Sunken Ships is a Zikoko weekly series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
Pamilerin* (28) and George*(28) were good friends for over five years. After their history of a good friendship, Pamilerin decided to give a romantic relationship between them a shot. What happened after surprised her.
In this Sunken Ships, she talks about their friendship, their brief relationship and how it has affected her views on love and friendship.
At what point did you realise that your relationship with George wasn’t going to work out?
Our relationship was doomed when I couldn’t recognise him anymore. He’d been in my life for over five years, but we’d only been together romantically for a few months. I knew I had to end things for my heart’s sake.
Whoa, that’s heavy. Let’s go back to how everything started.
We met at a mutual friend’s house party in 2018. We were paired up for a game, and our chemistry was amazing. At the end of the party, he took my number, and we started texting over WhatsApp. Soon, we became good friends.
How would you describe your friendship with George?
We were super close and spoke every day. He lived and schooled in Lagos while I was in Ibadan, so we didn’t see each other often. While our relationship was completely platonic, it was obvious that he had romantic feelings for me.
Did you have the same feelings?
At the time, no. I’m emotionally avoidant: relationships, love and all that complicated stuff scare me. A past relationship had been ruined by infidelity. I wasn’t willing to look at my feelings closely after that, and since he never brought it up, I was happy to enjoy our friendship.
Okay. When did things change between you?
2019. He started visiting Ibadan more often after we graduated from university, and we spent more time together. After he returned to Lagos following one of such visits, he confessed his feelings over a call and told me he wanted to take our relationship to the next level.
What was your response?
I turned him down. I told him about my issues with relationships and why I wasn’t ready to get into another one. I asked him if my refusal would affect our friendship, and he said no. So we continued being close friends.
Did he try to ask you out again after that?
Yes, multiple times. He didn’t do it as overtly as the first time. He just reminded me often that he really liked me and he wanted to be my first option if I ever wanted to try dating again. I used to laugh it off, but it was always at the back of my mind.
When did you realise you had feelings for him?
2020. During the lockdown, we went from talking to each other every other day to every single day. He was the first person I spoke to every morning and the last voice I heard at night. I started looking forward to his phone calls and messages more than usual. It took a while, but I had to admit to myself that the feelings I had for him had grown past simple friendship.
Did you tell him how you felt about him?
No, I didn’t know what to do with my feelings. I thought they would fade away if I ignored them, but instead they grew until the tension between us became too much to ignore.
What happened?
After the strict lockdown restrictions were lifted, George visited Ibadan in September. It was the first time I had seen him in person that year. We went on a picnic date to catch up. One thing led to another, and we shared our first kiss. It was then that I admitted to him that I had feelings for him.
How did he react?
He was so happy when I told him I liked him too. He kissed me again and said he was glad he’d waited for me to come around. He asked me to be his girlfriend again. This time, I said yes.
How would you describe your relationship? Was it different from when you were just friends?
It was bittersweet. It was definitely different from when we were just friends. The first two months of our relationship were amazing. It was as if we became even closer than we were before. We talked every day, had virtual dates, and we even had a weekend staycation together. I thought I had finally found the love they write about in books — you know, friends to lovers. But it didn’t take long for everything to suddenly change.
Tell me about those changes.
The first red flag was that he stopped sending me good morning messages two months into our relationship. I didn’t want to read too deeply into it. He’d gone to the village with his family for the holidays, so I told myself he was probably busy with the festivities. But when he got back to Lagos, he didn’t resume sending the messages.
Did you try to talk to him about the sudden change?
Not at first. I didn’t want to seem needy or clingy. I wanted to think we were simply exiting the honeymoon stage of our relationship for a more relaxed one. But things between us kept getting worse.
How do you mean?
He started getting too busy to speak for consecutive days. I would send him multiple messages, and on a good day, he’d reply to only one. When I’d call him, he’d claim he was busy and promise to call me back later. He never did.
I tried to return the same energy and pulled back from communicating, but it was as if he didn’t notice.
Wow, that must have hurt.
It did. I almost drove myself crazy trying to figure out why he completely switched up. I almost didn’t recognise my friend, who I had been so close to before the start of our relationship.
Did you talk to him about how you felt?
Yes, I did. At the end of January, after tolerating his laid-back attitude, I called him. I told him I was feeling alone in our relationship, and I felt he had changed towards me.
What did he say?
He brushed off my concerns. He claimed I was only feeling that way because I didn’t have a job to keep me busy. He said he had less time to talk because of the amount of work he was doing and asked me to be more patient with him.
How did you react to that?
I was surprised because he’d had a remote job since 2019, and that didn’t affect our friendship before we started dating. Regardless, I promised to be more understanding, and he promised to be more present.
Did things change for the better after that?
No. It was like there was an invisible wall I couldn’t explain between us. Things between us came to a head on Valentine’s Day.
What happened?
He didn’t speak to me at all on Valentine’s Day. I sent him several heartfelt messages, voice notes and left him missed calls, but he didn’t respond to any of them.
Ah! Did he explain why?
When I didn’t hear anything from him on the day, I stopped messaging him entirely. Valentine’s fell on a Sunday that year. He didn’t reach out to me till Tuesday.
READ ALSO: I Watched The Love Of My Life Marry Someone Else
Two whole days? That’s wild.
Exactly! He called me and apologised for missing Valentine’s Day, saying he was “busy” with “stuff” and couldn’t talk. That was his entire explanation. I tried to ask him for more information, but he didn’t say anything more. I got the ick so fast.
Omo. What did you say to that?
I told him that he could also forget he had a girlfriend because I was breaking up with him. I hung up and blocked him. I couldn’t wrap my head around him treating me like that. He, more than other people, knew how my last relationship had treated me.
I love how you stood on business. Did he ever try to reach out to you after that?
Yes, our mutual friend reached out to me the next day. He said George told him we’d fought and needed his help settling it. I told him we didn’t have a fight — I had broken up with him because of how he switched up on me after we became official.
What did your friend say?
He tried to make excuses for George’s, saying that I “didn’t know what it was like for men”. But I wasn’t willing to give him another chance to hurt me. If that was how he wanted to treat me after liking me for years, he could keep his feelings to himself.
How did you feel when you realised your relationship was over?
It was a painful realisation. I didn’t lose a romantic partner, I also lost one of my closest friends. I regretted moving our relationship past a platonic level. I wish we had just stayed friends.
Does this mean you don’t believe in the friends-to-lovers pathway?
Not anymore. I’ll never mix friendship and romance ever again. It took me such a long time to even date other people again, let alone my friends. Any friend of mine should please get comfortable in the friendzone.
Do you think you and George can get back on the same page, platonically?
No, I hated the way he treated me, and though I have forgiven him, I don’t see us ever being as close as we were before we were an item. That ship has sailed.
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