The First Love Episode 1 – Pilot

A story By Peju Amadi
THE THEORY OF THE FIRST LOVE
The one who introduced you to everything, made you love them, loved you back and
also broke your heart.
No matter how hurt you are, you will always love them, always. They will stay with you
forever and not only will you notice it, but deep down you will compare every other
person to them and none of them will live up because they were your first love.
 
Even after months of letting go, when you finally think you are okay, they will call or
you’ll hear your song, or see a movie, or something that reminds you of how much
they meant and how much you really loved them.
 
Then you will realize you’re not as completely over them as you hoped.
.
Simi’s heart raced silently when Seye was called up to the front. From where she sat, a few
rows to the front, she had a clear and close view of him. Dressed smartly in an admiral blue
fitted two piece suit that agreed really well with his light skin tone, he looked even more good
looking than she had imagined he would now.
 
He was much taller about six feet six inches, his shoulders broad and he had bulked up in
the right places. He wasn’t the lanky, skinny teenager anymore who she had grown up with,
that was certain.
 
His once dark and full curly afro was now tamed, closely cropped at the sides with finger
length curls flopping forward in the centre. He even spotted a nicely trimmed beard and
mustache carefully shaped to fit his chiseled facial structure.
 
She remembered teasing him when they had been younger on how his looks were
effeminate because he had taken after his German mother.
 
As he turned to address the crowd of colleagues, his steely gray eyes roving through the
crowd, she decided she had been wrong, he might have taken after his mom in looks but he
was pure male.
 
“He looks like a GQ model.” David, my colleague and close friend whispered to me and my
other friend seated on my other side, Irene.
 
Irene chuckled and I couldn’t help a small smile myself. Indeed, he did. He was all grown up
now and his presence very commanding.
 
I wonder what he would think of me if we met,rather, when we met. It was only a matter of
time and I couldn’t hide from him for too long. He was here now, we would be working in the
same company and it was inevitable that we would meet eventually.
 
Did he remember? I wondered. Even though it had been ten years since we saw each other
last, it felt like yesterday to me.
 
We had been kids at the time, my parents working and living on his family’s estate. We had
forged a friendship then that had led into much more before it had ended abruptly.
 
That was then anyway, now we were both grown adults, I doubt what we were as teenagers
mattered anymore. I had even heard he was presently engaged to a Victoria’s secret model.
“You grew up in his house, Simi, were you two friends?” Dave asked me.
 
 
I had not only grown up in his house, I had spent most of my time around him. We had
attended the same secondary school, he had been two years ahead of me but that hadn’t
stopped me from hanging around him any chance I got. I’d had it bad for him, and he had
also reciprocated my feelings but that was then, ten years ago.
 
“We were not that close.” I lied smoothly. What was the point in telling them we had been
friends when he had probably forgotten my existence by now.
 
I watched him as he spoke, his voice so deep, a slight hint of an accent, his hands gesturing
as he spoke with so much conviction and his gray eyes scanning the crowd.
 
“He sure is quite good looking, I’m quite sure the ladies are mentally taking numbers, what’s
your number, Simi?” David joked
 
I turned fixing him a ‘not funny’ glare and he chuckled.
 
“He’s engaged, David.” I told him.
 
“So? Engagements can be broken.” Irene chipped in.
 
I raised a brow, ” You too, Irene?”
 
“Can you see what I am seeing, girl? This guy is smoking, I have certainly taken a number.
I’m flirting the first chance I get.”
 
“Emmm, did you forget that you are engaged?” I asked her. ” Or were you playing when you
told us this morning, you and Joel were picking wedding dates?”
 
She.smiled with a concerned frown, “I am just joking…whats wrong with you today, you are
so serious. You can’t take a simple joke.”
 
I shook my head and turned back to look up at him, only for my gaze to meet his staring
straight at me. He paused in his speech, then his lips quirked in a smile obviously meant for
me and it seemed all time stopped. In that brief moment, it was me and him, no one else and
I knew he remembered.
 
My heart did a little skip just as he broke off our eye mooching. Turning, he continued with
his speech.
 
I released the breath I hadn’t known I had held on to for that short moment, wondering if
anyone else had noticed? I didn’t have to wonder for long.
 
“Erm, was it only me, or did you guys notice he just smiled at Simi?” David asked and Irene
nodded turning to me.
 
“Simi you said you didn’t know him.” Irene accused.
 
 
“I said we were not close but he must have recognised me.” I said trying to dig an escape
route from my lie.
 
“Well, that didn’t look like a recognition smile.” Irene argued “right David?”
“It certainly did not.” He agreed. “It was a smile of unspoken promises, past, present and
future.”
 
Turning to him, I fixed him a stern stare. “Are you now a poet in your free time, David? Can
you two just get off this thing already? The guy is engaged and he isn’t even my type. So two
of you should just let me be and stop trying to fix me up with any guy you come across.”
David and Irene exchanged glances before David spoke up. “There’s something wrong with
you today Simi, normally you would be laughing at our jokes and not taking them so close to
heart.”
 
They were right. I wasn’t comfortable talking about.Seye this way, it belittled everything we
had shared but my friends didn’t know about our past. I had to find a way to act without
letting my emotions get the best of me before they would figure it out.
 
In the meantime, I wondered why Seye had looked at me that way. I hated to admit it but like
Dave had said, it had held a great deal of unspoken promises, past, present and future.