Brothers forever.

I think my story would not be complete if I didn't mention my elder brother. He lives in Oakland, California. He is my half-brother actually because my dad had him while he was enrolled as an undergraduate in the UK. Then my dad brought him back to Nigeria when he was about two, because his mum and my dad had broken up. His mum didn't want to come to Nigeria and the courts decided to give him to my dad. By the age of three, my dad had started dating my mum and shortly after that they got married. So my mum raised him. He calls my mum “Mum” - I mean my mum is the only mum he ever knew, truly in all the sense of the word. He was somebody with his own mind, despite how strict my parents were, especially my dad. By the time he was in high school he was a typical ladies man, you know, too many girlfriends, girls and all that. I think he was sexually active at a very early age and our house was always full of boys and girls, just because of him. When he wrote his matric for the first time, he failed nearly all the papers. It's not funny, but that was what happened at that time. And I was still in my first or second year in high school, and my parents especially, my dad was like, “Yeah, this is what you get when you're not serious about your studies”.

My brother was all about girls, girls, girls. And my mum would say, “Look, that's why we're telling you to forget about girls for now until you get your university degree”. Anyway, so my brother had to re-take his matric. I think on the third attempt, he finally got his papers and got admission to the university in Nigeria. He read engineering like my dad. As he had a British passport, he relocated to the United Kingdom and later settled in the US where he lives today. My brother taught me all about fashion, what to wear, how to go out, how to party... And then it got to a stage when he wanted to educate me about girls: “This is how you talk to a girl. Don't you like this girl? Go and talk to her”. I would timidly head off and attempt to speak to a girl. Sometimes I wasn’t able to say anything. Then he would ask, “What’s your problem? You're a good looking guy. This girls likes you. You should have a girl. What's Papa and Mama saying? These are old fashioned people…” The story went on like that, but he was always on about it until he left Nigeria. By time he left, I was in my final year at high school and he would say, “You still don't have a girlfriend. You're still a virgin. Wow, I can't believe this.”

Anyway, by the time I got into varsity in Nigeria, he was in the UK then. At that time there were no cell phones, so we wrote letters or called one another by landline once in a while. If I was at home and he called me during the holidays, we'd talk, but we mostly communicated by letter. It would take weeks for letters to arrive in the UK, and another three weeks for me to receive a response. In the letters, he would ask about campus life in Nigeria. He would inevitably turn to the topic of girls. “Okay, I'm sure by now you have a girlfriend?” I would  ignore that part of the letter, and answer everything else, responding with generalities.

By now, I was in a relationship with a guy. When I spoke to him of this relationship, my brother assumed I was talking about a girl, and would give all sorts of advice: “Oh, break up with her. She's not good enough for you.” Or,  “You know, girls need special treatment. But again, don't let her use you as a footman”. I kept on with the deceit, but deep down, I used to feel bad.

I recall when I was in high school, there was this musician, Cliff Richards. We were watching him perform on TV and some of my brother's friends were around. I happened to mention to everyone that I had heard this guy is gay. My brother responded with such surprise: “Really? Wow, what a pity!”. I felt so bad for Cliff and myself - I mean, as though I'm somebody to be pitied because of the way he said it. Not with acrimony or any ill feeling, but it was the way he spoke, as though Cliff was physically or mentally challenged, you know? He made it sound tragic.

By this stage, I was working – we now had cell phones, and could communicate more regularly. He always returned to the same topic: “Oh, we're going to hear wedding bells very soon, especially now that you have a job”. By the time I went for my postgraduate in the UK, we could talk quite regularly. He asked if I had a girl back in Nigeria, and I said no. Then he asked if I was gay – I was so taken aback by his question, that I immediately denied it. His response was an immediate one of care. “If you're gay, you better tell me. And if you are gay, I'll advise you. You just stay back here in the UK and make a life for yourself. You know in Nigeria, you will not be okay. You'll never be happy in Nigeria if you are gay”. Despite him repeatedly asking me, I never felt able to tell him. So when the anti-gay law was passed and I moved to South Africa, he was puzzled. It was then that I told him I was gay.

He'd known all along. “I always suspected it, you know, you were never really interested in girls. And I saw your circle of friends, and thought that something is going on here, but, you know, you are my brother. You'll always be. Being gay is not the totality of who you are. I have gay friends. I have gay colleagues who I work with, and it's nothing for you to feel bad about it. I know people might not understand. I know mom might not be able to take it, but, you know, you've got me”.

And so we've managed to sustain our relationship, that bond we always had as kids. We've kept it going, which is so reassuring. It's nice to have a family member who is in your corner and who understands you. Who does not see you differently just because of your sexual identity. He believes that family come first, brothers forever. He checks up on me regularly, and asks after my health. He keeps telling me to be careful, and that he even wishes for me to settle down, find a nice guy and get married and, you know, just be happy. “Life is short. You're not going to be here forever, you know, give yourself up, be open to all the possibilities of being in a relationship and having fun”. So for that, I'll always be grateful for him being a brother and being a pillar of support regardless, and proving that blood can be thicker than water.