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Have you ever noticed that people only ever present to you the side of themselves they want you to see? That within a multifaceted personality, it's hard to truly see everything about a person?

What happens when you find out that the man you thought you knew has lied about every aspect of his life. That what you see is not what is presented to others?

Now picture this: girl meets guy and guy paints a beautiful picture of who he is, says he's qualified and educated, single, childless and mature? Damn ladies, is that resistible? I think not. Time goes by and you're almost inseparable; there's nothing you don't know about your man. This is it- you've found your one. This is love.

As time passes, things start to seem odd. You don't look at him in the same way. Something is up and your womanly intuition is telling you not to trust this man so implicitly, especially since you fell for him so quickly. So you do what any sensible person does in this situation and ask questions.....

They say if something looks too good to be true- it usually is. So, when Kaya* found out the man she'd known for a year and a half was a fraud, this phrase held even more resonance than ever before.

They had met in her local neighborhood whilst she was taking a stroll one afternoon. She recalls seeing him before and always thinking he was “kinda cute” so when he spoke to her she was quite comfortable conversing with this recognizable character.

They went out on a few occasions and eventually she trusts him enough to introduce him to the other man in her life… her son.

A couple of months have passed by now, and things appear to be o.k. "Appear" is the key word here though. Anomalies have begun to show in his stories and behaviors. For example, imagine this:  You and your man are asleep, (his habit is to sleep with his phone under his pillow), he gets up in the middle of the night to use the toilet. You turn over and stretch out into the recess, only to discover he has taken the phone to the toilet with him. Now ladies, since this man is not a fireman or an on-call doctor, it begs the question why the phone would need to accompany him to the toilet….

A year and 2 months have passed. The relationship is dead; it was 7 months ago in-fact when she had made the startling discoveries. Pretty much most of what he has told her was fallacy. From his age (went from 26 to 31 in three months flat) which at the time she thought wasn’t too much of a big deal, “a lot of people lie about their age… don’t they?”. Then there was his name. Yes folks, he lied about his name, I don’t even remember the excuse she said he used. What I do recall is that I was in a state of hysterics by the time she had finished telling me. No folks, this isn't funny, but, trust me, laughter was the only thing that stopped us looking  for that brother and cussing him out.

It was a chance meeting with the other element of our sistren circle which drove the final nail in the coffin, so to speak. We had got on a bus, traveling to meet Kaya for a girlie night out when we got stuck in traffic- due to one of London’s regular roadwork obstructions. We were busy chatting when I looked out of the window. “isnt that….” I asked. “Erm yes” she replied “so why the hell is he pushing a stroller???? And who is the chick he’s with??”

He’d gone too far this time. We phoned … expecting all hell to break loose, but  instead were met with calm resignation. “I know, he confessed all 2 days ago.” Turns out in a last ditch attempt to win her back, he had finally decided that honesty was maybe the best policy. Out came the reasoning behind the fake name and age, out came the whole truth regarding his last ex, their breakup, and then out came the truth about their child. A child he had denied for a year. Whilst he was putting his truth and business all out in the open, Kaya had proceeded to open the door, and once he was on the other side of it... closed it in his face.

Ladies beware of faces.

Onyx Knight