The Nice Caring Guy!

He’s the dream of every young, naïve and inexperienced girl who has not yet experienced a heart break. Even the more sophisticated, experienced and mature ones still end up with him now and then. There is just this irresistible aura around him for he’s got the right courtesies and social manners. He’s ever well dressed and spots that re-assuring and disarming smile that ladies like so much. Mind you, he’s not the smooth-talking and boisterous playboy that leaves so many troubled and battered hearts in his wake. He doesn’t boast about his good looks, nor gloats about his achievements and possessions. He’s not the classic name-dropper. He’s not and never would be in a hurry to shoot his game. He’s innately trained to act the way he does. He’s the nice and caring guy; the dream of every woman.

Ask any young girl why she is in love with her boyfriend. The usual answers would include:
“He’s nice and caring!”
“He buys me gifts, brings me cards all the time”
“He takes me out to buy me stuff”
“He’s such a romantic guy”
“And he loves me for real!”

Check her out in a couple of months afterwards and her story would have gone sour and awry. He’d dumped her or rather, never wanted to go all the way with her again. He just wanted to be a nice friend and never promised her any commitment though they’d shared the most intimate of experiences together. He walked away without a care in this world.. Now he’s shifted his attention to another unsuspecting girl! Hear out what Bimbo shared with me recently. She’s such a beautiful and lovely girl that makes eyes roll whenever she enters the midst of guys. Though partly a true-life story, I have muddled up the details and names to see if I could hide the identities of the dramatis personae involved.

Bimbo entered Unilag in her late teens. She never had dreamt of having a boyfriend because of her born-again Christian background. She was an active ‘fellowship sister’ and had the trappings of one who’d rebuff the entreaties of guys. She was scared of the campus playboys especially the handsome and tall ones. Those that had the best rhymes and knew how to tell girls what they liked to hear. Pure lies or over-bloated truths that tickled a lady’s fancies. She was tough and they couldn’t get her during the “October rush” hour!She never gave them chance to ‘toast’ her and the conservative ‘fellowship brothers’ were too reticent to ask her out for a date, save those guys in the “yuppie fellowships” that abound in our campuses.

Bimbo’s room mates (Chinwe and Bimpe), though born again were more outgoing and received male visitors regularly. Guys enjoyed their company a lot, and they were quite generous as they’d not hesitate to share their food whenever their male friends’ Bayo, Chike and Emeka visited. They hung out regularly with the guys and attended most of the concerts and shows, but Bimbo was the indoor kind of girl. Though she went out often with them, she preferred staying indoors and kept her self busy, reading her books, and also her Bible. One of the guys, Chike, visited them regularly like Bayo and Emeka, but he was not the type that talked much. He would smile or chuckle each time the loud and noisy Bayo doled out his rib-cracking jokes. The girls liked Bayo so much, while Emeka stole the show for his witty remarks and obvious intelligence. All that could be said of Chike was that, ‘he’s just quiet and nice”.

Bimbo took ill along the line, and couldn’t join the group in their usual outings. It was one of those minor illnesses that lasted for about a week. She would stay back all alone in the room when her room mates were out for fellowship in the evenings or hanging out with friends. It was during this period that Chike’s value to her was burnished and appreciated. He would visit each time her room mates were away and she treasured those moments. It was as though he intuitively knew whenever they’d left Bimbo all alone in the room. He would run the minutest errand for her. He would help her buy her medication from the pharmacy, got her meals at the café and sat beside her in her ‘time of need’.

With time, Bimbo began to treasure his company so much and looked forward to his visits. Those lonely moments with Chike to her were more treasured than the company of her room mates. No sooner, her emotions got a hold of her heart. She began to have a crush on him which she couldn’t suppress easily. They would hold hands each time she escorted him out of her hostel. Before parting, he would look deep into her eyes and give her a gentle and tender squeeze with his hands. He was stirring something in her being which she had held under check before every other guy in campus or at home. She was just emotionally- helpless before Chike, and he was glad with turn of events. She never saw the need to share her transformation with her room mates who remarked that
“Bimbo has so much changed!” She had fallen in love but denied the obvious signs!

Chike came one of those evenings when she was all alone. She had sent him a text that she was all alone in the room. Unlike when she voraciously read novels during times of aloneness, Chike’s company had replaced the place of novels in her life. He talked tenderly to her, and made her feel ‘loved’ for the very first time. He became her reading partner and would escort her from the classrooms back to the hostel at night. Each time they parted and in the cover of darkness, he would look deep into her eyes before giving her an “innocent peck” or just a hand squeeze! Before long, Bimbo lost her senses and began to dream about Chike, night and day. She had fallen in love with a guy who had never asked her out. She had concluded in her heart that they’re already in a relationship for he’s been ‘nice and caring’ to her!

When the scales fell off her eyes, Chike had made a mess of her Christian ideals. She had given away her innocence and naivety just before the visits stopped and the flow of gifts ebbed. She was devastated and lived with the horror of that experience through out her stay on campus. Chike however, moved on with life and never showed any remorse. How else would a lady pay back for all the unsolicited kindness to her! He left many other girls heartbroken in his wake long before he graduated from campus. Yet he still remained that “nice and caring” guy that everyone knew him to have always been. He fitted that utopian ideal which has helped to nurture and deploy that trait of being ‘nice and caring’ to every girl that his radar falls on. When he’s done with each of his victims, they end up realizing that he was not really ‘nice and caring’ after all. He had only served to tease their fantasies and nothing more. He ended up hurting them when they lowered their guards at the onslaught of his ‘nice and caring’ but emotionally- lethal arsenal. But are all nice and caring guys dangerous after all?