 bill. 'Eiisshh God bless yor fine girl,' he'd say. 'Please call me Robertson,' I'd always protest. Then I'd hug him. Or he'd hug me the kind that often left pains in my breast.

He would press harder pitching his chest to my breast. There was this night I'd to massage my breast with hot water when I got to the hotel. It hurt that bad. I believed he'd something inside his pocket that might have caused the damage.

I resolved to keep my distance whenever I visited or on the three occasions he visited my hotel room. The second day of the brainstorming session started early but we closed late. It ran from 7:00a.m. to 12:00a.m.

It was a marathon meeting. Attendance was huge. Each one of us had the privilege to join three separate sub-groups before the meeting came to an end. I saw the Ghanaian friend I met at the airport in the last subgroup I joined. It was the Publicity and Social media Team.

Our mandate was to fashion out a strategy to generate publicity in the lead up to the programme and how to sustain it. Members of the group were carefully selected based on their background.

I work as a PR consultant at Austin Public Relations located in Austin, US. Kwabena holds his doctorate degree in Development Communication - he told me at the Airport. The other members had varying communication background. I realised serious minds were at work. You could feel it by the contributions made by members. It was no joke.

But before we ended our group work I took count of about eight different occasions when our eyes met. I'd smile at him. He would look attentively at me as though searching for a missing item so small that he has to remain still before he could locate it.

I couldn't go to my hotel that night due to the time. He led me through the hallway into one of the rooms in the hotel.

He agreed to sleep on the floor while I get to sleep on the bed. We talked about the programme and the preparation thus far. He was apprehensive believing enough preparation had not gone into the programme considering we'd barely two days to pull off the programme where .

I did what I'm good at - giving hope where there appears to be gloom. I took two steps closer to him and whispered into his right ear: 'Things will pan out well.'
We talked until it was half past three in the morning when I made way to the bathroom to take a hot bath.

I enjoyed talking to him. He has a way of making you feel your opinion matters. On the many issues we discussed, he'd always gone quiet whenever it was my turn to talk.

Such a gentleman. I couldn't believe we'd to meet this way.

I dropped off my blue jeans, my white panty and parted with my cream tan top and hanged them by the hook in the bathroom. I stood under the shower and held the hot water switch to let out water.

'Eiisssshhh,' I said. I almost scream because the water was too hot. I reached for the sponge and the soap. I rubbed the soap on the sponge. I thought I'd closed the door to the bathroom. I washed off soap lather from my face only to lock eyes with him loathing my body.

He was looking at me intensely - the kind that betrayed his intention.

'Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa,' I let out a scream.

...to be continued.