It all started with my mother.

Before I got to Covenant University, she had heard about this 5.0 CGPA student in Architecture and, somehow, decided that I needed to find him.

So when I got to school, she told me to go and look for him and ask him how he got a 5.0.

If you know me and my mum, you’d know that it was an everyday discussion and there was no saying no to the request.

The thing was, though, I had no idea who this person was. I didn’t know his name. I didn’t know what he looked like. I just knew he was the Student Council Chairman.

So one day, after my mum sent a faculty staff member to pressure me to do her bidding, I walked into the Council office with three of my friends and asked to see the Chairman.

Interestingly, I had already assumed I wasn’t going to like him, and those other council people didn’t help.

He was the Student Council Chairman, so in my head, I had imagined someone very obnoxious, serious, annoying, and maybe a little full of himself.

But when I met him, he was actually very welcoming and humble. I remember being surprised by how easy it was to talk to him, and that was something I immediately respected about him.

As I entered the office, my plan was to do my mum’s bidding and go back to say I’d done it, so I told him exactly why I was there.

“Hello, nice to meet you. My name is Favour but my friends call me Abeng. My mother sent me here. She said you have a 5.0 CGPA and I should ask you how you did it.”

And that was our first interaction.

I don’t remember his response to that. I think he was a bit taken aback by what I would love to assume was my charm. But he tried to track back and get everyone comfortable, which I’ve come to learn is a superpower of his. I do know we all bonded pretty quickly. Maybe because he was also from FA. Or maybe it was just his cool, calm and collected persona.

And I guess we just clicked because pretty soon, we became friends.

Our friendship was not the everyday one. Sometimes we’d talk once in three months. But whenever we did, we did! Relating with him was so effortless and comfortable, and there was no awkwardness.

Winner was also just one of those people who was easy to like. He was kind, charming and very personable. He was always willing to help, and I can’t count how many times I called him to help me figure out my crazy studio designs, and he would listen to all my ideas without giving me a three-hour motivational speech. (He still does.)

We’d talk, we’d see each other, we’d check in every now and then, and life just kept moving.

My friends, however, seemed to think there was something I wasn’t seeing. They would tell me they saw something. Maybe that was because one time, my friends asked me to buy food in the cafeteria while going out with Winner, and by the time we got back, they had almost died from hunger and the food was cold because we had been gisting for so long, we lost track of time.

So when I said we were just friends, they could see the future. However, I didn’t see anything.

At least, not then.

Fast forward a few years, my sister had travelled to Ghana and I needed somewhere to stay, so I asked Winner if I could stay at his family house.

We were still just friends, but I think that period gave us a chance to spend more time together and get to know each other a little better.

And from there, we just got closer.

We talked more. We spent more time together. We started sharing more of our lives with each other, and somewhere along the way, our friendship became something else.

I still can’t really say exactly when it happened. There wasn’t one big moment. We just got closer and closer until, eventually, being apart started to feel strange.

The funny thing is, by the time I realised what was happening, Winner had already become one of the people I was most comfortable with. We had already become inseparable.

He was my person.

The person I could call, talk to, laugh with, work with, and just be myself around.

Somewhere along the way, we also became partners in almost every sense of the word. We built things together, including a business, and our friendship grew into something much bigger. We became friends, all-round partners, and now, here we are.

Ten years is a long time to know someone.

We’ve grown up together. We’ve changed together. We’ve figured things out together. We’ve had good seasons, difficult seasons, crazy seasons, and everything in between.

And through all of it, the friendship has remained at the centre of everything.

But beyond the friendship, there is just so much love. I genuinely can’t imagine doing life without him anymore. He is the person I want beside me when things are good, crazy or terrible. He is the first person I want to tell whenever something major happens, the person I share my crazy ideas with, and the person I want to tell about even the most ordinary parts of my day.

Now, I know you’re probably wondering if I ever got that 5.0 CGPA.

I didn’t. However, I got the man. So either way, I still won because I have Winner. ❤️